OIC welcomes suspension of industrial action over HIAL proposals

Orkney Islands Council has welcomed news HIAL and the Prospect workers union have established a ‘mutually agreeable approach for the modernisation of air traffic services at HIAL’s airports’, with Prospect agreeing to suspend all industrial action from 12.00 today, Monday 25 October 2021, while talks on the implementation of HIAL’s Air Traffic Management System (ATMS) continue.

Leader of Orkney Islands Council, James Stockan, said: “We are relieved to see HIAL and Prospect reach this middle ground and end the disruption that industrial action poses.

“HIAL’s proposed ATMS has generated significant and wide ranging concern since the plans emerged in 2018, and back then we made clear to HIAL and the Scottish Government our objections based on the impact of the loss of these well paid jobs across our islands.

“In spring this year Councillors passed a Notice of Motion calling upon the Scottish Government to require HIAL to pause their proposals in order to give proper consideration to the effect of them on our island communities - as highlighted in the findings of the independent Islands Impact Assessment undertaken by Reference Economic Consultants.

“While we are encouraged to see that - for the time being - air traffic services will continue to be provided locally at Kirkwall airport, we note this is only for the duration of a surveillance programme and we await more detail on what this entails.”

A statement released today by HIAL sets out the next steps:

• The introduction of a surveillance programme across the HIAL network with surveillance services provided for Stornoway, Sumburgh, Kirkwall, Inverness, and Dundee airports from a combined surveillance centre in Inverness.
• The phasing out of procedural air traffic control services and the adoption of more modern and widely used techniques, practiced globally.
• Air traffic services being provided locally at Stornoway, Sumburgh, Kirkwall and Dundee for the duration of the surveillance programme, with air traffic control for Inverness being provided remotely from the combined surveillance centre.
• A review of air traffic provision against a scope, agreed by HIAL and Prospect, to inform the next steps of the programme. The review to be undertaken at the end of the surveillance programme, or at five years, whichever is soonest.

 Read the joint statement from HIAL and Prospect here.