Controllers fight back over cuts

Air traffic controllers are taking legal action against Airways Corporation to prevent it closing seven traffic control towers and cutting staff.

In an application to the Employment Relations Authority, the New Zealand Airline Pilots Association (Alpa) claims Airways has acted prematurely, breaching the controllers’ collective employment agreement, as well as the good faith element of the Employment Relations Act.

Alpa also claims the Civil Aviation Authority has not been given sufficient notice, breaching safety rules.

Airways announced a month ago that it was looking at making 180 staff redundant, a quarter of its staff, after Covid-19 prompted a dramatic fall in air travel, which saw revenues evaporate.

The company says it was facing a 95 per cent fall in revenue, with chief executive Graeme Sumner saying it was ‘‘operating in an aviation environment unlike anything seen since the second world war’’.

‘‘In December 2019, there were 25 international carriers operating in New Zealand and now there is effectively one.’’

Alpa told members last month that the tower closures would save up to $5 million, but it did not expect this would be the last cuts.

‘‘We understand [Airways] needs to save about $25m. Airways are not likely to stop at just those seven,’’ Alpa told its members in a letter.

The units Airways intends to close are Gisborne, Rotorua,

Napier, New Plymouth, Invercargill, and the flight information services provided at Kapı¯ti Coast Airport and Milford Sound Aerodrome.

Alpa maintains Airways did not undertake genuine consultation with staff because it did not give them enough time to consider the information ‘‘in order to provide alternatives to, in this instance, redundancy’’.

It also claims Airways made it difficult to get information about the closures.

After requesting for information from Airways under the Official Information Act, the corporation

‘‘‘We understand [Airways] needs to save about $25m.’’

NZ Airline Pilots Association

replied 13 days later that there were 20,000 documents that fell within the scope of the request.

The corporation released 347 documents a week later in encrypted form, despite a request from the union for the link.

Alpa also claims that under Civil Aviation Authority rules, the closures had not allowed aerodromes to give the authority 90 days’ notice of a material change to the safety management systems.

Consultation over redundancies was ‘‘premature, insofar as no unit closures can be proposed until such time as the CAA has approved (or declined, or modified) the currently required air traffic management services’’ at each airport.