STAFF AT Aer Lingus and in the Dublin Airport Authority have been told that their pension scheme had a deficit of €700 million at the end of the most recent financial year.
In a memo to members in recent days, the chairman of the trustees of the Irish Airlines (General Employees) Superannuation Scheme, Brendan Walsh, said they had commenced a consultative process with employers and members’ representative bodies with a view to facilitating a formal funding proposal to be submitted to the Pensions Board.
This has to be completed by the end of next March.
Mr Walsh said that, while the scheme’s actuary had reported a €700 million deficit as of March 31st this year, the funding position had improved slightly since then due to the upturn in the investment market.
Some informed sources said yesterday that the deficit at present could be around €500 million following the recent upturn in the markets.
The Irish Airlines (General Employees) Superannuation Scheme covers staff and retired personnel at Aer Lingus, the Dublin Airport Authority and the former SR Technics plant at Dublin airport.
Last year a report on the scheme produced by Siptu – which was carried out before the closure of SR Technics and the restructuring at Aer Lingus – said that the former State airline had 3,131 active contributing members, 3,050 deferred pensioners and 3,098 pensioners; the Dublin Airport Authority had 2,538 active contributing members, 317 deferred pensioners and 975 pensioners, and SR Technics had 394 active contributing members, 159 deferred pensioners and 260 pensioners.
The Siptu report expressed concern regarding the financial status of the scheme.
Members of the union in the Dublin Airport Authority subsequently said that they would ballot on industrial action in support of improvements in the pension scheme.
The Siptu report said that there were two contributing Dublin Airport Authority employees for every one benefactor member, but that the situation was reversed for Aer Lingus staff.
The report maintained that, following the privatisation of Aer Lingus, two ancillary pension funds were established for the airline’s staff, which received more than €100 million from the proceeds of the sale of the company.
