Caribbean Air­lines Lim­it­ed pi­lots, rep­re­sent­ed by the Trinidad and To­ba­go Air­line Pi­lots’ As­so­ci­a­tion (TTAL­PA), de­liv­ered a let­ter to the Min­is­ter of Fi­nance yes­ter­day. They al­so held a silent demon­stra­tion out­side the Er­ic Williams Fi­nan­cial Com­plex along In­de­pen­dence Square, Port-of-Spain.

Dressed in their full uni­forms, the pi­lots gath­ered out­side the fi­nan­cial com­plex and voiced their frus­tra­tion over pro­longed de­lays in salary ne­go­ti­a­tions, hav­ing worked un­der ex­pired con­tracts for the past nine years.

They cit­ed con­cerns about job se­cu­ri­ty, low­er wages com­pared to for­eign pi­lots and the air­line’s pro­pos­al of a 20 per cent salary cut. The pi­lots al­so crit­i­cised the Gov­ern­ment for what they called its in­ad­e­quate re­sponse to their pro­pos­als, which have fur­ther de­layed ne­go­ti­a­tions.

Dur­ing the protest, they de­liv­ered the let­ter to Im­bert, un­der whose purview Caribbean Air­lines falls.

TTAL­PA trustee Kei­th Dowdy said pi­lots, who al­so protest­ed ear­li­er this month at the Pi­ar­co In­ter­na­tion­al Air­port, were will­ing to com­pro­mise.

“Our terms and con­di­tions con­tract has been ex­pired for nine years, and we re­ceived no re­sponse from our peace­ful pick­et. We have clear­ly ex­pressed what we want - 4 per cent in­crease, which we be­lieve fits the na­tion­al con­text. This would be a com­pro­mise on our part, al­low­ing us to re­turn to ful­ly sup­port­ing the air­line.”

He added, “To put it in­to con­text, our salaries are de­ter­mined by bench­mark­ing. If you pur­chase an air­craft, you need some­one skilled enough to fly it safe­ly. If Caribbean Air­lines re­placed all its pi­lots and hired for­eign pi­lots, what would they pay them? What would their com­pen­sa­tion be? That’s why you bench­mark. “Cur­rent­ly, a se­nior flight at­ten­dant at Unit­ed Air­lines earns more than a cap­tain at Caribbean Air­lines. We are earn­ing less than 50 per cent of what pi­lots fly­ing the same air­craft in­to the same des­ti­na­tions—like JFK or Toron­to—are mak­ing, de­spite op­er­at­ing un­der the same weath­er and con­di­tions.”

The pi­lots’ as­so­ci­a­tion said they will con­tin­ue their ac­tion for as long as it is con­sti­tu­tion­al, guid­ed by in­dus­tri­al re­la­tions con­sul­tants and with­in le­gal bounds.

“We will pur­sue every pos­si­ble course of ac­tion. Our backs are against the wall, and we can­not re­turn to our mem­ber­ship with noth­ing to of­fer,” said Dowdy.

The protest by the pi­lots yes­ter­day again did not im­pact flights com­ing in and out of the coun­try’s two air­ports.

At the start of this month, pi­lots - armed with plac­ards, walked through the Pi­ar­co In­ter­na­tion­al Air­port and stood out­side to protest the de­layed ne­go­ti­a­tions.

TTAL­PA has been in the mid­dle of col­lec­tive agree­ment is­sues dat­ing back to 2015, and with the pan­dem­ic, fi­nan­cial chal­lenges wors­ened, lead­ing to sig­nif­i­cant pay cuts for pi­lots to pre­serve their jobs.

As part of the ne­go­ti­a­tions, pi­lots sac­ri­ficed a por­tion of their salaries to help CAL main­tain op­er­a­tions, but they con­tin­ued to seek bet­ter terms re­gard­ing wages and work­ing con­di­tions.

In Au­gust 2023, CAL pi­lots called in sick, leav­ing thou­sands of pas­sen­gers strand­ed and af­fect­ing dozens of flights.

How­ev­er, TTAL­PA said it nev­er in­struct­ed any in­dus­tri­al ac­tion. An in­junc­tion was lat­er sought by CAL re­strain­ing pi­lots from call­ing in sick.

Yes­ter­day, Dowdy said while TTAL­PA was try­ing to re­solve the mat­ter with meet­ings, it was un­cer­tain if these would con­tin­ue.

“We were in a meet­ing with Caribbean Air­lines, and we were sent back to it. We have been faith­ful­ly at­tend­ing these meet­ings in a very am­i­ca­ble at­mos­phere, and we have made every ef­fort to ac­com­mo­date their con­cerns. How­ev­er, they are now say­ing that it is un­rea­son­able to con­tin­ue, as it’s clear they are not go­ing to re­ceive an an­swer from high­er au­thor­i­ties,” Dowdy said.