Aer Lingus has said it has written to pilots today to request meaningful direct discussions to seek a resolution to the ongoing dispute over pay.
It comes after the airline yesterday confirmed that at least 244 flights are now cancelled for next week from Wednesday to Sunday due to industrial action being taken by the Irish Airline Pilots’ Association (IALPA).
Next Saturday alone 120 flights have been cancelled, because of eight hours of strike action by pilots, which will impact 15,000 passengers.
In a statement, the airline said this afternoon it has repeatedly sought to engage directly with IALPA on ways to increase pilot pay beyond the 12.25% increase agreed with all other collectively bargained groups, based upon reaching agreement on improvements in productivity and flexibility.
It said IALPA has to date refused to enter into those meaningful discussions, and it ended the most recent direct discussions with the company on Monday 17 June.
The airline said it has also asked IALPA and the Forsa trade union to re-engage with the industrial relations machinery of the State – the Labour Court and the Workplace Relations Commission – but at this point they have rejected this request.
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President of IALPA Mark Tighe has said pilots are looking “to retain” their previous pay, not improve it.
Mr Tighe said the pay claim of 24% “is to do with the inflation over the period of time. It’s an accumulative increase,” he said.
“This figure should have been paid … over the period of time in 1%, 2% and 3%, accumulating to deal with inflation,” he added.
Regarding the escalation in industrial action by the union, Mr Tighe said: “The company had become very aggressive over the last week.”
Speaking on RTÉ’s This Week, Mr Tighe said that the airline had “set up a pilot sickness review committee which is not in our agreements, so they are contacting each individual pilot who they believe is excessively sick”.
He described this as an “outright attack” and “designed to intimidate”.
“Pilot sickness is a significant legal thing because a pilot, obvioulsy by law, cannot be in control of an aircraft when they are sick,” he said.
Mr Tighe said that claims of fake illness are “uttely baseless and false”.
He added that Aer Lingus had ” threatened to cancel our working conditions”, adding that the airline had also “individually written to member pilots yesterday, where they accused them of breaching the company’s social media protocol”.
The IALPA president noted that “top excutive management” at Aer Lingus between 2019 and 2023 had “their pay increased by 66%”.
“We’re just looking for inflation,” he added.
Mr Tighe said that claims by Aer Lingus that it had repeatedly sought to enage with the union were “not accurate.
“We met them last on Monday and we’ve asked repeatedly since then to meet them, most recently the 21st and yesterday the 22nd,” he said.
“The impasse clearly sits with Aer Lingus,” he said.
Regarding the possibility of all-out strike action, Mr Tighe said that was “certainly a possibility”. However, he said that “it’s not being discussed at this moment in time”, adding that there is a “possibility that the company may take drastic action”.
Mr Tighe said that the union “absolutely” has the support of its members in relation to this dispute.
“In fact, our cabin crew union representatives wrote to the Association and expressed their clear support for us”.
He said that the union “are not and do not want to affect our passengers and Irish businesses”.
