Alitalia also in trouble

Alitalia has been in trouble for years - the Italian government has been giving them huge amounts of cash (illegally according to the EU but although the EU has been 'telling off' the Italians, they haven't actually stopped them).

Alitalia is probably the most over-staffed airline around and within the industry, it's known that the only way to get a job there is to know someone and if you know someone senior, you are guaranteed a job (disclaimer - this is hearsay but common knowledge iykwim). It's known as a badly run company - for example, it was one of the few airlines that lost money in 2000 which was the last boom year for the industry.

Air France/KLM put in a bid to buy them earlier in the year but the unions voted against that because it meant around 5,000 redundancies. At the same this was going on, Berlusconi got back into power - part of his campaign was stating that the Italians needed to keep their national airline Italian and not sell out to 'foreigners'. He said he had a definite plan to save the airline.

The unions won't negotiate and I have just seen a report that they are now out of cash and may not fly from Monday. I think it's a case of watch this space - it all depends on the unions now.