Adelaide Airservices cuts risk lives

Date: 06 April 2000

Airservices Australia are planning a further round of job cuts for the Adelaide staff responsible for maintaining the safety of the National Airways System.

CPSU Aviation Section Secretary, Adrian O?Connell warned today that ?If this round of job cuts proceed over 70% of the Airways technical and engineering staff responsible for Adelaide and rural South Australia will have gone. In 1998, 92 staff were required to do the work that Airservices now claims can be done by 27 staff.

?The job cuts are being driven by the Federal Government and Airservices agenda of cost cuts and contracting out. This ideologically driven agenda is placing lives at risk.?

Adrian O?Connell said ?We are concerned about safety and what the cuts mean for of rural pilots and the travelling public of South Australia. South Australia will lose experienced operatives whose local knowledge of conditions in South Australia cannot be replaced.

?Safety standards will drop. It will take longer for faults to be rectified, particularly in regional and rural areas. Project work will be planned and designed on the east coast or in Canberra without access to crucial local knowledge.

?The National Airways System is the complex web of navigational aids and communications systems that maintain the safety of pilots and the flying public throughout Australia. Airservices and the federal government apparently no longer see the maintenance of this vital public infrastructure as a safety issue.

?Airservices plans further cuts to service for regional and rural South Australia. It has already tried to cut back on navigational aids and it plans further cuts to radio information services to pilots through out regional South Australia.

We will be raising the issue in safety forums and with the Senate. Airservices has been cutting jobs since 1991 and now they are going too far.?

Media Comment:

Adrian O?Connell,
CPSU Aviation Section Secretary
Ph (02) 9211-9292
Mobile 0418 977 170

Kate Coleman,
CPSU South Australian Branch Secretary
Ph (08) 8422 3999
Mobile 0419 818 195

Background:
Alistair Waters,
National Industrial Officer
Phone (03) 9206-2211

For further information

Contact:	Adrian O'Connell
Union:	CPSU - National Office
Phone:	0418 977 170

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