Dionne Rose, Staff Reporter
HYLTON
UP TO press time last night, Minister of Labour and Social Security, Horace Dalley, was locked in a marathon meeting with representatives of the Jamaica Airline Pilots Association (JALPA), the Bustamante Industrial Trade Union (BITU) and the management of Air Jamaica in a bid to resolve a wage dispute.
Talks had broken down on Monday, but Prime Minister P.J. Patterson intervened on Tuesday and implored the parties to return to conciliatory talks at the Labour Ministry.
Yesterday evening, Senator Dwight Nelson, vice-president of the BITU, advised The Gleaner that the meeting was expected to continue into this morning in an effort to complete a 32- point claim.
"After some six, seven hours of discussion, I don't think we are at any position different from where we were at 8 o'clock this morning (Wednesday)."
He explained: "There are still some 32 items on which we have yet to reach an agreement. We are at Item Two and there is still no agreement on those two items. So, I think it is going to be a long, long night."
He said there were 36 points of differences between the union and the company, four of which, he said, were agreed on prior to the meeting.
HYLTON OPTIMISTIC
Meanwhile, Noel Hylton, who is leading the Air Jamaica team in the negotiations, was optimistic that an agreement should be concluded by today.
While declining to say what were some of the points of differences, Mr. Hylton said, "I am hopeful that we will come to an agreement by sometime tomorrow (Thursday).
"We will be here tonight as long as we can and early tomorrow morning and hopefully settle by tomorrow (Thursday) afternoon."
