Editorial

Air traffic controllers have an exacting and a highly responsible job. Their conditions should therefore be commensurate with their duties and responsibilities. Having said that, however, they ought not to consider themselves above the law. As air traffic controllers, they carry out an essential service and are therefore prohibited from taking industrial action.

What they did last Thursday, handing over what they call as the approach control licence to the labour director when they found they could not move ahead in their talks over their collective agreement, was equivalent to just that, taking industrial action.

They brought the airport to a standstill, directly hitting no fewer than 14 flights and disrupting the travel plans of hundreds of tourists and Maltese.

Was it wise on their part to do so much damage in so short a time when they could have chosen other means to press their claims? It definitely was not.

It is in fact never wise to hit essential services. That is why there are laws to protect the country from such actions. However valid their claim is, the air traffic controllers should not have gone to this extent. If they felt they could not make headway in the talks, they should have at least tried to seek public support first before taking action.

Their move brought back memories of the action taken by air traffic controllers in the United States on August 3, 1981 when some 13,000 of the 17,500 members of the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organisation walked off the job. Their dispute was over claims for higher wages, a shorter work week and better retirement benefits.

The then President, Ronald Reagan, lost no time in facing the situation squarely. He gave the air traffic controllers an ultimatum: they were either to return to work within 48 hours or face termination. The workers were federal employees and as such they were violating the no-strike clause when they walked off the job.

In firing the controllers, President Reagan had been accused of resorting to a brutal overkill, but the people generally sided with the government. The controllers' organisation's leaders were hauled off to jail for ignoring court injunctions against a strike and the justice department proceeded with indictments against 75 controllers.

Fines amounting to $1 million a day were levied against the union while the strike lasted, and over 11,000 strikers received their pink slips.

In Malta too, air traffic controllers are prohibited from striking under the essential services section of the Air Services Act and their work will also be deemed to be an essential service under the new Employment and Industrial Relations Bill currently being debated in parliament. This is indeed as it should be for the air traffic controllers' work remains an essential service.

The executive secretary of the Malta Air Traffic Control Association has denied that the air traffic controllers were using their licences as a strike weapon. But in handing over their licence to the labour director, that is exactly what they did and the government should not allow any sector of the community to take advantage of another in this way.

Again, however justifiable their claim is, the air traffic controllers were wrong in their action.