More Aer Lingus pilots are expected to be suspended by the airline today in a move which could escalate the dispute over its plans to establish a new base in Belfast, writes Martin Wall, Industry Correspondent.
The company also said last night that it would not enter into talks with pilots' representatives unless a ban on co-operation with the establishment of its new Belfast set-up was lifted.
Four pilots have already been removed from the payroll. One was suspended without pay at lunchtime yesterday while the company last night sent letters of suspension to three others.
However, the Irish Airline Pilots' Association, which is a branch of the trade union Impact, said last night that industrial action was not on the cards.
Ialpa president Evan Cullen said: "We are going to sit on our hands and wait for management to shut down the operation and then see how they explain it to the shareholders."
Mr Cullen said that the suspension of pilots would inevitably lead to a reduction in flight services as other aircraft captains and first officers reached their legal flying limits.
The Labour Relations Commission was reported last night to be planning to intervene. The airline said, however, it had not been contacted by the LRC.
It is understood that the suspended pilots had refused, in line with advice from Ialpa and Impact, to participate in the airline's recruitment process for new staff for the Belfast base.
The company wants some of its 30 pilots who have training and instruction responsibilities to begin assessing applications for the positions of aircraft captain and first officer in Belfast. About 400 applications have been recieved.
These pilots would also be required later to serve on interview panels and provide training for successful candidates.
Management has maintained that such work is an integral part of the duties of pilots with training responsibilities, for which they receive additional pay.
Ialpa has advised members not to co-operate with the establishment of the Belfast base.
The union has been in disagreement with management for some time over the proposed terms and conditions of pilots at the Belfast operation.
Further conflict could arise today after the airline management rejected moves by about 30 pilots to resign their training and instruction responsibilities.
Management saw the resignation plan as an attempt by pilots to neutralise the threat of suspension while continuing to refuse to co-operate with the recruitment programme.
"These pilots have been appointed as instructors and are paid as instructors. This is a paper exercise to evade their responsibilities.
"We will not accept partial resignations of responsibilities," Aer Lingus said in a statement.
However, Mr Cullen said that pilots' contracts allowed them to resign as instructors and revert to flying duties only. He said that the four suspended pilots had all first resigned their training roles.
An Aer Lingus spokesman said that the suspensions would not affect flights in the short term.
The attempt by pilots to resign their training functions represented the first response of Impact and Ialpa to the threat of suspension for those who did not co-operate with the recruitment programme.
Impact said that it remained available for talks either directly with the company or through the State's industrial relations machinery.
The union said management's actions "inevitably risked" the disruption of services because suspended pilots could not fly planes. It described the suspension of pilots as "a self-defeating action" which would make it harder to achieve a resolution.
Bertie Ahern urged management and unions at Aer Lingus to work together to resolve the dispute. "Trying to call victory for one side or the other or force victory for one side is never a good idea and my advice to them for what it is worth, is to try and confront those problems and resolve them together", the Taoiseach said.