What is it with you lot? 10 pages worth of the pitfalls with the Brookfield contract within Ryanair. Same issues expressed around this time every year, each year they become more and more exacerbated. And everybody still argues about it.
1. No one moans in the summer when we are doing 80-90 hrs per month. If anything I hear people complaining that they are bollexed and can't get any time off!
2. No one moans when they first get taken on as a cadet, whizz through line training and fly their little asses off at the expense of more expensive FOs.
3. The UK and Irish operation has become a seasonal one at best. With high tax rates, stagnated growth, vast competition and the recession; I can't see it changing unfortunately. Yet what percentage of the airline is/wants to be based here?
4. The Brookfield Contract is here to stay. MOL is a regular Houdini and will magic his way out of anything to suit his purpose. The current Ryanair contract stands at €28000 basic and half sector pay for FOs. It would be a ****e side less if the powers that be turned round and told Ryanair to employ all their pilots directly. Actually, what you would probably see is around a quarter to a third of FOs being laid off completely and the rest being placed on seasonal contracts a la Jet2.
5. People now joining seem to have no expectation. I have mixed emotions on this one. For one I am glad that people have a sense of reality however a cadet that I spoke to just yesterday was only too prepared to be sent to any outpost whatsoever and perfectly accepted that he may be looking at a lengthy spell in the right hand seat. He was only 2 minutes in the company and he was admitting that he would probably be gone in 3 to 4 years anyway. Is this the type of candidate Ryanair now want? - I willing to bet so!
6. EMT is now a TRTO and has been for some time. Nice little business which will continue to do very well, even after the last 737-800 rolls out of Seattle, the growth ends and MOL heads for the hills after cashing in his remaining shares!