It’s your job to set policy and direction and make changes to personnel as required. The MEC is higher on the union structure than the negotiating committee, but from my perspective it sure looks the other way around.
The members of our negotiating committee are extremely talented and dedicated and have made huge personal sacrifices over the past four years. However, when you look at the roller coaster of ups and downs over these last four years - mostly downs - it’s totally understandable to have a negotiating committee that is battle-fatigued, especially when fed a continuous diet of doom and gloom from the very savvy and experienced management negotiating team.
It’s your job to recognize this and make appropriate changes to rectify the situation. When you listen to the conference call, listen closely to how Mike Hynes answers not only my comments but virtually every other caller’s comments. What I hear from Mike is very similar to what I and many others hear from the negotiating committee, a defensive, condescending, and somewhat arrogant tone - especially when anyone questions their actions.
At this time, I don’t believe we should recall our negotiating committee; however, I feel it would be an appropriate time to temporarily send them back to the line. We all know Continental has a staffing problem and we could certainly use the help. This would also give the negotiating committee members some perspective and a chance to experience first-hand, the reality of what our membership deals with every day. Four or more years of full-time trip loss is too much time for any union official to be away from the line. I would much rather have our negotiators return to the line than spin numbers on potential concession scenarios.
Another area of significant concern is Mike Bowen, our MEC Vice Chairman. I have only spoken to Mike on two occasions in the recent past. The first was just prior to or during the Iraq war last year and the second time was on the P2P conference call last Tuesday. Both times he acted the same - severely dejected, “battle fatigued,” or, more appropriately stated, someone who is suffering from the “Stockholm syndrome.”
For example, on the conference call Mike made statements like “the airline business will be a whole lot different (if Bush wins in November), we may not have very many current pilots flying our airplanes…In eight days Chris Lynch and I who interviewed together, started class together will be in this business eighteen years. This certainly isn’t what we signed up for at all…There are some of us questioning whether we’re going to be airline pilots ten years from now. I should have studied in school.”