Ryanair Strike implications re Cancellations NO INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS POSTS

L1011

737max wrote: »

Seems to be only 79 people to me. 79 people does not equal overwhelming acceptance.

Of 84 who were eligible to vote. Only full time, employed, non-management grade pilots were eligible to vote.

79/84 = overwhelming. You don't even get that % in CIE.

Bob24

devnull wrote: »

Unfortunately in that letter the IALPA made it clear they were no longer happy about just representing pilots based in Ireland and are now looking to use this as a vehicle to use to try and expand their reach across the whole of Ryanair operating territory as part of a power grab.

How so? They might have additional motives alright, but all I see in the letter is them relaying the demands of their members and threatening Ryanair with further actions shall the company target their members specifically.

Whether it makes sense or not is another question, but what’s in the letter is about Irish pilots.

devnull

L1011 wrote: »

The overwhelming acceptance of the ballot by the staff suggests that if the direction is coming from outside they have no issue with it whatsoever.

Honestly, as someone who has been involved in industrial relations in the past it's nowhere near as clear-cut as that when some unions are involved in companies that are competing with each other.

I worked in a company which was relatively small, but the union that represented some of the staff also represented the staff in a much bigger, traditionally very heavily unionised competitor and the staff in my company were played to a man for the benefit of the staff in the other company under the pretense that they were supporting the staff.

The person who was guiding the union in our company was a senior person in a rival company who was worried that our company being young and a lower cost base than them, could cost their company trade and they would lose customers to us. Therefore they had a vested interest in increasing our costs and convincing the staff to strike or whatever for them, to protect their much more numerous staff in the other company, who were paying far more in subs.

After that our company refused to recognize any union and would only deal with people on an employee council basis and would not allow any non employees to attend meetings for example or speaking on behalf of the staff because they were effectively using the staff in our company to assist their members in another.

View Profile

Wasting your time here with 737. He's not looking at the facts and clearly has an agenda.
Troll on Mr Max!

devnull

Bob24 wrote: »

How so? They might have additional motives alright, but all I see in the letter is them relaying the demands of their members and threatening Ryanair with further actions shall the company target their members specifically.

They clearly stated that they want to represent all Ryanair staff, not just IALPA members, which makes it clear there is a power grab agenda at play especially when all statements are coming from staff who have never worked for Ryanair and have worked and do work for rival airlines.

I would be much less skeptical if they were focused on representing their members rather than becoming a pan European representative body and allowing their members who work for Ryanair to take center stage. That would show that there is no agenda at play.

L1011

devnull wrote: »

Honestly, as someone who has been involved in industrial relations in the past it's nowhere near as clear-cut as that when some unions are involved in companies that are competing with each other.

I worked in a company which was relatively small, but the union that represented some of the staff also represented the staff in a much bigger, traditionally very heavily unionised competitor and the staff in my company were played to a man for the benefit of the staff in the other company under the pretense that they were supporting the staff.

The person who was guiding the union in our company was a senior person in a rival company who was worried that our company being young and a lower cost base than them, could cost their company trade and they would lose customers to us. Therefore they had a vested interest in increasing our costs and convincing the staff to strike or whatever for them, to protect their much more numerous staff in the other company, who were paying far more in subs.

After that our company refused to recognize any union and would only deal with people on an employee council basis and would not allow any non employees to attend meetings for example or speaking on behalf of the staff because they were effectively using the staff in our company to assist their members in another.

That doesn't really hold much validity when you've got a situation where a heavily unionised Ryanair would multiple the size of IALPA to levels I doubt they could have imagined before it became clear nothing was rosy in Swords anymore.

Ryanair clearly have severe industrial relations issues with their pilots, across Europe, and it has finally come to a head. Thinking of conspiracies when clear mismanagement is a more likely cause - and there are signs of clear mismanagement - is fantastical.


Ryanair are going to have to improve conditions for pilots or they aren't going to have any.

devnull

L1011 wrote: »

That doesn't really hold much validity when you've got a situation where a heavily unionised Ryanair would multiple the size of IALPA to levels I doubt they could have imagined before it became clear nothing was rosy in Swords anymore.

