The rift between striking pilots and Air France deepened yesterday as management pledged to forge ahead with its low-cost airline ambitions in the country.
Plans to create new foreign hubs for budget arm Transavia are being postponed until the end of the year in an effort to buy time for detailed talks.
But chief executive Alexandre de Juniac he said he would press ahead with plans to develop Transavia in France.
He said his plans were aimed at averting “catastrophic consequences” for the company due to the walk out by pilots which enters its eighth day today (Tuesday).
Acknowledging that talks with the unions had reached deadlock, he threatened to abandon a 2007 deal on a staged rollout for Transavia in France, instead moving more quickly to add aircraft and recruit pilots regardless.
As pilots extended their industrial action until Friday – costing the airline €20 million a day – de Juniac said: “To remain in the race in Europe, we have no alternative than to rapidly expand Transavia,
“We are now taking every measure to explain and accelerate its growth out of France. The Air France-KLM Group is reaffirming its aim of reaching a fleet of more than 100 Transavia aircraft by 2017.”
Chairman Frédéric Gagey added: “These decisions must enable us to restore calm within the company and end the strike that has lasted too long for Air France, its customers and its staff.”
The pilot unions’ demand to use Air France pilots employed under the carrier’s conditions on the Transavia network and to replace the existing 44 Boeing 737s by Airbus A320s, would “inevitably lead Transavia France to failure,” the airline said, adding: “The compromise solutions proposed by management have all been rejected.”
The airline added: “If the pilot organisations do not agree to the economic and social terms and conditions of the project put forward, management will be forced to begin the formal procedure for denouncing the agreement to create Transavia France, signed in 2007.
“This agreement currently restricts the development of Transavia France; its withdrawal will make it possible to implement the project more quickly.
“The aim is to rapidly equip Transavia in France with additional aircraft beyond the 14 currently in the fleet.
“It should be remembered that this project included the creation of 1,000 jobs over the next five years, including 250 jobs for French pilots.
“It will now be possible to hire staff faster. The project will, as expected, be primarily open to Air France pilots on a voluntary basis.”
The main pilots’ union SNPL described the proposal as “unacceptable” and an attempt “to put out a fire by blowing on the embers”. The smaller of the two main unions, SPAF, said it also rejected the management position.
“Alexandre de Juniac has completely lost the confidence of the pilots,” Jean-Louis Barber, head of the Air France section of SNPL, told a news conference.