Portugal’s Economy Minister, António Pires de Lima, is not backing down in the pitched battle with airline TAP pilots union and fully expects the union members to reconsider their planned strike action scheduled for May 1st.
Speaking to reporters after a Brazil-Portugal Business Forum, which included among the guests the Vice President of Brazil Michel Temer, Pires de Lima said that we have to hope that the union will 'better understand the situation' and understand the impact that the pre-announcement of the strike is having on public opinion.
Pires de Lima did not qualify or quantify his assertion that public opinion was against the strike and it is unlikely that a poll yet has been commissioned or any results known.
Pires de Lima said "our commitment is to respect the agreement we made in December 2014, there is no change in relation to this agreement."
Last week, the Union of Civil Aviation Pilots (SPAC) delivered a strike notice for between May 1st and 10th, which, according Pires de Lima, if it goes ahead "will cause great harm to the Portuguese economy, especially the tourism sector."
"I want to believe that the strike will not happen, it would do tremendous damage to TAP and would be very bad for the economy," said the minister, when asked about the meetings that are scheduled between the pilots union and the TAP president.
On the possibility of again using a rarely implemented civil requisition to keep the airline flying, the economy minister soberly added that he did not want to speculate.
Pires de Lima’s conference speech concentrated on the planned privatisation for Lisbon port, but talked about TAP as well despite the current problems saying the airline runs almost 90 flights per week to and from Brazil and is the "biggest carrier from Europe to Brazil," more than double the frequency of the airlines in second and third place.
The minister spoke of the "joint wills" of Portugal and Brazil with biotechnology, aeronautics, shared service centers, information technology and renewable energy as areas where more partnerships could be developed.
There are two remaining candidates from Brazil in the TAP sale process, GOL and Azul.
Comments
Amongst the muddle will be the hoteliers with pre-booked 'packaged' flights and accomodation who presumably have to pay back their anticipated guests. Or assume these guests will make alternative travel arrangements with a budget airline. Or do a TAP and hang onto the money.
As Pires da Lima has spotted there is much negative spin-off in this chaos to Portugal's reputation as a tourist destination.
It seems to me that TAP is not moving with the times. Does it have a budget brand? If it does, why do I not know about it? I suspect that TAP is vainly grasping at a market which is disappearing, and neglecting the bulk carrying budget market.
The current financial state of TAP must be enough to alert anyone with eyes to see that it is impossible to run a profitable airline based on the Lusophone market.