Ryanair has asked the High Court to overturn a finding by the Labour Court that there is a trade dispute between Ryanair and the Irish Airline Pilots Association (IALPA) concerning the airline's Dublin-based pilots.
Martin Hayden SC, for Ryanair, yesterday applied to Mr Justice Hanna for a number of orders against the Labour Court arising from the decision by Impact, of which IALPA is a part, to ask the Labour Court to investigate an alleged trade dispute over Ryanair's Dublin-based pilots.
Ryanair contends there is no trade dispute and that Impact is not entitled to "intermeddle" in Ryanair's affairs.
After considering the matter, the Labour Court decided on January 25th last that there was a trade dispute. It is that and other findings which Ryanair seeks to overturn.
Ryanair also wants orders quashing the Labour Court's decision that it was not Ryanair's practice to engage in collective bargaining and that there was/is no operative internal dispute procedure in place within the airline.
Ryanair complains it had no real opportunity to test the claims being made by Impact. It also contends that the Labour Court acted beyond its powers in finding the alleged dispute related to all Ryanair's Dublin-based pilots rather than a group of eight pilots who had been offered conversion training.
In an affidavit, Eddie Wilson, director of personnel and inflight with Ryanair, said Impact had asked the Labour Court in November to investigate an alleged trade dispute between it and Ryanair over the airline's Dublin-based pilots.
Ryanair accepted the right of employees to join, or not join, trade unions but it did not accept that it, as an employer, was compelled to negotiate with any trade union. It had been the policy and practice of Ryanair for many years to deal directly with its employees without the "intermeddling" of trade unions and this system had served Ryanair employees "very well", he said.
Employees elected representatives to employee representative committees and those ERCs negotiated directly with Ryanair.
In the case of Dublin pilots, it was for them to elect representatives onto the pilots' ERC. Since the retirement of the pilot members of the pilot ERC in August 2004, the pilots had not appointed new representatives.
It was in those circumstances that Ryanair strenuously objected to the referral by Impact/IALPA of the issue to the Labour Court. Ryanair believed the court had no jurisdiction to carry out the investigation requested as the criteria for such an investigation, as set out in the Industrial Relations Act 2001, had not been met.
There was no trade dispute within the meaning of the Act. It was the practice of Ryanair to engage in collective bargaining negotiations regarding Dublin-based pilots and internal dispute resolution procedures were ongoing and had not failed.
Ryanair had asked for, and was granted, a preliminary Labour Court hearing on a number of issues at which it outlined that position. It was only at the close of the hearing that Impact stated for the first time that the Dublin-based pilots, whom they purported to represent, were withdrawing from any further collective bargaining procedures and no longer wished to participate in the internal dispute resolution procedures, Mr Wilson said.
No pilot was present at that hearing to support the assertions by Impact and no testimony was adduced by Impact to controvert the assertions by Ryanair.
Despite this, Mr Wilson said, the Labour Court had accepted the assertions and submissions made by Impact and decided there was a trade dispute in existence, that Ryanair did not engage in collective bargaining negotiations with pilots and that there was no operative internal dispute resolution procedures in place.
Ryanair contended that decision was unreasonable and one that could not have been arrived at by any reasonable adjudicator of fact, Mr Wilson said. It also breached Ryanair's right to fair procedures and to natural and constitutional justice.
