CARIBBEAN Airlines has been fined $350,000 for failing to comply with an Industrial Disputes Tribunal (IDT) ruling to reinstate former Vice-president of Legal Affairs and Corporate Secretary Nerine Small.

The fine was imposed yesterday in the Corporate Area Resident Magistrate's Court after the airline was found guilty of the breach. The court found that the airline failed to carry out an order made by the IDT on July 31, 2012 that Small be reinstated in her job effective July 1, 2011 with payment of full normal wages.

Small, who is an attorney-at-law, was first employed with Air Jamaica from 2002 as associate general counsel. She was made general counsel in 2006. In April 2010, Caribbean Airlines took over Air Jamaica and in May of that year she was made vice-president of legal affairs and corporate secretary. Small's services were terminated in 2011.

Small took the matter to the IDT, which ordered in July 2012 that she should be reinstated. Small, who was represented by attorney-at-law Georgia Gibson Henlin, said her lawyer wrote to Caribbean Airlines in relation to the IDT's ruling. It was reported that the airline responded three days later that it would comply with the order.

On August 15, 2012, the airline sent a letter informing Small that her position had been made redundant. Small then took the issue to court, contending that the airline breached the ruling by refusing to reinstate her.

The airline, in its defence, contended that it complied with the ruling, but Resident Magistrate Tara Reid-Kerr found that it had not done so.