Moves to lay off up to 90 at Shannon airport

A move by the Shannon Airport Authority (SAA) to begin laying off up to 90 contract workers at the airport was yesterday described as "provocative in the extreme" by a senior Siptu official.

As part of cost-cutting at Shannon airport, the SAA yesterday wrote to 23 temporary catering staff employed in the airport's kitchens, bars and restaurants telling them that their contracts will not be renewed from March 23rd. It is the first stage of the cutbacks at Shannon after the rejection by unions last month of a €35 million "survival plan" .

In a letter to staff earlier this week, executive chairman of the SAA, Pat Shanahan, said that "all areas of the cost base will be reviewed, including recruitment, overtime, temporary contracts, redeployment and efficiency of organisational structures".

It is likely the remaining jobs of the 90 temporary staff will be phased out over the coming months. Siptu is to hold a general meeting of catering staff at Shannon today.

An exit from catering was one of the main aims of the €35 million plan and Siptu national industrial secretary Michael Halpenny said the move by the SAA to issue the letters "is provocative in the extreme".

"We are calling on the management at Shannon to re-enter talks at the Labour Relations Commission (LRC) and rescind the notices issued to the staff."

"We are willing to resolve the issues at the LRC with management and the matter can be referred to the Labour Court. I think we are being very fair and reasonable," he said.

There are 443 permanent staff at Shannon and SAA sources were indicating last night that the authority would only return to talks at the LRC "if there is acceptance from the unions that savings of up to €10 million per annum have to be achieved. Then, only genuine and engagement can take place".

However, Mr Halpenny said last night: "The authority is asking us to believe that everything they say is gospel. Well, the world doesn't work like that. It is as if the Dublin Airport Authority (DAA) suddenly realised that there is something wrong at Shannon and tried to cure it all in one way. That doesn't work."

Mr Halpenny also stated that comparing the cost-base of Shannon to UK airports "is fatuous nonsense" as Shannon would have a very different mix of business with a sizeable amount of US traffic which entails higher costs.

Earlier this week, Mr Shanahan said that the airport would have made a loss last year only for the airport's military traffic and that the airport recorded an operating loss in January.

He said Shannon airport will not survive "if we just talk and there is no action".

Mr Shanahan also stated that "without Ryanair, we would be in much bigger trouble".

Mr Shanahan said any inference from Siptu "that Shannon is propping up Ryanair is totally off the wall".

"If Ryanair adds a net contribution of €8 million to €10 million per annum to Shannon airport, if it didn't have that €8 million to €10 million, instead of trying to reduce the cost base by €10 million, we would be trying to reduce it by €20 million."

"Ryanair has been a major boost to Shannon and a major boost to the region and certainly, it is a red herring to suggest the only reason we are trying to reduce costs is because we happen to have low-cost airlines."

Mr Shanahan said the cost per passenger at Shannon is twice that of Dublin and that "Cork and Knock are beginning to move ahead competitively and leave Shannon in the ha'penny place, and we need to address that issue".