Members of the Italian Airline Pilots Association, or ANPAC, voted overwhelmingly in favour of the new arrangements earlier this week.

ANPAC is understood to represent around a third of Ryanair’s nearly 900 pilots in Italy.

It is the first such agreement between Ryanair and any union, with the airline hoping to negotiate a similar settlement with Irish union FORSA.

Eddie Wilson, Ryanair’s chief people officer, said: “We welcome this first CLA with our Italian pilots and hope that it will be shortly followed by a similar agreement covering our Irish pilots.

“We have invited our UK, German and Spanish unions to meet with us in the coming days so that we can negotiate and hopefully agree similar pilot CLAs in these other larger markets.

“These agreements demonstrate the real progress being made by Ryanair in its negotiations with its pilots and their unions across different EU markets.”