LIAT: Job cuts expected

(from left) CEO of LIAT, Brian Challenger; Chairman of LIAT, Dr. Jean Holder; Prime Minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Dr. Ralph Gonsalves; and Prime Minister of Barbados, Freundel Stuart

(Barbados Nation) – Job and route cuts are on the horizon as Leeward Islands Airt Transport (LIAT), charts a course to keep its planes in the sky and return to profitability.

The path could also include a change in the “nature and character” of the airline.

That indication came yesterday from St Vincent and the Grenadines Prime Minister Dr Ralph Gonsalves, chairman of LIAT’s shareholder governments, at a press conference following a full day of meetings with Prime Minister Freundel Stuart, his Antigua and Barbuda counterpart Baldwin Spencer, LIAT’s board and management and unions representing workers.

“Across the board, we have to make savings, we have to be more efficient in the way we are doing things, we have to enhance our revenues and we have to reduce the unit cost of operation,” Gonsalves said.