FlightGlobal.com
Home
Premium
Archive
Video
Images
Forum
Atlas
Blogs
Jobs
Shop
RSS
Email Newsletters
You are in:
Home
Aviation History
1988
1988 - 1354.PDF
UTA struggles for expansion VTA crews based in the South Pacific stand to lose most from chairman Rene Lapautre's radical reforms by Gilbert Sedbon in Paris UTA, the French privately-- owned long-haul airline, is doubling its fleet of aircraft to nearly 30 and drastically cutting down on pilots' pay to become competitive with the lowest fares in the "open skies" struggle ahead in Europe. In doing so, the company may revolutionise air transport in France. In addition to the four Boeing 747-300s, one 747-200F, six DC-10- 30s, and two Boeing 737s in operation now, UTA chairman and chief executive officer Rene Lapautre is await ing two 747-400s for next year and has ordered a dozen 737s for delivery in the following two years. Also on order are six Airbus A340-300s for service in the next five years. Lapautre, stormy petrel of the French air transport industry, is overhauling his company, France's largest independent carrier, and reactivating its Aeromaritime subsidiary as a major charter outfit. In the process he is quashing old employment pacts and nego tiating new ones. After signing deals with Nouvelles Frontieres, Lapautre has switched some of his regu lar airliners into the charter business and hired Aero maritime pilots and cabin crews at lower pay levels than currently in force at UTA. This has incurred the wrath of the unions. A major tug-of-war has begun, with crippling strikes in the offing. "By refusing to negotiate new pacts, the unions have forced UTA to seek solutions else where," says Lapautre. "The reactivation of Aeromaritime is no challenge to the pilots, cabin crews, and ground personnel, but a new strategy in the com pany's development." Lapautre, a diminutive, jovial 57-year-old with a fondness for big Cuban cigars, is up in arms against the Establishment. "Things have changed, and we must all become aware of the wind of change," he says. "We can only expand on markets where competition is toughest, as in the US. We are obliged to rejig, squeeze operating costs, and offer travel agents the lowest fares. The unions are turning a deaf ear, because their objective is 'always more', and they don't give a damn to the company's development. I won't have it." The UTA boss is not yielding one iota. For the past 18 months he has called on his pilots, cabin staff, and ground personnel to make a big effort to win the battle ahead—preparation for the Single Market in the Euro pean Community in January 1993. He asked the pilots, who are among the best paid in Europe, to contribute 5 to 7 per cent extra flight hours, compared with the current annual average of barely 450 hours. "I've told our crews based in the Pacific that they are over paid, because they are cashing extra bonuses and do not even pay income tax at home," he says. A DC-10 captain in the South Pacific draws FFr1,150,000 ($200,000) a year tax free, against FFr850,000 for pilots in Metropolitan France, while a Boeing 747 captain draws FFr1,300,000 a year, compared with FFr950,000 at home. Lapautre has asked Pacific- based pilots to forfeit their bonuses and line up with their colleagues at home, thus incur ring a 40 per cent loss of income. UTA has reactivated its sub sidiary Aeromaritime, hitherto mainly composed of four Super Guppies for the transport of Airbus sections from the various production centres in Europe to Toulouse for final assembly, to capture a share of the fast- growing charter market. Aero maritime pilots and cabin crews are hired on new pay scales, lower than in UTA proper, and UTA pilots and cabin crew alike all see a threat to their own privileges. They have therefore launched a series of strikes, objecting to UTA aircraft being transferred to Aeromaritime and being operated at reduced costs. The cockpit crews (315 pilots and flight engineers) are, in the first place, objecting to the airline hiring non-UTA pilots for Aeromaritime for less pay and longer working hours. The 700 cabin staff are objecting to ground personnel joining them as ground jobs are suppressed in the drive for greater pro ductivity. Already 180 ground jobs have been lost, and 25 staffers have grabbed the oppor tunity to join the cabin crew. Lapautre is doggedly press ing for greater productivity, making his aircraft fly 4,500hr a year, compared with 3,800hr in 1986. He no longer wants to be part of the protected French air transport hierarchy. Above all he wants freedom of action to meet the challenges of liberali sation in the 12-nation Euro pean Community and the competition from international mega-size airlines. UTA's network covers the whole of Africa, but, with business dwindling on that continent, the airline has devel oped its routes to Singapore, New Caledonia, and Tahiti and on to San Francisco. But Lapautre has so far failed to secure a footing at Newark, New York, because state-owned flag carrier Air France is barring the way—with French Govern ment backing. In the meantime, Lapautre is going all out to extend UTA's network into Europe. He is pressing hard for landing rights in Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Athens, Milan, Rome, and Madrid from his Paris Charles de Gaulle hub, and later to London from Nice-Cote d'Azur and on to Munich, Lisbon, and Barcelona. "Too much is too much," says UTA pilots union leader Michel Pecorini. "Monsieur Rene Lapautre is breaking up UTA. We will go on strike if this continues much longer." The pilots and cabin crew unions have withdrawn all their proposals for a settlement of the dispute "and we will resume talks only on a sounder and more realistic basis," says Pecorini. "We can stage a series of damaging strikes, but we do not wish to do so." Pecorini says that the unions have gone a long way to assist the UTA chairman in his grand design. "For Aeromaritime, we had agreed to a return to pay and working conditions prior to the 1960 labour-management agreements. We've agreed to a drop in annual pay of FFr100,000 for a Boeing 727 captain. We've agreed that Aeromaritime pilots' pay not be indexed on the salaries of French pilots as a whole. We've accepted to review the rulings on our promotions in UTA to avoid a cascade of costly moves. We've accepted that the pro ductivity of UTA personnel be increased by 7 per cent." Lapautre is threatening to tear up existing agreements and put back to zero the labour- management relationship in UTA. Despite the present shortage of pilots, Lapautre says that he can always find pilots ready to take over and fight for UTA. The mighty battle may reach a gigantic showdown. The unions at Air France, Air Inter, Brit Air, TAT, and other French airlines may join in sup port of their UTA colleagues. 20 FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL, 21 May 1988
Sign up to
Flight Digital Magazine
Flight Print Magazine
Airline Business Magazine
E-newsletters
RSS
Events
