I wish to refer to the impact of this crisis on the staff in Aer Lingus, the way in which they have been and are still being misled, and the way in which one message is being put out by the Government for public consumption while something quite different is happening in practice on the ground.
The bottom line in the Cahill plan for Aer Lingus is that the airline's loyal, hard-working staff are being asked to endure the pain. The equity which is to be put into the company, £175 million, is much less than needed and less than half the £400 million which Bernie Cahill said was needed only four months ago. Moreover, it is phased over three years and at best will reduce the debt. It is a payment to the banks to keep them off the company. It is too little and it is too prolonged.
The change in the Shannon stop is no doubt painful for that region but at least the Government is recognising that Shannon must be compensated for the loss of the stop. Already there has been a parade of company chairmen and executives, the Taoiseach and Ministers to Shannon to smooth the troubled waters.
What is being offered to the staff? We are told that £5 million per annum must be achieved through cost cutting and that 80 per cent of that must come from the payroll. Ultimately, that will mean that the staff of Aer Lingus will be forced to shed jobs and to endure worse working conditions. All the fine Government aspirations over the past few weeks that there will be no compulsory redundancies is nothing more than a continuation of the misleading of the staff which has gone on since the beginning of this crisis.
The staff of Aer Lingus have been misled by the Government since the beginning of this crisis and the Government is continuing a dishonest double speak to the company's employees. The staff were politically misled last November by the Tánaiste and the Minister for Foreign Affairs. They were misled by the Taoiseach at the launch of the Fianna Fáil manifesto when he said "We cannot and will not allow Aer Lingus to flounder". They have been floundering ever since. They were misled by the Government over Bernie Cahill's appointment and over the way in which the rescue plan was to be evolved. "Partnership" is the buzz work of this Government and when the Minister announced the appointment of Mr. Cahill last March he told us that the plan would be evolved in a spirit of partnership, through discussion with management and unions.
Responding to my Private Members' Motion on Aer Lingus on 6 April last the Minister stated:
Since the House last discussed the matter fora have been established, consultations are taking place and there is a management commitment to consult the unions and the representatives of the workforce at all stages before the formulation of major policy proposals, so that everybody has a say in the future of the company and those who have a stake in the company have their say. That is something that I, as a former Minister for Labour, would insist upon, quite apart from the fact that it is an obligation under the Programme for Economic and Social Progress. That obligation will be honoured.
Of course, we now know that the unions were not consulted, that the staff had no input into the Cahill plan and that they got more information about the future of their company from well-placed journalists around this city than they did from Mr. Cahill and the management.
From the time the plan was presented there was an attempt by the Government to stand back, to pretend it had made no decision on it and to let the unions and management at it. This pretence has now been exposed; it is inconceivable that Mr. Cahill appeared out of the dark to the Minister with the plan and that there was not ongoing contact between the Minister, his Department and Mr. Cahill before the plan was submitted. Indeed, the Government's ultimate decision announced last night that the plan has been accepted in full has confirmed that the Minister had given his effective approval long ago.
The meetings with the Congress of Trade Unions and the assurances apparently given that there would be no compulsory redundancies cannot be reconciled with the Minister's statement last night when he told us that £50 million in cuts would have to be acheived, no equity would be put in until the unions had agreed to the £50 million in cost cuts and, further, there would have to be proof that these cuts were being implemented. Like every Member of this House, he knows that there will not be anything remotely approaching 1,500 voluntary redundancies in Aer Lingus and that if he insists on £50 million being achieved in cuts the only way it can be done is by force.
There is no point in Deputy Seán Ryan coming in here and saying he is not voting for compulsory redundancies. He will never be asked to vote on a motion seeking compulsory redundancies, but the fact is that when he votes for the Government amendment endorsing the Government's policy which endorses the Cahill plan, he is voting ultimately for enforced redundancies at Aer Lingus.
