The Labour Court is to investigate a case taken by the Irish Airline Pilots Association on behalf of some Ryanair pilots relating to their terms and conditions of employment.
The investigation will centre on the pilots' right to training by the airline, their contracts and their rights where redundancies are sought. The Labour Court findings are binding.
The dispute arose as tensions between Ryanair and its pilots heightened when the airline told them that joining a trade union would put their careers at risk.
During last summer Ryanair sent letters to its Dublin-based pilots, many of whom are senior captains, warning it would refuse to train them on its new aircraft if they supported IALPA's campaign to represent them.
Yesterday, IALPA president, Mr Evan Cullen, said it was delighted with the court's finding. "We look forward to the Labour Court investigating the complaint," he said.
A Ryanair spokeswoman said the outcome was as expected. "This decision does not surprise us. This is just the Labour Court backing a trade union organisation. We have to see the detail but if it does imply compulsory, by the back door, representations we will mount a constitutional challenge," she said.
Meanwhile, eight of Ryanair's senior pilots have separately made a complaint about victimisation in the workplace to the Labour Relations Commission. They say the complaint is based on the actions of the airline's senior management who were seeking to persuade pilots to accept terms and conditions attached to their training on new aircraft.
This case had been suspended while the Labour Court was considering whether to proceed with the other investigation. It will now go ahead.
IALPA, a division of IMPACT, has taken the initial case under the new Industrial Relations (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2004.
Ryanair is claiming that the Act cannot be used to enforce trade union recognition against an employer, such as Ryanair, which does not engage with trade unions. The court accepted this submission but noted that the legislation does provide a measure of protection to employees when pay and conditions are not freely determined by collective bargaining.
The ruling notes that the airline's claim that it has never negotiated with a trade union, including IALPA, is ambiguous. Up to 1997 a committee, on which IALPA members sat, concluded agreements with Ryanair, it said.
