High Court ruling on airport strike due today

With less than 48 hours to go until strikes could bring the country’s main airports grinding to a halt, tens of thousands of intending passengers will only find out this afternoon whether an attempt to legally prevent the Siptu action has been successful.

At the High Court yesterday, Dublin Airport Authority and Ryanair — which have both sought an injunction against Friday’s four-hour stoppage — outlined the “havoc” and “maximum disruption” the strike over airport and airline workers’ pension shortfall would cause.

However, one airline representative said that, even before the court decides this afternoon whether to grant the injunction, much of the damage has been done.

During yesterday’s High Court hearing, the DAA, which runs Dublin and Cork airports, said losses could run into millions and spoke of the irreparable damage that would be done.

Mark Connaughton, for the DAA, said it was his client’s case the proposed strike was illegal because it did not arise out of a valid trade dispute. He said the dispute was essentially one with the pension scheme trustee. He also said the ballot of Siptu workers was “flawed”, as the union had not complied with its own rules.

Ryanair told the High Court 93 of its flights and 13,500 passengers would be affected by the action and its knock-on effect on schedules.

Martin Hayden, for Ryanair, said the airline was “caught in the crossfire” of a dispute involving other parties. The airline accused Siptu of abandoning the State’s industrial relations mechanisms and reverting to “Victorian-era tactics”.

However Siptu, represented by Richard Kean, said the stoppage arises out of “a bona fida trade dispute” concerning the pension rights of workers.

The union also accused Ryanair of escalating tensions by “landing on the back of the DAA’s proceedings”. It said the airline had no locus standi to seek the injunctions and its application was “utterly misconceived”.

Mr Justice Paul Gilligan said he wanted to give the matter “some thought” and would give his ruling this afternoon.

Yesterday’s injunction did not involve Aer Lingus even though its staff are in the same pension scheme — the Irish Airlines Superannuation Scheme — as the workers from the DAA. The IASS is almost €800m in deficit and three years of talks have failed to address how that shortfall should be addressed.

Yesterday, an Aer Lingus spokesman said whether DAA and Ryanair “win, lose, or draw” the High Court case, it is too late to reconfigure schedules.

“The damage has been done to Aer Lingus and its customers at this point,” he said. “Any lifting of the strike threat will be too late. We cannot add further confusion to our travel plans.”

He said a “significant” number of customers had cancelled their flight and sought a refund or moved their flights to another date. Last week, Aer Lingus cancelled the flights of 3,000 passengers for Friday.

It said it hoped some could be accommodated on alternative flights. The airline also hired in aircraft which would be put into action alongside the delayed planes on its busiest routes, to catch up on the schedule.