ST JOHN’S – LIAT has confirmed that a decision of the LIAT-LIALPA Arbitration Panel was received on Monday.
The decision to move to arbitration followed continuing failure to resolve outstanding issues over salary and benefits between LIAT and LIALPA. At a meeting in Kingstown, St Vincent, on July 28, 2009, attended by LIAT’s three lead shareholder prime ministers, it was agreed with LIALPA that outstanding matters should be referred to binding arbitration.
The three-member panel led by retired Barbadian jurist Leroy Inniss and including Herald Wilson, retired director general of Civil Aviation of the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS), and Captain Desmond Ross, a retired pilot and former chairman of LIALPA, decided upon key aspects of the new collective agreement. “We now look forward to sitting down with LIALPA in arranging for the finalisation of the documents to reflect the rulings and recommendations of the arbitration panel.
“Our legal and finance teams are already hard at work in this regard and we hope that we can finalise this matter with LIALPA in a timely manner,” said LIAT’s acting CEO Brian Challenger, speaking from Antigua. He added that the document represented “an extremely balanced approach to the outstanding areas of disagreement that have plagued relations between LIAT and LIALPA over a number of years”.
He said LIAT remained committed to an equitable and just award for its pilots, consistent with what was happening in the economy and industry generally, “which reflects what is happening with our other employee groups, and which is sensitive to the company’s ability to continue to function as a going concern. We believe that these concerns have been factored into the arbitrators’ rulings”. Both sides presented arguments during the process which was governed by the Arbitration Act (No.12 of 1975)of Antigua and Barbuda. (CMC)
