Following a ruling in January that prohibited Ryanair for blacklisting pilots that take strike action, the Supreme Court has rejected Ryanair’s application to appeal the decision.

This means that the Court of Appeal ruling is the law. Employers are prohibited from blacklisting their employees for taking strike action. Ryanair were also ordered to pay costs.

The union challenged Europe’s largest airline’s policy of withdrawing travel benefits from pilots who went in strike in 2019 in the UK’s Court of Appeal.

The case related to a 2019 strike by pilots of the airline, where the airline then removed travel benefits from the workers that took industrial action. The January ruling concluded that the move constituted a breach of the Blacklisting Regulations.

BALPA said the decision “underscores that such retaliatory actions against workers who take part in lawful industrial action are both unacceptable and unlawful,” and that this “effectively punished pilots for exercising their legal right to strike”. It was argued that Ryanair’s conduct amounted to blacklisting under UK regulations designed to protect workers from such discriminatory practices”

Alice Yandle, Partner at Farrer & Co, which represented BAPA commented: “We are pleased to hear that the Supreme Court has refused Ryanair’s application for permission to appeal. This confirms that the Court of Appeal’s ruling earlier this year is the law: that the Blacklisting Regulations prohibit employers like Ryanair from blacklisting their employees for taking part in strike action.”

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