Talks bid to avert airport strike threat

IT APPEARED as if threatened strike action at the island’s two airports was on hold yesterday, as unions and management entered negotiations on a dispute over employment conditions.

A spokesman for airport operator Hermes spokesman, Adamos Aspris, said: “There are some negotiations going on.”

“Hermes is taking all actions in accordance with the concession agreement,” he added. Aspris did not want to comment further.

Airport workers unions on Thursday threatened to strike within days, claiming Hermes was violating an agreement to make hourly-paid workers permanent.

In a letter addressed to the Ministers of Finance and Transport, SEK and PEO unions representing the workers said Hermes had failed to stick to the agreement signed with the government when it handed over the running of the airports.

“We await immediate action on your behalf which will force Hermes to implement the agreement it has signed, or else we will move to strike measures at the airports within the next few days so as to protect what has been agreed, as well as the rights of our members,” said the letter.

The unions accused Hermes of not proceeding to offer permanent jobs to those workers who used to be employed by the state when it was operating the island’s two airports at Larnaca and Paphos. Since the takeover in May, the workers have been hourly paid.

The letter said Hermes was bound by the conditions of the agreement it had signed with the government, which states that if, on the specified date, all 730 hourly paid employees are still working at the airports, Hermes is obliged to offer permanent work contracts to all of the 730.
Today, only 300 of those workers remain at the airport.

A source close to the negotiations said they expected that as long as the two sides were talking, the threat of strike action was off the cards. “We would expect the parties to give all their attention to the negotiations and not to make things worse,” the source said.

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