As BWIA workers retrenched UK engineers repair BWIA plane BY JUHEL BROWNE Trinidad Guardian Engineers at BWIA who received their retrenchment notices Tuesday were shocked to learn British engineers began repair work on one of the carrier's aircraft the same day. Aviation sources informed the Guardian that 15 engineers from the United Kingdom arrived in the country a few days before BWIA retrenched 617 of its staff. Sources said the engineers are staying at a hotel near Piarco. Among those retrenched were a significant number of BWIA's mechanics, aircraft inspectors and engineers. On Thursday, BWIA corporate communications director Clint Williams confirmed the UK engineers would be in Trinidad for a few days repairing one of the airline's shelved MD 83s. He did not say whether BWIA paid their hotel expenses and exactly when they arrived in Trinidad. "BWIA has always, from time to time, used contract labour services from approved international suppliers. One such supplier is a company called Staff Hire. It's a UK-based company. They have staff all over the world," Williams said. "We currently have an MD-83 aircraft which is being repaired for return to the lessors. It became apparent that the work on it would not be completed in time for the separation activities since, as you remember, we had sick-out action in that department." On January 22, a third of the BWIA's maintenance and engineering department night shift did not report for work and were accused of taking sick-out action by management. The following day, Williams said that action delayed the annual inspection of one aircraft. Employees in BWIA's maintenance and engineering departments long suspected the airline wanted to scrap their units and hire outside professionals. On Tuesday, BWIA CEO Conrad Aleong announced the airline would outsource its heavy (annual) inspections, making many maintenance and engineering positions redundant. Christopher Abraham, president general of the Aviation Communication and Allied Workers Union said BWIA had no right to contract the UK engineers just as it was about to retrench 617 of its local employees. "I want to ask the Minister of National Security how come his Ministry granted their (UK engineers) work permits. They are now doing work the regular (BWIA) staff would have been doing. You could only grant work permits if the skill doesn't exist in the country," said Abraham. Williams noted in light of BWIA's new business plan, it had no choice. "The decision was made to contract the services of this company in order to finish the work so the aircraft could be returned and we would not incur charges for the late delivery of that aircraft." *************************************************** The owner of Roger's Trinbago Site/TnTisland.com Roj (Roger James) escape email mailto:ejames@escape.ca Trinbago site: www.tntisland.com Carib Brass Ctn site www.tntisland.com/caribbeanbrassconnection/ Steel Expressions www.mts.net/~ejames/se/ Site of the Week: http://www.caribscape.com/tamnakthai/ TnT Webdirectory: http://search.co.tt *********************************************************