So you think that staff members of another airline wouldn't seek to use newly gained influence over staff in their biggest competitor to the advantage of themselves or their own employer?

But it does hold validity based on the current situation, I'm not talking about coulda, shoulda woulda, I'm talking about right here right now rather than ifs, buts and maybes.

The simple fact is the IALPA represents far more Aer Lingus staff than it does Ryanair now, where Aer Lingus staff pay far more subs than Ryanair staff, with former Aer Lingus staff running the show of a union at a lower cost competitor airline who is a threat to the jobs and conditions of staff in Aer Lingus.

L1011

If IALPA unionised large amounts of Ryanair staff Aer Lingus would become an irrelevancy to them compared to the fees income from FR staff. It would be the most counterproductive thing ever to do if trying to boost EI

Looking for reds under the bed (well, greens in this case) is the stuff of conspiracy theory

devnull

L1011 wrote: »

If IALPA unionised large amounts of Ryanair staff Aer Lingus would become an irrelevancy to them compared to the fees income from FR staff. It would be the most counterproductive thing ever to do if trying to boost EI/

Again, ifs, buts, maybes, coulda, woulda, shoulda.

I'm talking about the here and now and the current dispute and the current situation not what might happen in the future because it's not really relevant to what is happening now because right now the opposite of what you said is true and right now we're talking about current motivations.

As for what might happen years down the line in the future, who knows, it's just merely speculation but unfortunately none of us can predict the future, if so I'd be winning the lottery on Saturday night!

L1011

devnull wrote: »

Again, ifs, buts, maybes, coulda, woulda, shoulda.

I'm talking about the here and now and the current dispute and the current situation not what might happen in the future because it's not really relevant to what is happening now because right now the opposite of what you said is true and right now we're talking about current motivations.

As for what might happen years down the line in the future, who knows, it's just merely speculation but unfortunately none of us can predict the future, if so I'd be winning the lottery on Saturday night!

You are the one speculating on the here and now, may I remind you

Razor44

irrespective of any persons stance on organised representation within the workforce, I think we could say that Ryanair's employment practices for its pilots etc are dubious, contractors/ not contractors, self-employed but no right of delegation etc. It is symptomatic of the whole bogus self-employment problem in general, but to imply that looking for a better deal for your working conditions, is somehow a bad thing, seems a bit off the mark. It doesn't matter if its a union advocating or not, the companies job is to keep up profits, the staff have a right to advocate for a fair wage/conditions etc, in relation to the work they do. One of the ways to do that is to strike. Obviously, there are issues in the company, staff feel they aren't being listened too, so they have to strike, it's not rocket science. They are after all labour dependent workers, so the only tool they have is to withdraw that labour. I don't see how everyone is losing their s**t on that? I assume everyone wants good conditions and pay etc in their jobs?

Id assume that EI pilots would have more to worry about then FR pilots conditions? I'd have thought the ones shared by there fellow IAG members might be more of an issue for them? that's an actual question btw

At the end of the day, if the action was not representative, there would be no staff backing, no strike, no issue, or no need to spin the strike by management, and anyway its all just business, no one negotiates from a position of weakness, it'll be sorted and FR will get back to making money.

Irish Steve

A long time ago, I had very close and personal experience of how the aviation industry unions operate, and I can assure you, they have very little interest in individuals, and a great deal of interest in promoting and strengthening their corporate manipulation and control over the activities of any company into which they can get their hooks, which is one of the reasons that they have full time salaried officers working for them.

There is no doubt at all that IALPA (and others like SIPTU) would love to be in the position to cause Ryanair the maximum grief and difficulty possible, and their aim in doing so would be to strengthen their manipulation and control over all the Irish airlines. I would be very surprised to find anyone from IALPA that has much interest in the specific issues that are currently on the table at Ryanair, the absolute imperative for IALPA is to gain a stronger influence over what happens for ALL airline pilots, and of course to widen significantly their membership base, as that then gives them more finance and (in theory) a stronger negotiating position with the airline managements.

