Aer Lingus ‘spend €400k a day hiring planes and crew’

THE union representing cabin crew involved in an industrial dispute with Aer Lingus have claimed the airline is spending €400,000 per day on leasing aircraft and crew from other airlines.

The IMPACT trade union described this “wet leasing” as “unnecessary” and warned that if the airline decide to hire aircraft and crew for transatlantic flights, the final costs to the airline would cost up to €250,000 per round trip.

According to an IMPACT spokesman, it costs approximately €40,000 to hire an airplane and crew for a European round trip and over €250,000 for a transatlantic return trip. It’s believed up to 10 aircraft per day are being hired.

Last night an Aer Lingus spokesman refused to discuss their operating costs, saying that would be a matter for their shareholders.

The airline said the short-term leases will enable the airline to operate a full schedule “on an ongoing basis if necessary”.

The move came after Aer Lingus was forced to ground 2,700 passengers on 34 flights to and from 17 European destinations due to the dispute with its cabin crew in which staff are refusing to work new rosters introduced by the airline last Monday.

The company says it has written to 140 members of staff, who have already been taken off the payroll, offering them a second chance to comply with new rosters.

IMPACT also accused the airline of “wasting money” by having to refund passengers for cancelled flights, by leaving their own airplanes and pilots idle and by hiring external staff to conduct disciplinary hearing against Aer Lingus crew

“The cost of management’s actions are completely disproportionate to the issues that remain in dispute — just 20 flying hours a year, or less than half-an-hour a week. We are challenging management to come clean and release verified figures on how much money it is wasting and the extent to which this will damage the bottom line when the next quarterly and annual figures are published.”