Aer Lingus shareholders approve €191m payment to new pension fund

Barr y O’Halloran

Aer Lingus shareholders have voted overwhelmingly in favour of the airline's plan to make a once-off €191 million payment to a new pension scheme as part of the proposals to deal with the €750 million hole in the existing fund.

A poll on the proposal returned 421 million shares for and 1.9 million against, leaving the way clear for the company to pay the €191 million to the new scheme and moving it substantially closer to ending the four-year old row over the insolvent Irish Airlines’ Staff Superannuation (IASS) fund.

The numbers indicate that the holders of close to 80 per cent of the company’s shares voted, while the margin of the vote itself was 99.55 per cent in favour and 0.45 against.

Aer Lingus and Dublin Airport Authority jointly operate the IASS, which has an estimated €750 million deficit. Part of the proposals for tackling the problem involve transferring staff to a new defined benefit scheme, to which both companies will contribute lump sums totalling €263 million.

The Aer Lingus shareholders' vote followed a stormy meeting at the Dublin Airport Radisson, which was nearly disrupted by protesting retired workers, who at one point surrounded part of the conference room in which it was held and banged on the windows.

A number of former staff attending the meeting itself also expressed their anger to Aer Lingus chairman, Colm Barrington, and claimed the scheme's trustees had refused to deal with them while the company's management were ignoring their plight.

They say that they are facing the loss of up to six weeks income a-year under the plan to restructure the insolvent scheme.

The pensioners have hired a legal team and are considering going to court. Leaving the meeting, retired Aer Lingus worker, Vincent McCabe, said “we will go to court if we have to go to court”.

Speaking afterwards, Mr Barrington said that Aer Lingus had honoured all its obligations.

“We have got to get the situation resolved and get industrial peace,” he added, referring to the strikes and other unrest that have been a feature of the pension dispute.