Union throws down gauntlet to Air New Zealand

Trade union E tū has called on Air New Zealand (NZ, Auckland Int’l) to stop outsourcing in the wake of fresh cabin crew redundancy proposals. Due to the lack of long-haul international flying, Air New Zealand recently proposed to cut up to 385 more cabin crew jobs, which would take its COVID-19 related job losses to around 37% of its workforce. E tū, the union representing cabin crew, said in a statement the latest job cuts were proposed to be carried out by December. E tū’s Head of Aviation, who calls himself Savage, charged the company was continuing to outsource work, retaining an agreement with a cabin crew hire company in Shanghai, despite there being no operational reason to do this. “The Shanghai Pudong base has always been about paying crew less and devaluing the role of cabin crew. Outsourcing is a barrier to raising standards in aviation and it needs to end.” He added: “For the company to focus on immediate labour costs, without taking into account the bigger picture, is short-sighted and damaging to all aviation workers. The government’s new approach to procurement – to help create jobs for those most affected by COVID-19 – is something Air New Zealand needs to follow,” he said. The airline had announced 4,000 job losses before the latest proposal to cut cabin crew. The percentage figure was higher than the cuts to nearly 30% of jobs at Australia’s Qantas (QF, Sydney Kingsford Smith) and around 20% at Singapore Airlines (SQ, Singapore Changi), Reuters reported. Air New Zealand said in a statement it would need fewer cabin crew due to the decline in demand on North American routes. This had led it to reduce its Los Angeles Int’l flights from daily to three a week; and convert all its San Francisco, CA flights to cargo-only services. “In the foreseeable future, we have around 385 more wide-body cabin crew in the business than we have work for,” an airline spokeswoman said. “Any decision we make will be made in consultation with our people and the unions, with redundancies as the last resort.”