STAFF AT the Dublin Airport Authority (DAA) police and fire service have voted overwhelmingly for industrial action in a row over alleged breaches of agreements governing working conditions.
Siptu, which represents the staff concerned, said the dispute centred on failures by the DAA to maintain staffing numbers in line with the terms of the agreement.
Siptu sectoral organiser Dermot O'Loughlin said there were not adequate numbers of fire and police personnel to cover the operational safety and security of Dublin airport. The union maintained pay scales for fire and police personnel at the DAA were lagging behind gardaí and members of the Dublin Fire Brigade.
Siptu also said the terms of voluntary packages on which a number of staff left the company were less than those set out in an agreement. The union maintained the company was now seeking to make changes to the rosters for sergeants in the airport police service.
"It is quite obvious that the members of the airport police/fire service are deeply annoyed and frustrated. They quite simply have had enough," Mr O'Loughlin said.
He said that 92 per cent of the DAA's police and fire service had voted to take industrial action.
The DAA said there was no basis for a Siptu ballot for industrial action, "and absolutely no basis for raising needless concerns amongst passengers about possible disruption to airport operations".
The authority said it had sought to put in place appropriate structures at the airport in response to the increasing range of security requirements it had to implement and to manage growing passenger numbers. It said this had resulted in the creation of more than 20 new promotional positions within the airport police and the airport passenger security units.
The DAA said Siptu had opposed the creation of these promotional posts earlier this year and the matter had been referred to the Labour Relations Commission (LRC). "In a recommendation of last March, agreed by both DAA and Siptu, the LRC recommended the new positions should be boarded and filled, and that if any further issues were to emerge from this process, including rostering issues, they should be referred back to the LRC."
"The DAA has since appointed people to the new positions, all of whom are members of either the airport police or airport passenger security units and the new arrangements are due to commence next week," it stated.