BASSETERRE, St. Kitts – FOLLOWING two full days of cancelled LIAT (1974) Ltd. Flights, caused by a pilots’ sickout, the airline’s service is back on schedule today (June 18).
Sickouts by the pilots brought a major disruption in inter-regional travel in the last 48 hours and over 6 500 confirmed passengers were forced to cancel travel plans after being stranded at airports across the region. As many as 144 flights were cancelled over the two-day industrial action, a threatening blow to the already struggling air carrier.
According to Corporate Communications Manager Desmond Brown, starting this morning all affected passengers are being allowed to rebook without additional costs. However, there is no guarantee of travel for passengers who turn up without confirmed bookings.
“While the Company is doing everything to minimize the effect on passengers, they are being advised that for the rest of the day they should expect delays. LIAT regrets and would like to apologise for the inconvenience to its customers/passengers who were affected by the disruption of its services,” Brown stated in a LIAT press statement made earlier today.
Sickouts stemmed from statements made by LIAT management stating that lengthy wage disputes between the Antigua-based airline and the Leeward Islands Airline Pilots Association (LIALPA) had already been resolved. LIALPA had threatened to walk out if LIAT management did not retract and apologise for the statement.
The resumption of service comes hours after St. Vincent and the Grenadines’ Prime Minister Hon. Dr. Ralph Gonsalves, who heads one of the three stakeholder governments of LIAT, noted his “profound disappointment” with the “irresponsible and unreasonable action” taken by the pilots. He urged them to return to work, recognizing the importance of inter-regional travel.
“I am using this forum to urge the pilots to go back in the skies. We can sit and talk and set up a framework to address some of these issues. We can’t undermine this civilisation and this Caribbean Community in this manner,” he said yesterday.
The Board of Directors met yesterday to put measures in place that would restore service and deal with the “severe distress” that this action has caused the Caribbean public. Issues of settling retroactive public holiday payments, addressing concerns about the status of current pension deductions and signing off on a new contract immediately following the arbitration judgment were high priority concerns in that meeting.
A press statement issued after the meeting noted that LIAT’s Management, like LIALPA, is keenly awaiting the report of the Arbitration Panel in the near future. In the meantime, pilots must continue to provide the services “critical to the socio-economic wellbeing of the region”, the company board stated.
Communications Manager Brown told SKNVibes that a statement dealing with backlogs and passenger credit would be released later today.
Passengers are urged to contact the LIAT Call Centre to rebook their flights from Antigua (1-268-480-5582), toll free from the rest of the Caribbean (1-888-844-5428) or from Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands (1-866-549-5428).
