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Aviation History
1975
1975 - 0911.PDF
FLIGHT International, 22 May 1975 mm 817 Pilots on the dole REDUNDANCY for a pilot is inevitably a more serious event than for many other persons in different occupations. There are several reasons for this, and they require some examination. After the collapse of Court Line and the numerous problems in other British airlines, including the large, if temporary, surplus of pilots in British Airways, the outlook is not cheerful for hundreds of pilots. The history of UK pilot employment makes depressing reading. The independent airlines, with instability evident most of the time since 1945, have been the main problem area, although at times both BEA's and BOAC's plans abruptly changed, causing early retirement and stag nation of promotion. The record is bad and we have seen a series of collapses, mergers and liquidations since the late 1940s. Memories are short: do you remember British Eagle, BUA, Lloyd, Channel, Skyways and Donaldson? Some were toppled by politics, others by technical causes, some were undercapitalised and others incompetent; others were wound up as unprofitable. Many pilots have been exposed to the sudden need to reconstruct their lives, often with little or no warning. The difficulties which pilots experience in obtaining pension entitlements, outstanding salary and statutory redundancy payments should be known as nothing short of a scandal, but the immediate problems of survival, hopefully on earnings-related social security, are not as serious as the long-term occupational dilemma facing most of those made redundant. The chances of maintaining a current licence will certainly be minimised by the Civil Aviation Authority's proposals to increase licence renewal charges by 600 per cent and the discretionary powers of Government departments tend to be used in harshly realistic ways when it comes to providing taxpayers' money for retrain ing or resettlement. Funds have been available, for instance, to train a fixed-wing pilot to fly helicopters, in view of the shortage of qualified pilots for the North Sea oil field work, but they are not available to allow the pilot to maintain his employability by keeping his licence current and valid. Cash can be made available, however, should the man wish to train for an entirely different career. In that event the substantial investment in his training as a pilot is lost; does this anomalous situation really represent the most effective use of national resources? Are there any real differences between the situation of a redundant businessman, scientist, or even journalist, and a redundant pilot? Is there any need for special study of aviation unemployment? There are many special problems faced by the highly trained pilot, most of which are caused by the ultra-specialised nature of his work and the cost of his training. There is far more chance of job transfer in most other occupations and professions. A major problem for the pilot is the cost of conversion to another type of aircraft. If he is lucky enough to have been trained and to be currently licensed on a widely used type such as a 707, 727 or DC-8 he will be immeasurably better placed to get a new job than the man who has a VC10 or One-Eleven rating. Pilots have begun to insure their futures by working for companies which can offer this sort of transferability. It is often not the pilot's total experience or even his record in other respects that determines his employability, but the conversion costs to his employer. There is also the numbers game. Each company main tains its own seniority list, so that a very experienced airline pilot with many years in command may have to join at the bottom of this stack and abandon all hope of further promotion. Commands are occasionally available for suit ably type-rated pilots who. are willing to work for the smaller or marginally secure operators; luck plays a large part here. The choice may be between the post of second officer with an airline of financial and operational stability, or a command, with the risks of unemployment and other pressures which sometimes attend marginal operators. These options are by no means always available; about half the Court Line pilots are still unable to find flying jobs. There is need for a new study of pilot supply planning and the provision of reasonable security for those willing to invest their working lives in the industry. The State airline has not done much better than the independent's over the past few years in planning total pilot requirements. The main problem is the long lead- time before a trainee takes his place as one of two pilots on a complex modern aircraft. During this period industry conditions can fluctuate from depression to boom. Unfor tunately, some employers feel that they have no responsi bility towards their employees, who can be fired at will. This leads to a hardening of attitudes among pilots. In such cases as the Court Line collapse, events moved so swiftly that they could be said to have been uncontrollable, if not unforeseeable; in others, however, the creation of redundancy can stem from deliberate management decisions. Another side of the coin is shown in the North Sea helicopter business, where rapid expansion has caused a shortage of helicopter commanders. The CAA has approved the issue of UK licences to foreign nationals on a tempor ary basis. Likewise, many unemployed UK pilots have turned to overseas operators for jobs. Licences are to some extent transferable; this is helpful but the mere possession of an International Civil Aviation Organisation licence is no guarantee of work. Many obstacles face the emigrating pilot, especially the taxation laws, which require a choice between complete severance from the UK and payment of UK tax. Perhaps pilots should begin to insist that insurance policies against redundancy be written into their contracts, to pay for the renewal of licences and ratings or type conversion. The various pilot training establishments have had a hard time planning their future and have had to contract now with the diminished need for new pilots. Yet within a few years there will be a pilot shortage, and by that time the bulge in retired and redundant ex-Service pilots, now unfortunately coinciding with the industry recession, may be over. Political attention is always focused on the need for a healthy private'enterprise sector in the UK airline industry, but there does not seem to be any commensurate effort aimed at the creation of a pilot force which can hope for some measure of employment stability. All pilots know those unfortunates who have had to work for many operators and who now have no pension and no job, despite having many thousands of hours in command of UK-regis tered aircraft. We should surely hope that the most experienced pilots and the most able can command our aircraft. The system seems to ensure that a proportion of these are regularly thrown on the scrap-heap.
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