Emirates has declined an invitation to attend the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) for conciliation talks about its Dublin Airport redundancy programme.
Emirates confirmed to The Sunday Independent that it declined an invitation from the WRC to attend a meeting and stated that it does not have any additional comments to make at this point.
According to The Irish Independent, the airline has told at-risk employees that they will not receive any more statutory redundancy payments, and, according to sources, management told employees that there are no plans to outsource the work to a third party ground handler.
The cuts, which Emirates said are necessary due to the continuing COVID-19 crisis and a drop in the number of Dublin flights from 14 to four per week, will not impact the airline's Irish management team.
Counter Proposal Rejection
Emirates' decision to decline the WRC's invitation to attend a conciliation talks meeting follows the airline's rejection of a counter proposal from staff suggesting that they take a leave of absence until March to allow time for the aviation sector to recover as COVID-19 vaccines start to roll out.
Employees also proposed either job sharing or temporary layoffs.
However, Emirates said in a letter to staff that the situation is "so dire and the recovery period so long and still uncertain, that [it has] no option but to proceed".
Emirates said that news that vaccines could become available in the coming months is "very encouraging", but there "will still be a significant lag between distribution of a vaccine and demand (and thus capacity) returning, and there are no clear timelines on this".
The airline added that "there are no current plans to increase [the number of Dublin flights from four per week] within the next six months".
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