CY unions meet to discuss pay rise strategy

FOUR Cyprus Airways (CY) unions met yesterday to discuss further measures to secure pay demands, and said they would seek a meeting with Communications and Works Minister Leontios Ierodiaconou.

Costas Demetriou, the head of Cynika, the airline’s biggest union, said his members as well as the three other unions covering cabin crew and engineers, had rejected CY’s proposal for a lump sum in lieu of pay rises for 1999.

Demetriou said the company had offered £300,000 to some 2,000 employees seeking a 2.5 per cent pay rise in line with rises in semi-government organisations. The demand led to a four-hour work stoppage on January 28.

“The money offered by the company amounts to a rise of only around one per cent on a one-off basis,” Demetriou said. “We want an annual increase.”

But Demetriou added the unions would not consider further strike action until they had secured a meeting with Ierodiaconou. “We called his office today and expect an answer this week,” Demetriou said.

The unions also have a meeting with CY management tomorrow to discuss the company’s survival.

Demetriou said, however, that, as far as the four unions were concerned, there was no connection between the pay demands and the discussion on the company’s survival.

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