Govt plays hard-ball with Air Malta's cabin crew union

After the Union of Cabin Crew (UCC) stormed out of a meeting with tourism minister Edward Zammit Lewis late Friday, the govt has started a recruitment process for Air Malta cabin crew adverts published in various newspapers. In view of the stand-off between the two sides, this could be seen as a thinly veiled threat by the govt to apply pressure on current Air Malta cabin crew to comply with what is being offered. The advertisement calls on all trained cabin crew to apply for a 3-day refresher course starting Monday. This is not the first conflict to unfold in relation with embattled Air Malta, with the Airline Pilots Association previously taking industrial action over a collective agreement that expired last year. Sources have said that the UCC had been offered a similar package to what had been offered to ALPA. <br/>