MANILA: Philippine Airlines said it had cancelled all its international and domestic flights on Tuesday after a surprise walk-out by its ground crew in protest at plans to oursource their 2,600 jobs.
The strike added to the chaos brought on by powerful Typhoon Nesat, which slammed into the country earlier in the day causing many other domestic flights, ferry services and railway operations to be suspended.
"We are cancelling flights today, all the way up to 6:00pm (1000 GMT). This affects all our international and domestic flights," PAL spokeswoman Cielo Villaluna told AFP.
"Our workers walked out of their jobs and these include the airport services staff in charge of checking in and boarding passengers, as well as those in the catering services."
Villaluna said it was not clear how many of the 2,600 ground crew whose jobs are due to be outsourced were involved in the strike, but she pointed out it was enough to paralyse operations.
"We are now taking steps to find a solution to ensure that normal operations are restored," Villaluna said.
She said the move was meant to be a "pressure tactic" by the ground staff union to prevent the loss-making PAL from spinning off its in-flight catering, airport services and call centre reservations by October 1.
PAL sent termination notices to its ground staff last month, saying it needed to trim its workforce to save up to 15 million dollars in annual operating costs.
PAL, Asia's oldest airline, reported a net loss of $10.6 million for the three months to June.
PAL has said the laid-off staff have an option to join the outsourcing operation. But this has infuriated the union, which said the conditions of the new jobs would be far inferior.
The mass firing was backed by President Benigno Aquino this year.
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