More Ryanair pilots to strike next week
Nearly 200 Ryanair pilots based in Ireland, who are members of the Irish Air Line Pilots’ Association (IALPA), are to strike for 48 hours next week.
IALPA served notice on the airline last night, confirming the dates of August 22 and 23 and saying it would give notification of further strike days in due course.
British pilots employed by Ryanair are also due to walk out on August 22 and 23 and have also set three dates in September.
BALPA today called on Ryanair management to meet for conciliation talks at ACAS.
General secretary Brian Strutton said: "Our members’ experience of trying to negotiate directly with Ryanair management has not been good. However, BALPA is offering to hold talks under the auspices of ACAS to try to resolve this dispute and avoid the need for strike action. If Ryanair cares about its customers they should join us."
Pilots are in dispute with Ryanair over pay and conditions.
Ryanair dismissed the Irish pilots’ pay proposals as ‘unrealistic and unimplementable’, and argued they amount to a 101% pay increase.
The airline also criticised the timing of the industrial action.
"Ryanair Pilots are insisting on these pay demands being met, just one day after Norwegian announced the closure of its Dublin operations with the loss of over 120 crew jobs, despite the fact that Ryanair has a surplus of over 500 pilots due to the delayed delivery of over 30 MAX aircraft this winter, and just 10 weeks before a ‘no-deal’ Brexit could cause further disruption to air travel and airline jobs in Ireland and the UK", it said in a statement.
Chief people officer Eddie Wilson said Ryanair pilots would ‘earn more than the President of Ireland or our Taoiseach’.
"We have done everything in our power to avoid disruption to our flights and our customers’ holidays," he said.
"However, no company can concede to grossly unreasonable demands from its highest paid workers for a further pay increase of over 100% (when they already agreed and received a 20% pay increase earlier this year) at a time when the airline industry is in crisis.
"We remain willing to engage in Mediation with our pilots and Forsa but call on them to avoid disrupting our customers’ travel plans in pursuit of what are clearly unrealistic and unimplementable pay proposals."
IALPA said the action would only be called off if Ryanair offered ‘a substantive counter proposal’ which ‘properly addressed all areas of the IALPA claim’.
Meanwhile cabin crew in Spain have announced plans for 10 days of strikes in September unless Ryanair changes its mind to close several bases in the country.
Cabin crew in Portugal are also due to strike for five days from August 21 in a dispute over leave.
Bev
Editor in chief Bev Fearis has been a travel journalist for 25 years. She started her career at Travel Weekly, where she became deputy news editor, before joining Business Traveller as deputy editor and launching the magazine’s website. She has also written travel features, news and expert comment for the Guardian, Observer, Times, Telegraph, Boundless and other consumer titles and was named one of the top 50 UK travel journalists by the Press Gazette.
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