Ross Sheil, Staff Reporter
AIR JAMAICA is to make 40 of its 220 pilots redundant in the next two months. Making the announcement yesterday, Executive Chairman, Dr. Vincent Lawrence, said the airline needed fewer pilots since it had cut four routes Manchester, Antigua, Houston and London to Havana. The national carrier has also reduced the frequency of flights on some routes.
LETTERS SERVED
Redundancy letters were served yesterday to 23 staff and 17 contract pilots, representing 18 per cent of the full complement. This follows January's announcement of 200 redundancies in other staffing areas, including 100 flight attendants, as part of the company's restructuring and cost-cutting exercise.
The series of redundancies are part of Government's efforts to make the airline profitable after reacquiring it in December 2004.
Dr. Lawrence announced in January this year that pilots would also be made redundant and since then, negotiations with the Jamaica Airline Pilots Association (JALPA) had failed to reach an agreement.
He said the redundancies and packages being offered to the pilots were in accordance with the existing labour agreement with JALPA. Air Jamaica said contracts were terminated on the 'last in, first out' principle.
However, JALPA President, Captain Ludlow Beckford, insisted pilots had, "consistently and without hesitation, acceded to Air Jamaica's requests to go above and beyond our contractual obligations." He said the pilots had offered concessions of US$12.5 million, including a 12 per cent salary cut. Captain Beckford said concessions to the airline amounted to 29.5 per cent in salary and benefits.
But a source close to the negotiations on the Air Jamaica side countered JALPA's account: "All that they were willing to give us was a 5.5 per cent cut in basic salary. All the work rule concessions that they made would be for a year only and they would return to their current level after a year. Given the problems that were faced by management they were unable to accept that."
Meantime, Air Jamaica Communications Director, Sandrea Falconer told The Gleaner: "I hope that good sense will prevail and that the pilots will not take strike action because today's decision was taken to preserve the national airline."
The airline had reportedly tried to negotiate a maximum annual pilot salary of $8.37 million (US$135,000). Some pilots get more than $14 million (US$200,000), making them among the best paid in the industry.
Air Jamaica board said it was completing its assessment and restructuring plan and expects to recommend a new overall structure and strategy to government shortly.
