Two 24-hour stoppages are pencilled in for Bank Holiday Monday August 25 and the following Friday, August 29. Other carriers that would be affected include Air Malta, Air Transat, Oman Air, K D Avia, TAP Air Portugal, and Virgin Nigeria. Any action will not affect British Airways, which has its own handling operation at Gatwick.
The dispute involves baggage handlers and check-in staff employed by Swissport, who have rejected a 3% pay offer and plans to axe their sick pay for the first three days of absence, including that resulting from industrial injury.
At Gatwick, 318 Swissport employees voted 72% in favour of industrial action. They are asking for a 5% rise with no conditions.
Workers at Stansted were awaiting results of a similar ballot on Friday, while those at Manchester were due to vote on Monday. More ballots will take place throughout the coming week at Birmingham and Newcastle airports.
A Gatwick spokeswoman said: ”We are talking to Swissport about what this might look like.”
Swissport said it was working to minimise disruption. Both it and Gatwick said they were ”disappointed” by the threat of industrial action.
Steve Turner, national officer for Unite, the union involved in the dispute, blamed a ”race to the bottom” by airlines anxious to cut costs for the escalation of the dispute.
Virgin Atlantic said only five of its flights a day would be affected and that unspecified contingency arrangements were already in place.
”We have been here before and coped before,” said a spokesman.
Gary Noakes
More about Gatwick here