The Tribune

By RASHAD ROLLE

Tribune Staff Reporter

rrolle@tribunemedia.net

LABOUR and National Insurance Minister Shane Gibson vowed not to negotiate with “a gun” to his head as he expressed frustration yesterday with the two-day sick out Bahamasair pilots staged, their actions leaving many holiday travellers stranded.

Speaking to reporters, the minister apologised on behalf of the government to “passengers who are stranded throughout the Bahamas, Orlando, Fort Lauderdale, Miami”.

The sick out began on Monday afternoon and continued yesterday, leaving the airline’s domestic and international flights grounded.

The industrial action began after pilot association executives reportedly walked out of a negotiation meeting with government over its new contract.

“I personally got involved (recently) with union negotiations when they had about 12-15 issues outstanding and we were able to resolve all of them and it came right down to one issue: increments,” Mr Gibson said.

He added that given the weak economy, officials have asked unions to scale back on their demands.

“Bahamasair is an airline that we subsidize between $15m to $25m every year and so it’s not like you have money there that you can just reach out and grab out of a bin and decide to give to them the amount that they want and all of the unions they basically understood that,” he said.

He added that the pilots “are the highest paid among any group of workers in the country.”

The pilots are requesting lump sum increment payments for 2013 and 2014, along with a full increment being added to salaries from 2015 to 2017.

Dash 8 captains earn a maximum of $91,246 while jet captains can earn as much as $131,916 before overtime.

Yesterday, Bahamas Airline Pilots Association (BALPA) President Captain Joseph Moxey said his members are “not being unreasonable” in their demands. He apologised to the public for the situation, but said the pilots are “stressed out and mentally drained” and it is not safe for them to fly a plane in that state.

“We’ve always been reasonable with the company in every regard,” he said. “The company is offering us half increments for three years when we have already given up two years which will be ‘13 and ‘14. We have given that up in full, only three years will be left in the contract and they are offering half increments at three years, which means for the entire five-year contract we would have received one and a half increment.

“That is a slap in the face. We said, we’ll give you two years, that’s not a problem, but the same what BEC got, give us the lump sum along with the three year increment added to the salary.”

Mr Gibson said the pilots know the government is grappling with “skyrocketing” national debt and the country’s infrastructure demands.

“ . . .So to leave passengers stranded all over the country and throughout Florida rather than come to the table and see how we could negotiate in good faith is terrible.”

Mr Gibson said Bahamasair has a contingency plan in place to deal with matters like the sick out.

“Bahamasair has entered into agreements with local carriers and a couple international charters to move the passengers and so hopefully between the end of (Tuesday) and (Wednesday) morning everything should be back to normal,” he said. “If the pilots come back to work then I guess we would be able to use all of Bahamasair aircraft. If they don’t, we’ll have to use some of the smaller carriers. Businesses like Pineapple Air, Western Air, Sky Bahamas, I want to thank them for really stepping up to the plate and assisting with moving the passengers throughout the islands and hopefully the pilots won’t put us in a position where we have to decide now what to do with Bahamasair. Because Bahamasair is a burden on the taxpayers and it has been a burden for a long time. Sometimes these types of things have to happen to force you into making the kinds of decisions that under normal circumstances you don’t have to make.”

Mr Gibson suggested that the pilots would face repercussions for their actions, which he said were illegal.

Asked about the conflict ahead of a Cabinet meeting yesterday, Deputy Prime Minister Philip “Brave” Davis said normalcy will resume at Bahamasair early this morning “with or without the pilots.”