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MT 20 JULY 2016

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6 maltatoday, WEDNESDAY, 20 JULY 2016 News Portraying pilots as greedy has 'backfired' CONTINUES FROM PAGE 1 Howev- er Air Malta has so far refused to meet the pilots' demands to raise salaries, which range from €65,000 to well over €106,000 for a f light captain, but who, unlike European airline stand- ards, f ly an average of just 56 hours a month. "The demands are way less than what pilots working for various European airlines ne- gotiated three or four years ago. Portraying the pilots as a greedy lot has backfired and it has in- deed strengthened the union among its membership," the sources added. The agreement with Alita- lia, the Italian national airline, for a 49% minority stake in Air Malta is hingeing on guarantees that will improve productivity from Air Malta's pilots and a senior government official has told MaltaToday that "failure to reach an agreement with the pi- lots will lead to a breakdown in talks with Alitalia." The pilots' union has been a major critic of Air Malta's re- structuring efforts ever since a €230 million deal was inked with the European Commis- sion to scale down the bloated airline and turn it around to a profit-making business by 2016. The targets are now out of reach for the ailing airline, with Air Malta pinning its hopes on Alitalia to bail it out. ALPA has accused Air Malta's management of downsizing its aircraft f leet to the detriment of the airline's market share, and claims senior management enjoys remuneration packages that would make the public balk. The union will go to court on Friday 22 July to contest the prohibitory injunction against any further industrial action. The pilots have already toyed with action of their own after reporting for work dressed- down and without their uni- forms. "ALPA has lost its trust in the current management of Air Malta," the union said last week, showing no signs of re- prieve for this new feud. 'Pilots stopped from striking to save Air Malta's future' – Muscat If Air Malta fails, then we would no longer be talking about potential wage increases to pilots, but rather about a failed airline." TIM DIACONO AIR Malta took legal action to stop pilots from taking "dispro- portionate industrial action" so as to save the national airline's future, Prime Minister Joseph Muscat said. When asked by MaltaToday, Muscat denied any contradiction in the fact that the legal action was being instigated by a Labour administration. "We are in no way trying to clamp down on the rights of pi- lots to take industrial action, but rather to stop them from tak- ing disproportionate action that could jeopardise the future of the entire airline," Muscat told a press conference at Castille on Tuesday. "If Air Malta fails, then we would no longer be talking about potential wage increases to pi- lots, but rather about a failed airline." A court last week provisionally upheld a warrant of prohibitory injunction filed by Air Malta against the Airline Pilots Asso- ciation (ALPA), in order to pre- vent the union from ordering any industrial action "that could im- pede the company's operations, financial position or affect on- going negotiations". ALPA will contest the injunc- tion in court on Friday, and its president Dominic Azzopardi has already lambasted it as a "clear threat to the right of free association of workers, as well as to their entitlement to safeguard as a last option these rights by resorting to industrial action." A few days before the request for the injunction was filed, Azz- opardi had warned that pilots were ready to step up industrial action, including delaying f lights and going on strike altogether, unless their calls for improved conditions were met. The current industrial action is limited to a dress-down direc- tive, with pilots refusing to wear their caps and jackets to work. Muscat said that talks with all other Air Malta workers' unions are proceeding well and that he is ready to give every stakehold- er, including ALPA, the benefit of the doubt during the negotia- tions with Alitalia. "This isn't a question of popu- larity, but about what a company can afford," he said of the nego- tiations that could see the Italian airline acquire 49% of Air Malta. "Unlike previous administra- tions, we do not have the option to shoot the ball of the airline's future towards the next election. The action we are taking is in- tended to keep Air Malta alive." After months of speculation, the government in April signed a memorandum of understand- ing with Alitalia that will see the Italian airline acquire a 49% stake in the ailing Air Malta. However, Alitalia has warned Air Malta that the entire deal rests on the outcome of its nego- tiations with the pilots' union. The financial demands pilots are making in the renegotiation of the collective agreement fall broadly into two categories: a 30% increase in the basic salary and guaranteed minimum bo- nuses. The increase in the basic salary, which pilots want to be backdat- ed to January 1 this year, would yield an average salary increase per pilot of €28,000 annually to the average €93,000 salary. The difference to €50,000 comes from changes to the sys- tem by which pilots are awarded units every time they f ly. These units are translated into mon- etary bonuses at the end of the month. 'No Alitalia deal, no Air Malta,' Prime Minister Joseph Muscat said on Tuesday The pilots' union accused Air Malta chairperson Maria Micallef (above) of maliciously lying about their wage demands

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