Ryanair pilot claims unfair dismissal over flight schedule

A FORMER Ryanair captain has claimed he was unfairly dismissed following his refusal to complete a schedule of flights because his 12-hour flying limit might be exceeded.

Ryanair has rejected his claim and said he was dismissed because of "gross misconduct" when he failed to comply with instructions.

The case taken by Danish pilot Paul Christiansen opened at the Employment Appeals Tribunal in Dublin yesterday.

The tribunal heard that he received a contract of employment with the company in November 2004. He was dismissed last December.

The dispute between Mr Christiansen and his employers began on October 30th, 2007. He had been rostered for four flights, beginning at Skavsta, Sweden, continuing to Paris Beauvais, back to Skavsta, on to Basle and returning to Skavsta. This would have taken about 11.5 hours, which was below the daily flight limit of 12 hours.

However, a delay of more than half an hour at Beauvais meant that it looked like the daily limit might be exceeded by about seven to nine minutes, barring any further delays.

The tribunal heard that captains could use commander discretion to allow the crew to continue for up to two hours past the flight time.

"That decision is entirely the captain's. He cannot be coerced and he should not be pressurised to extend that time," Michael Landers, for Mr Christiansen, said.

He said the captain grew concerned about exceeding the limit when he was about five hours into the schedule. After failing to resolve the issue with his base captain, he decided that he could not continue with the return flight from Skavsta to Basle. He stood himself down at Skavsta.

Martin Hayden SC, for Ryanair, said the captain had taken the decision some 10 or 15 minutes before the flight was due to depart. This had resulted in delays for 636 passengers on a number of flights.

He said the captain was not entitled to refuse to fly to Basle and should have made the decision at a much later stage if necessary. Mr Hayden said about seven to nine minutes was at stake and the time could have been made up during the flights. "He could still have made it within 12 hours," he said.

A disciplinary hearing resulted in his demotion to first officer. Mr Christiansen was then directed to complete a refresher simulator course but failed to do so. Mr Hayden said he refused to comply with instructions from anyone in Ryanair and walked out of a disciplinary hearing.

Mr Landers said Mr Christiansen believed his demotion was wrongful and unlawful and that the process lacked procedural fairness. Meetings were called at very short notice and Mr Christiansen was subjected to an "extremely intimidating" experience.

Mr Hayden claimed the tribunal did not have jurisdiction to deal with the legitimacy of the demotion. When tribunal chairman James Flanagan ruled that the demotion was germane to the case, Mr Hayden indicated that Ryanair would challenge this decision in the High Court. The hearing was adjourned until February next.