I would like to add my support to the demands by former SRT workers to be admitted to the PIPS pension insolvency protection scheme. I am contacting Ministers Hanafin and Coughlan to ask them to take some action in this regard.

In the wake of the collapse of the SRT pension scheme, the value of the pensions to be made available to members is only about one third of what they expected to receive. The workers believe that were they to be included under the provisions of the Pension Insolvency Protection Scheme, that would go some way to alleviating the situation for themselves and their families.

However, Minister Hanafin seems dead set against affording the former SRT workers the protection of PIPS. The Minister maintains that because SRT was never insolvent in the technical sense, that the pension is not eligible under the relevant 2009 legislation.

I’m not so sure about that, but I am sure that the employer is absolutely insolvent by any reasonable measure. For instance, its liabilities far exceed its assets, and the company can only provide a limited service to Aer Lingus through the ongoing financial support of its Swiss parent.

The workers understand that PIPS will not solve their funding shortfall problem, but it would at least be of some assistance to them. The difference between the price of purchasing pensioner annuities through PIPS would be a small but welcome saving for the scheme.

Given also that the Taoiseach Brian Cowen and Minister Coughlan refused to find a successor business to the successful SRT Dublin operation, it seems the least they could now do is to admit the 1150 former SRT workers to the protection of the PIPS scheme.