Labour Court tells DAA to start process to restore craft workers’ pay

Court says the hours and pay of workers should be restored over the next four weeks, to allow ‘intensive talks’ take place

DAA, previously Dublin Airport Authority, is a commercial semi-state airport company

Fearghal O'Connor

March 28 2021 02:30 AM

DAA should begin the process of putting 133 Dublin Airport craft workers back on their full wages – as it has promised to do with all of its other workers, the Labour Court has ruled.

The electricians, carpenters, plumbers and fitters – represented by Unite – were singled out to remain on 60pc of pay, because they had not agreed to DAA’s “new ways of working”.

CEO Dalton Philips announced two weeks ago that airport staff would all return to full pay – except those who had not signed up to the work practice changes that he has said are essential to DAA’s financial sustainability.

But Unite referred the matter to the Labour Court, which recommended that the process of restoring the hours and pay of the craft workers be restored over the next four weeks, to allow “intensive talks” take place on the changes.

Airport management wants to create teams that would follow the work across the campus with “multi-skilled” technicians, rather than being restricted to working in one or other of the two terminals, for example.

At the end of the four-week period any unresolved issues should be referred back to the Labour Court for a final determination, it said.

On March 11 Philips had told staff that, from that day, DAA would restore full pay to employees who had accepted work practice changes. Most of the company’s employees have been on 80pc cent of pay since April last year when traffic at the airport collapsed.

Talks between management and craft workers on work practice changes had taken place and broken down, and were subject to a referral to the Workplace Relations Commission prior to Covid.

The talks were parked when the pandemic wiped out most traffic at the airport, and DAA sought so-called “new ways of working” as a way to avoid compulsory redundancies or permanent changes to core terms and conditions of employment.

When the craft workers failed to sign up to this in October the company unilaterally cut their pay to 60pc because of their failure to agree on the work practice changes.

DAA told the Labour Court that reducing pay and hours was not their preferred option, but it was “haemorrhaging money and could not continue to do so”.

The company has also run into new problems with its airport search unit workforce, who are represented by Siptu, and whose pay and hours are due to be reinstated from 80pc to 100pc from today.

The trade union wrote to the company to say that it was “not acceptable” from a work-life balance point of view that shift patterns were changing and day shifts were changing to night shifts in order to accommodate the additional shifts on the roster.