AER LINGUS PILOTS will conclude voting later today on whether to accept a pay deal compromise put forward by the Labour Court.

The Labour Court recommendation of a 17.75% pay increase over a four-year period came after weeks of industrial action and hundreds of cancelled flights – this intervention came after IALPA threatened further industrial action could be taken. 

Aer Lingus management has accepted the deal and the Irish Airline Pilots Association (IALPA) recommended that its members also accept the deal.

An electronic ballot opened last Thursday and this ballot will close this morning and a result is expected at around 11am.

IALPA initially voted to begin industrial action after rejecting a Labour Court recommendation that would have increased pay by 9.25% – the union had instead been seeking a pay increase of around 24%.

The first day of work-to-rule industrial action by IALPA members at Aer Lingus began on 26 June, and there was also all-out strike action over an eight-hour period on Saturday, 29 June.

Aer Lingus returned to a full service on Wednesday, 17 July ahead of the IALPA ballot on the 17.75% pay deal.

Despite initially seeking a 24% pay increase, IALPA president Mark Tighe last week described the 17.75% deal on the table as a win for pilots.

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Tighe said: “While it’s not quite the inflation that we were discussing we’re looking at, two years from now, pilots will be 19.2% better off than they were – which is some ways towards inflation.”

“We’re recommending it because we believe it’s a deal that the pilots can hopefully accept.

“We’ve had a very successful time as a group of people, demonstrating our unity and strength together, and that’s vitally important moving forward.”