This article is from page 14 of the 2006-04-18 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 14 JPG
AER LINGUS workers have been urged to join forces with fellow SIPTU members in the Great Southern Hotel chain, to take industrial action against the privatisation of the airline.
A member of Fingal Council, the local authority which has Dublin airport in its area, has called for escalating industrial action.
The call for SIPTU members working for Aer Lingus to take action would also affect members of the union working at Shannon Airport.
Councillor Clare Daly (SWP) said that the “privatisation of Aer Lingus is totally unjustified. It represents a threat to reasonable wages and conditions. We could face an Irish Ferries style situation once multinational speculators move in.”
Cllr Daly said she was “urging my union, SIPTU, to immediately convene a major conference of workers from both Aer LIngus and the Great Southern Hotels group, to draw up a serious campaign of escalating industrial action to stop this neoliberal Government, implementing privatisation policies for which it has no mandate.”
The call comes after SIPTU airport members, voted recently on a mandate for industrial action, should the management try to force rationalisation measures through.
The industrial unrest comes at a time when Shannon is reporting a 22 per cent increase on the number of passengers travelling when compared to the Easter Bank Holiday of last year.
Overall figures for the year show that passenger traffic at the Clare airport has grown by 38 per cent.
Despite the strong results, the directors of the Dublin Airport Authority have said that the break-up of the three airports will not take place for some time and probably not for at least a year.
The Authority will need about €300 million of distributable reserves before the break-up can go ahead.
At present, reserves stand at just €141 million.
DAA Chairman, Gary McGann, said that giving Cork Airport a debt-free status in future, as was suggested, could make the break-up even harder to achieve. He said he supported the new terminal at Cork, which is due to open shortly, but the question was finances.