* Aer Lingus in talks with state, parent group on liquidity
* Airline cannot give assurances on no further job losses
* Ireland to ease EU's toughest travel curbs from July 19
(Releads on liquidly talks)
By Padraic Halpin
DUBLIN, June 22 (Reuters) - Aer Lingus needs a few hundred
million euros in extra liquidity due to COVID-19 disruptions and
does not expect the easing of Irish travel curbs next month to
provide a significant near term bounce, its new chief executive
said on Tuesday.
The Irish airline, which recently announced company-wide
layoffs and the closure of one of its main domestic cabin crew
bases, is losing more than 1 million euros ($1.19 million) a
day, Lynne Embleton told an Irish parliamentary committee.
It is in funding talks with the Irish state and its parent
International Airlines Group, having already received a
150 million euro loan from Ireland's sovereign wealth fund last
year.
"We are looking to restore our liquidity to the tune of a
few hundred million euros. The precise numbers depend on where
we can access liquidity from, the terms of that liquidity and
indeed the number of days we continue to burn cash," she said.
Embleton said the decision to close the carrier's base at
Shannon Airport, one of its four main domestic hubs, did not
signal a strategic retreat from Ireland's regions. But she said
she could not give assurances there would be no more job losses.
Ireland's airlines have been highly critical of the
government's COVID-19 travel curbs which for months have been
the strictest in the European Union.
Ireland will adopt the EU's COVID-19 certificate to help
citizens move more freely across the bloc from July 19, as well
as broadly applying the same approach to Britain and the United
States.
"It is looking too little too late to have a significant
bounce that will get us on the right path to restoring
connectivity, supporting jobs in the near term," Embleton said,
citing curbs for unvaccinated travellers from Britain and the
United States.
"We will be smaller for some time to come unfortunately and
it will take a long time to fully recover," she said.
($1 = 0.8406 euros)
(Reporting by Padraic Halpin; Editing by Louise Heavens and
Edmund Blair)
International Airlines (IAG)
