Lockout at Aer Lingus

Things seem set to worsen before they get better at Aer Lingus. Quidnunc is informed that the human resources department has bought a copy of Lockout: Dublin 1913 for its library. Written by Quidnunc's colleague, Padraig Yeates, it details the events of Ireland's biggest industrial dispute. It began on the trams, lasted five months and left 100,000 people on the breadline. Lockout has had a large readership among IMPACT members and while there were no commercial aircraft around in 1913, many of the other fundamentals of industrial relations seem amazingly similar - for all the talk of social partnership. It won't be long before the LUAS project is completed and trams are back on the streets. Then, given the persistently bad industrial relations climate at Aer Lingus, anything could happen.