Local Lodge 2508

APRIL 20, 2012­—RICH DELANEY District 141 was informed late last night by US Airways that they had reached agreements with three unions representing employees of American Airlines, including the Transport Workers Union that represents Fleet Service employees, over labor agreements in the event of a merger between the two carriers.

It is unbelievable that the company would secretly negotiate with labor groups outside of their own airline, and reach contractual terms for the future, when the state of labor relations within US Airways is so uncertain.

Insulting
It is insulting and disrespectful to the employees of US Airways to learn that, while the company’s negotiators have been unwilling to agree to terms with their own unions, they announce agreements with outside organizations that they publicly claim are improvements to the contract we are negotiating.

Read more         Download PDF

As American Airlines works its way through the bankruptcy maze that we have already experienced, District 141 is preparing for their exit from court.

Our first concern is possibility of consolidation in some form with US Airways. Our experiences with mergers and consolidation show us that the only entity looking out for the interests of workers now is the Union. The potential of a merged AA/US airline would be similar to the past examples of DL/NW and UA/Continental—some classifications are fully represented by Unions (although different) and some are partially represented. The lessons we have learned over the past years regarding organizing both the unorganized and the traditionally organized workers will be a great help and we are planning for these issues now.

The second concern we have applies to all District 141 Members. The reality that the current labor agreements on AA will be changed and downgraded through the bankruptcy process. While it would be simple to take the position that we all suffered through our bankruptcies so now it is AA’s turn, that will not help. As we have seen time and again in this industry, companies look at the lowest comparison for employee compensation and working conditions, not the best or even the average. We have seen this in our own negotiations when comparing the IAM agreement to the IBT contract and have faced it in every round of negotiations since AA developed the two tiered pay scale in the early 1980’s. As we continue our contract negotiations on United and US Airways we need to be fully aware of what is happening to our brothers and sisters at AA.

US Airways has announced the reduction of force in stations across the system. The reason given for these furloughs is a combination of schedule changes and the loss of contract work.

While all affected IAM members will have the ability to transfer to other stations, we are reviewing the announcement to determine that all contract provisions are enforced.

The impacted stations are PIT, LAS, EWR, MCO, PBI, SFO, and TPA.

In November of 2011 the IAM (District 141), TWU and Southwest Airlines entered into a “Seniority Integration Process Agreement” for the purpose of developing a single seniority list for the combination of both carriers “under wing” employees.

In accordance with the “Seniority Integration Process Agreement” between the IAM, TWU and Southwest Airlines and failing to reach a successful completion of a complete agreement on the integrated seniority list, the parties have selected and agreed upon a panel of arbitrators. The panel will consist of the following arbitrators:

Roberts Golick, Esq.
Ira F. Jaffe, Esq.
M. David Vaughn, Esq.

Arbitrator Jaffe shall serve as Chairperson of the panel. Hearing dates have been set as well. The hearing shall be from April 12, 2012 through April 16, 2012 if necessary.

Read more