Mr. Sean Doyle:

There is a lot in what the Deputy has asked. Perhaps I will start about the questions about payroll and the TWSS. We have operated the TWSS in a way that is entirely consistent with the legislation enacted and have worked closely with the Revenue Commissioners in that regard. We have had to implement cost-saving measures and I refer the Deputy to the hours of work and pay that have been given by the airline. We operated approximately 5% of the normal Aer Lingus flying programme between April and June. Our programme increased a little in July but was still less than 20% of a normal year. Over that period, we guaranteed 50% of hours and wages to our employees.

In every case, the full value of the subsidy has been passed on to our employees. Anybody who was entitled to more, on the basis of the commitment that we made, was topped up over and above the subsidy to the pay applicable to the hours they have worked. In addition, for the days that employees did not work, we paid an amount equivalent to the short-time working payment they would otherwise have received from social welfare.

We have, unfortunately, had to lay off some staff members but we still paid them the full subsidy, thereby maintaining the employment relationship between the airline and those employees. We have been compliant with the legislation pertaining to the TWSS and have worked hard to make sure that is the case.

I will talk about the guarantees we can give. At the outset, I told the committee about the scale of the challenge we are facing and how unprecedented it is. At the moment, we are well behind what other European carriers are doing to reinstate services, recover the operation and have more hours to go around. We are uncertain about the future because our pathway, in the short term, is unclear. That returns to the points I made earlier. We have been engaging constructively with Fórsa, SIPTU and the Irish Air Line Pilots Association. Unfortunately, we are yet to reach the kinds of agreements that we would have liked but we have put a lot of effort and energy into those engagements.