The other side of the coin is that there are some very specific and clear issues that have been allowed to develop over a long period of time within Ryanair that are becoming increasingly unacceptable as valid work practice, and they need to be addressed. In some areas, there is a strong possibility that State actions will force some of those changes, especially in the area of "self employment", as that is an area where loopholes in existing legislation have been exploited by the employer, to the detriment of the people forced down that route, but it will require legislative change to ensure that those loopholes (also exploited by other areas like the construction industry) are made inaccessible in the future.

Forcing Ryanair to accept external union representation is unlikely to result in the sort of changes that the present employees are seeking, because the agenda of the unions is much wider than just seeking to resolve the issues within Ryanair, and for that reason alone, I can see Ryanair management fighting long and hard to prevent such recognition, as in the long term, it is very unlikely that recognising IALPA (or any other ALPA body) will provide significant and meaningful long term benefits to the Ryanair employees.

devnull

L1011 wrote: »

You are the one speculating on the here and now, may I remind you

I've always talked about the here and now and never once talked about what might happen in the future and I've not used the word 'if' once in any of my posts when I talk about a possible future scenario a long way down the track, because as I stated, I can't predict the future so just base things on what I actually feel, know and my knowledge of industrial relations.

Talking about the here and now is in my view a lot more relevant than speculating about something based on speculating about something else that might not even happen in the future, but that is just my two cents.

As I said, it's not unheard of that a union that represents a large number of members in one company and rather less in another will use this to the advantage of the staff in the company with a larger number of members, especially when the person driving the union has a connection to the company that is heavily unionised but not the other one when they are each others biggest competitors.

You seemed to suggest that if Ryanair had many more members in IALPA this would be to the determent of members in Aer Lingus. This would seem to be an acknowledgement that you agree that when a union represents staff from two companies and one company has far more members than the other, this would be to the detriment of the members who work for the one with far less representation unless I misunderstood anything?

Bob24

devnull wrote: »

They clearly stated that they want to represent all Ryanair staff, not just IALPA members, which makes it clear there is a power grab agenda at play especially when all statements are coming from staff who have never worked for Ryanair and have worked and do work for rival airlines.

I would be much less skeptical if they were focused on representing their members rather than becoming a pan European representative body and allowing their members who work for Ryanair to take center stage. That would show that there is no agenda at play.

Could you quote the specific passage of the letter you are referring to? I don’t see that.

L1011

You misunderstood something.

I said that if you speculation - for that is what it is - was true it could only be down to someone extremely short sighted as the speculative situation would reverse rather rapidly.

devnull

Bob24 wrote: »

Could you quote the specific passage of the letter you are referring to? I don’t see that.

Continue to fail to recognise the EERC or IALPA as the representative body for pilots in Ryanair including IALPA's Members.

Note that it doesn't say Dublin or Irish based pilots, or just IALPA members, it appears to suggest that they want to represent ALL Ryanair pilots.

Irish Steve

MOD Note

A gentle reminder to all that a standing forum rule is that while you can attack the post, attacking the poster is not acceptable.

There can be no doubt that the Ryanair industrial relations issues are controversial and capable of stirring strong feelings, but there are some limits, which are clearly defined in the forum charter.

This is the second reminder on this today in this thread, as a result of reported posts.

If this standing forum rule is not respected, bans will follow

devnull

L1011 wrote: »

You misunderstood something.

I said that if you speculation - for that is what it is - was true it could only be down to someone extremely short sighted as the speculative situation would reverse rather rapidly.

I think we both misunderstood each other

My point was that I was talking about the current situation that is ongoing rather than anything that which may happen further down the track. I wasn't talking about what could happen in the future since I was replying to posts in relation to present issues.

pilly

The way I look at it is if large organisations are looking after their staff then these employee councils etc. work well. If they're not looking after their staff and in fact seemed determined to piss them off that's when the unions swoop. I think that's a pity because I agree with some previous posters, a unions first aim is not to help the workers.

MOL caused this situation by being the arrogant tosser that he is. Had he shown some respect for the pilots he wouldn't be facing this pre-Christmas mess and it is a mess.

I posted some months back that I was unsure about booking Ryanair for Christmas, I didn't in the end, booked Aer Lingus and I'm so glad now.

