BWIA plans job cuts By Luis Araujo (Trinidad Guardian) National airline BWIA has signalled plans to start sending home workers. But one union says the move is not necessary. In an internal company update, dated January 10, president Conrad Aleong told staff that despite good nine-month results, a poor last quarter in 2001 had forced BWIA to look at staff reduction. "We can no longer avoid reductions, but this is still in the early stages," Aleong stated. Communications director Clint Williams said yesterday the airline will be going through a restructuring exercise. How many people could be affected or from what departments, will be worked out. This will be revealed to staff, he said, on January 30. Williams said after restructuring, some jobs will be redundant. Some employees may be relocated, others could be retrenched. The update stated while the figures are not available for the last three months, the airline carried 10,000 fewer passengers last October than in October 2000. In November, it carried 25,500 fewer passengers than in November 2000. "With two months' sizeable losses, it is clear that the profit of US$6.4 million that we had earned at the start of the fourth quarter is in grave danger of becoming a loss for the full year 2001," the update stated. Curtis John, president of the Aviation Communication and Allied Workers Union said the airline was using the situation to its advantage and there was no justification for staff reduction. He said: "Their objective is to get into the area of contract labour." Union officials met with BWIA management yesterday. In October, the airline asked workers to accept a wage freeze as one of a number of cost-cutting measures in the wake of September 11. The airline also had to face increased insurance rates. The owner of Roger's Trinbago Site: Roj (Roger James) *************************************************** Trinbago site: http://www.tntisland.com ICQ: ICQ # 15836110 ICQ Pager: mailto:15836110@pager.icq.com escape email #!1 mailto:ejames@escape.ca yahoo email #2: mailto:triniroj@yahoo.com Yahoo Pager: triniroj Caribbean Brass & Soca Connection Group on Yahoo: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/caribsocabrass Caribbean Brass & Soca Connection Club Website http://www.tntisland.com/caribbeansocabrassconnection/ ******************************************************* Steel Expressions Orch http://www.escape.ca/~ejames/se/ email #1: mailto:steelexpressions@yahoo.com email #2: mailto:steelexpressions@home.com ******************************************************* The Trinbago Site of the Week: (Traffik) http://www.cariwaksoca.com/trafik.htm (Caribbean Traffik Jam) courtesy of Roj Trinbago Website & TnT Web Directory Roj's Trinbago Website: http://www.tntisland.com TnT Web Directory: http://195.224.187.36/ *********************************************************