'Good chance' of saving Air NZ jobs

The chances of saving some Air New Zealand aircraft engineering jobs is better than 50 per cent according to one union - but the airline is being less upbeat.

Airline chief executive Rob Fyfe announced yesterday that 110 of 617 mainly Auckland-based jobs in the heavy maintenance division would go in the next two months.

The job losses were in the aero-engine area as the airline starts outsourcing that work overseas.

The final decision on the remaining 507 jobs, related to wide-body airframe maintenance and support functions, will be made in February after further talks with unions.

The delay in announcing the fate of the remaining jobs is a minor victory for the Engineering, Printing and Manufacturing Union and Aviation and Marine Engineers Association following Air New Zealand's shock announcement in October that it planned to cut 617 jobs.

The unions took the radical step of hiring corporate troubleshooters Michael Stiassny and Brendon Gibson of Ferrier Hodgson to come up with an alternative proposal involving extensive labour reforms across the board, such as more flexible hours.

The tactic of using a firm that had credibility with the airline has delivered the unions a reprieve and a promise to look at the proposal, which aims to save around 300 jobs.

However, it will involve the agreement of the entire 2000-strong engineers collective at the airline, although Engineers Union national secretary Andrew Little says they have that in principle.

Mr Little was upbeat yesterday despite not being able to persuade the airline to keep the aero engine workers, saying he was confident the proposal would be accepted for the remaining staff.

"For that half of the proposal I am optimistic."

Mr Fyfe told the Herald yesterday that the airline had an open mind about the proposal.

"However I must reiterate, that unless a revised wide-body option produces comparable savings to outsourcing, then we will have no option but to close this part of the business," he said.

"We are sufficiently interested to keep the dialogue going and we'd only do that if there was a possibility of success, but I'd say it's a possibility rather than a likely outcome."

"You do need to be cautious - there's a lot of work to be done here yet."

The airline has estimated it would need to make $48 million in cost savings over five years to make retaining the business viable.

Association national secretary George Ryde said the timing could not be worse for the workers losing their jobs, with Christmas looming.

He said some could be redeployed to other parts of the airline and he had heard that Air New Zealand had been approached by other firms seeking workers.

"These guys have got very high skills which may be useful for other industries. They are guys who do like fiddling with aircraft, so a lot of them will be looking at their opportunities overseas."

Mr Ryde said he had safety concerns about engine maintenance being outsourced overseas.

"If you do your own engineering you have control; you apply your standards."

But Mr Fyfe said suggestions that outsourcing might compromise safety were "grossly incorrect" and scaremongering.

BY THE NUMBERS

* 110 Jobs Air NZ announced yesterday would go from the wide-body aero-engine area from next year.

* 507 Jobs still on the line in the wide-body airframe maintenance area.

* $48m Amount that would have to be saved over five years to make retaining the airframe maintenance viable. 300

* The number of jobs the unions believe can be saved under a Ferrier Hodgson counter-proposal put to the airline.