AIR traffic controllers were back on the job yesterday, but still want to mount a legal challenge to a Supreme Court order that those who had called in sick on Thursday and Friday should get back to work.

“We want to challenge the court order, because how can you order people who are genuinely sick to return to work?” asked Howard Greaves, the president of the Jamaica Air Traffic Controllers Association (JATCA).

He was speaking from inside a JATCA executive meeting, called to formulate a legal response to the court injunction. The labour ministry filed the injunction Friday after the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) reported that a number of air traffic controllers had called in sick.

CAA Director-General Colonel Torrance Lewis told the Sunday Observer that approximately 10 workers called in sick for each of the five shifts from Thursday night into Friday. The industrial action, he said, had taken the CAA by surprise as the two bodies were on good negotiating terms and had discussed non-monetary aspects of the JATCA’s concerns about two weeks ago.

“The last time they took industrial action, we had some indication, but this time we were a bit surprised. I suppose they just thought they were going to be sick,” Lewis said.

But Greaves maintained that his colleagues had been genuinely ill.

The fact that they had not discussed wage negotiations at their last meeting with the CAA was a clear indication that there was no sick-out planned, he said. Genuinely ill members had called in sick, a move that had been misinterpreted by the CAA and the ministry of labour, he added.

“Only about nine or 10 people, in all, called in,” said Greaves.

He added, however, that air traffic controllers want to meet with the Minister of Finance, Dr Omar Davies, to discuss their proposal for a 20 per cent salary increase.

But Transport Minister Robert Pickersgill told the Sunday Observer that it was unlikely that the pay hike would be approved because of the public sector memorandum of understanding. The MOU put a three per cent cap on wages that were being negotiated before it came into effect on February 17, 2004 and froze all others.

“Once you give it (a pay increase) to one group, then it’s no secret, you have to give it to all; and that will undermine the MOU,” Pickersgill said.

“The last time they took industrial action, the ministry of labour, under the Essential Services Act, got an injunction against them. Now they did it again with the thinking that once they didn’t say it was industrial action, then it wasn’t,” the minister added.

The air traffic controllers also want an extended leave period, improved health benefits and a revamping of the CAA’s educational programme, which would give them time to further their studies. They said they are frequently asked to work 12-hour shifts, which is double the normal time of six hours per shift.