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Aer Lingus turbulence more complex than pilots’ claim for a ‘few million euro’

Rhetoric between two sides has become more bitter, but there may yet be a resolution

Aer Lingus has cancelled 270 flights so far amid a pay row with pilots. Photograph: Artur Widak/PA Wire

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Barry O'Halloran
Fri Jun 28 2024 - 06:00

Any hopes of a deal in the long-running Aer Lingus pilots’ pay row ended on Thursday afternoon with the breakdown of talks that had begun that morning in a Dublin Airport hotel. Each side blamed the other as it became clear that five hours of discussions had failed to bridge the gap between the pair.

Members of the Irish Airline Pilots’ Association (Ialpa), a branch of trade union Fórsa, at the carrier began a work to rule on Wednesday, forcing Aer Lingus to cancel hundreds of flights and disrupt tens of thousands of passengers, into next week. The union also plans an eight-hour strike on Saturday morning.

Its president, Capt Mark Tighe, acknowledged this week that the dispute boils down to one thing: money. Ialpa began seeking a 23.88 per cent pay increase for its members, or 27 per cent according to some calculations, although it decided to moderate before entering the talks on Thursday.

The organisation says this will compensate them for soaring inflation since 2019, when the airline last boosted their pay. It will also bring them into line with equivalent European carriers, including British Airways, part of International Airlines Group (IAG), along with Aer Lingus.

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In fact, Capt Tighe argues that his members are not seeking as much as pilots in other carriers, who have won increases “above and beyond” cost-of-living increases. Instead, they are trying to insulate their salaries from the worst impact of recent inflation. “We are just looking to protect our pay,” he said following a Labour Court meeting on Tuesday.

The union frequently highlights the €225 million profits that Aer Lingus earned last year. Ialpa calculates that pilots’ demands will cost just “a few million euro”.

Aer Lingus branded the claim “exorbitant” and “untenable”. The company maintains that pilots’ pay has risen 23 per cent since 2019, on the back of increments built into its salary scales. It argues that any increase above 12.25 per cent agreed with other airline staff, including cabin crew, represented by Fórsa, must be tied to extra productivity.

Pilots are well paid, not least because they are responsible for hundreds of passengers’ safety when they are doing their job. Aer Lingus pilots’ salaries quickly became a talking point when the company published pay scales as the dispute headed for boiling point.

They included figures showing that the increase sought by the union would boost some long-haul captains’ pay by almost €50,000 a year to a total €347,000 annually, when all allowances are included. Ialpa countered this by pointing out that entry-level pilots get a basic of €42,000.

Aer Lingus’s own figures actually paint a complex picture of its pay scales, with 26 different points, including long-service and other increments. Those begin at about €60,000 for a co-pilot and end with a maximum pensionable salary of €207,000 for a senior captain and almost €145,000 for a co-pilot.

Ialpa points out that a cadet starts at €36,000, rising to €42,000 over three years, against an average industrial wage that the Central Statistics Office calculates was €50,400 during the first three months of this year. The union adds that cumulative public sector pay rises from 2020 to next year will top 21.6 per cent.

At the same time, Ialpa maintains that by 2026, British Airways pilots’ pay will have increased 30.6 per cent, and at Lufthansa by 34.4 per cent, EasyJet by 36.2 per cent and Air France by 24 per cent.

Ialpa points out that a cadet starts at €36,000, rising to €42,000 over three years, against an average industrial wage that the Central Statistics Office calculates was €50,400 during the first three months of this year.

Ialpa argues that even Norwegian, which three years ago sought the High Court’s protection from creditors while it put together a rescue plan, will have increased pilots’ pay 17.15 per cent by 2026. The Scandinavian carrier has also added new points to its salary scale, effectively boosting salaries by 26 per cent for anyone with more than 16 years’ experience.

Aer Lingus says its profits still trail what it made before Covid, while its 9.9 per cent operating margin is the lowest of IAG’s four airlines. Aviation consultant, Enda Corneille, himself a former Aer Lingus executive, calls that margin very healthy. “Anything over 10 per cent and you’re a rock star in aviation terms,” he observes.

However, he notes that Aer Lingus does not want to commit itself to a high pay increase as it will be stuck with the cost should profits start falling, which Corneille argues is inevitable in air travel. “Every five to seven years something happens to wipe out airline profits,” he says.

Ialpa members in Aer Lingus began a work to rule on Wednesday. This means only working to published rosters, with no overtime or out-of-hours duties, not accepting changes to rosters or taking managers’ calls to request they do any of these things in the first place. On Saturday they will strike from 5am to 1pm

The logistical headaches from both actions, taken during the airline’s busiest period, would have caused “inevitable” cancellations and disruptions, according to management. Aer Lingus anticipated this by cancelling 270 flights over the week from Wednesday to next Tuesday, July 3rd. That total includes services it axed after pilots served notice of this Saturday’s strike, which runs from 5am to 1pm, and 50 services over Monday and Tuesday of next week.

Industrial action at Aer Lingus: How will it impact passengers?