Btw the fervent MOL supporters were claiming there wasn't a hope of any more disruption before Christmas. Good job I didn't fall for that ****e.

L1011

devnull wrote: »

I think we both misunderstood each other

My point was that I was talking about the current situation that is ongoing rather than anything that which may happen further down the track. I wasn't talking about what could happen in the future since I was replying to posts in relation to present issues.

You have engaged in speculation that EI staff are whipping up trouble via IALPA here. If that isn't what you meant it is certainly what you wrote.

devnull

L1011 wrote: »

You have engaged in speculation that EI staff are whipping up trouble via IALPA here. If that isn't what you meant it is certainly what you wrote.

I was merely pointing out that it can and it does happen and I've seen it happen in two companies when one union represented a large number of staff in one and a small number of staff in another. People can decide for themselves what to think.

I was simply giving my two cents and the fact I wouldn't be surprised if it was happening here, for the reasons I outlined and also as Irish Steve says, there are often agendas at play with these things.

A319er

Well my two dollars worth is that a mean despicable little man who belittles every other professional in the very successful company he runs is about to reap what he sowed, a shame as FR are now so big that all of Europe are watching and are forming very negative opinions about FR , MOL , the IAA and are hoping the pilots get treated with respect.

pepe the prawn

737max wrote: »

"Do you think those 79 pilots are being unreasonable in their demands? "
Do you really need to ask this? How out of touch are you?

Yes I do need to ask because you haven’t used any compound evidence to substantiate your argument.

And you still haven’t answered my questions..

737max wrote: »

Ryanair pilots are by no stretch of the imagination "exploited" or poorly paid.

How do you know this? Don’t say its from what you read in the papers because that’s not gonna fly as an answer that carries any weight. How do you know they are not poorly paid or exploited?

737max wrote: »

Temporary issue which is being resolved presently.

Temporary issue?? That’s been known in the public domain since September, but that has been an internal company issue for much longer, and you say it’s temporary?

And you say it’s being resolved, now with threat of strike action from pilots partly due to managements “no budging” stance on the issues that have been raised? You call that a resolution?

737max wrote: »

Pilots who don't present themselves for work are worth absolutely nothing to a company.

Have you ever ran a company that had even just a small number of employees?

737max wrote: »

Seems to be only 79 people to me. 79 people does not equal overwhelming acceptance.

See here you’re letting the spin from Ryanair work it’s magic on you. Do you know why there was only 79 pilots who voted for industrial action? Can you explain why the other 220+ pilots didn’t/couldn’t vote?

Noxegon

View Profile wrote: »

Pilots flying in Asia and ME get well looked after by their employer.

Have you ever read the Middle East forum on PPRuNe?

arccosh

So... all this talk about strikes, when will the flights affected be announced, I've a flight 20th and the web chat people weren't much help

737max

Imagine one Organisation having the power to call a strike and close down nearly all connectivity in to Ireland at any time. There is competition between airlines at the moment so if one goes the other continues and Ireland remains open for business.
An industrial action in Aer Lingus and Ryanair closes down the Country.
That's the bigger play.

Imagine having to negotiate with the puppet of the Union movement who have made other Airlines so uncompetitive that they have driven them out of business and then steer the carcass of the company in the direction of their favoured purchasers who will keep their members in the style they have become accustomed to.

It is a matter of National Interest that this move be shut down. Thankfully, The Labour Party are in opposition at the moment.

I'm thankful that this battle won't be played out in the media and that Ryanair have a huge warchest to sustain the fight.

737max

pepe the prawn wrote: »

jabber, jabber, jabber

won't be responding to that.

737max

Ryanair now have to decide if they roster the troublemakers on that day and let them not turn up for work then strip them of their benefits or not roster them and continue with minimal impact on service.

L1011

737max wrote: »

won't be responding to that.

Don't bother replying like this either if you don't want to reply to a post.

Also, multi-quote / post rather than multiple posts in a row when at all possible, please.

View Profile

Noxegon wrote:

Have you ever read the Middle East forum on PPRuNe?

Yes regularly.

Have you read the Ryanair one?