From the MEC Chairman's letter of today:
The committee has scheduled a meeting with management for Tuesday, March 13. Following the meeting, you will receive a Negotiators’ Notepad, which will provide you with an introduction to the contract opener as well as the opener itself.
Wow! Terrific! I sure would not have guessed that! The MEC will be providing us with the "opener
itself."
Keep in mind that, as in past contracts, the opener will be largely conceptual in nature.
Oh well...that euphoria didn't last long. The above statement is a flat out lie. In past contracts, our union released a highly detailed summary of the opener after it was exchanged with management. I remember one over 20 pages in length showing the details of every section and what we were demanding in each section. Why would TO say such a thing when there are thousands of us that remember just the opposite?
Second, "...the opener will be largely conceptual in nature?" How does that square with the previous sentence that states: "
which will provide you with an introduction to the contract opener as well as the opener itself."
But instead of any critical thinking at all, we have a number of folks here dying to portray this as the start of something really big. Sigh...
You will be able to understand where and in what sections we will seek improvements,
I don't know if I've ever read a single paragraph wherein each sentence walked back the previous sentence. Now we're down to some sort of "largely conceptual" document that will allow us some "understanding" where and in what sections we will "seek improvements." So TO will have done his duty with a document that says we'll be seeking improvements somewhere in Scope. This will allow some members to think that we're shooting for a reversing in outsourcing, while the actual opener may be to only hold the line on outsourcing and close the RAH loophole. Close the loophole with more "rock solid" language that is.
but it is important that negotiations occur in the negotiating room and not in public.
What an embarrassing straw man. The members knowing what
their bargaining agent is opening with...is NOT negotiating in public. That is a pathetic attempt to make Delta pilots feel good about being mushroomed.
I've got to say guys, I'm disappointed with the level of critical reading here. If this attribute of ours doesn't get better, we'll get steamrolled.
Now cue up the usual suspects who tell me to go retire somewhere, or take that negative ALPA versus DPA crap somewhere else.
Carl