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Donal Moriarty, Aer Lingus chief corporate affairs officer, insists that the cancellations will protect as many services as possible through the work to rule. Pilots sticking rigidly to their rosters leaves the company without the flexibility needed to operate its full summer schedule.

Corneille reckons that a work to rule is harder to contain than a strike. “It’s very difficult for the airline to predict where the pinch points will come,” he says. He points out that the last time Aer Lingus faced such a prospect, 22 years ago, it shut down for five days.

So, the focused cancellations are a less extreme response. By Thursday morning, they appeared to have done their job, with Aer Lingus avoiding having to cut flights at the last minute. Of the 35,000 passengers hit by the cancellations that run until Sunday, most took alternatives offered by the airline within 48 hours of their original departure, or changed their own travel plans.

But managing that gets harder with time as the need for roster changes builds up over the weeks as the airline deals with commonplace disruptions, Moriarty admits. Consequently, Aer Lingus cannot guarantee that the steps it has taken will prevent last-minute upsets for passengers.

The row has been building since Ialpa lodged its pay claim in October 2022. Signs of tension between the sides bubbled to the surface last September, when Adrian Dunne, Aer Lingus chief operations officer, wrote to Fórsa/Ialpa highlighting increased instances of pilots refusing requests to work out of hours for illness or other reasons.

Aer Lingus cancelled 13 transatlantic flights and rerouted one European service, costing it €2 million. Dunne’s letter pointed out that one pilot had responded “sort the pay” when asked to work out of hours. The executive suggested that the trend constituted unofficial industrial action. Katie Morgan, Fórsa national secretary, flatly rejected this, saying the union had not sanctioned any such thing and offering to meet to discuss the issue.

Then in January, Ialpa confirmed that pilots had overwhelmingly rejected a company pay tribunal offer of 8.5 per cent. According to the management, this was worth 12.25 per cent when flexibility on summer leave, agreed in 2019, was factored in. Cabin crew and other groups had already accepted pay rises at this level after going through the same process.

Subsequent talks between the pilots and company went nowhere. In February, Aer Lingus opted to take the issue to the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC), part of the State’s system for resolving industrial disputes, but this failed to produce a resolution. Further meetings between the two sides followed in early April before they went to the Labour Court, the last stage of the State system, in the final week of that month.

Within about three weeks the court recommended that pilots accept increases totalling 9.25 per cent as an interim measure and that the sides return to the WRC to deal with several deadlocked issues, including the cost of the summer leave flexibility agreed in 2019. They could then ask the court in August to make final recommendations on any remaining unresolved issues.

That would have pushed final resolution to the end of the crucial summer months. Aer Lingus quickly accepted the deal, but pilots voted almost unanimously against it. With every avenue exhausted, they began balloting on industrial action early this month. A digital vote produced a quick, overwhelming, result in favour.

After Ialpa served notice of Saturday’s eight-hour strike, the rhetoric became increasingly bitter. The union claimed the company was threatening and antagonising members while management accused pilots of greed and blackmail.

However, Aer Lingus queried whether this was valid under industrial relations law, which requires a secret ballot on strike or other action. Ialpa said it was legal, but rather than spend weeks arguing the issue through the courts, organised a traditional vote with ballot boxes and papers at its bases around the Republic. That took three days to generate an even more resounding vote for industrial action, up to and including strike. Of 668 pilots who voted, just six opposed the motion while two spoiled their ballots.

Observers say the airline’s challenge to the first vote hardened attitudes among pilots. But that hardening was not limited to one side. After Ialpa served notice of Saturday’s eight-hour strike, the rhetoric became increasingly bitter. The union claimed the company was threatening and antagonising members while management accused pilots of greed and blackmail.

Against that background, the Labour Court asked the pair to attend separate meetings on Tuesday, prompting Taoiseach Simon Harris among others to voice hopes of a breakthrough. This failed to materialise. Instead, the court told each that it would not aid them in resolving the row at this time, and would review the position in July.

On Wednesday, with the work to rule under way, Ialpa accepted an Aer Lingus offer to meet on Thursday morning. This revived breakthrough hopes, but the rift between the sides has left most observers cautious about the prospect of a quick resolution.

One sticking point for Ialpa is management’s insistence on only discussing any pay increase for pilots beyond the 12.25 per cent agreed with ground and cabin crews on grounds of extra productivity and flexibility. The airline does not have much choice. If it agrees to give pilots a bigger boost than their colleagues, without tying it to some extra productivity, that could trigger further pay claims.

That is because ground and cabin crews’ agreements allow them to revisit these deals if management gives any other group in the company an “unfunded” increase greater than 12.25 per cent. “Unfunded” in this case means without extra productivity.

So those organisations are watching developments carefully. Even without this clause, Corneille argues that giving pilots increases over and above whatever those workers are getting opens the door to further claims. “The company is all too aware of the potential knock-on effect on other staff groups,” he says.

Corneille believes that the sides will eventually thrash out a solution, simply because they must. They could yet need a third party to step in, and he believes it will involve productivity, in some form. Whatever the solution involves, the key question for holiday makers anxiously scanning travel updates is when will it arrive? So far, no one can answer that.

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