More Bad Press 3

This one came from the AGE

Militant controllers 'shirkers'

• Mathew Murphy
• July 31, 2008

THE head of Australia's air services body has accused the nation's air traffic controllers of shirking work commitments to highlight the current shortage of trained staff.

Airservices Australia chief executive Greg Russell told the Asia-Pacific Aviation Conference in Sydney that absenteeism of air traffic controllers was 20 times higher so far this year as wage negotiations approach.

Mr Russell said that in 2006 and 2007 there were seven interruptions to the staffing of Australian air space, but in 2008 there had been 140 interruptions.

"We may well ask what is different in 2008 and I think the answer is pretty obvious," Mr Russell said.

Airservices Australia was 17 controllers short of the 900 required, but the situation had been the same for more than three years, he said.

The shortage of air traffic controllers made headlines recently when the absence of two controllers due to illness meant air space between Sydney and Canberra was unstaffed for two hours. Mr Russell said the situation was not "palatable" but at no time was there danger to aircraft and international standards were not breached.

Air traffic controllers were averaging almost three times as many sick days a year than the rest of the workforce. "Is it too high? … the national benchmark is about six sick days a year. We are running considerably higher than that at the moment … we have to better manage that absenteeism. It's really hurting us," he said.

Mr Russell said the industry needed major reform, including combining the 32 separate air space sectors across Australia so air traffic controllers could be moved across sectors at short notice.

Over the next five years as many as 500 air traffic controllers would be employed, he said.

He said he was hopeful of being able to sit down with the union and work through a deal by September.

The union did not returns calls from The Age yesterday.