Originally Posted by
Tuck
Uh no - they all are - we have no choice in the amount of dues we give or how those dues are spent - as a result very little comes back to us - a bit more than 50% total. We have very little choice (6000 votes out of the total - one vote here is the same as one vote at a Canadian regional) in how national policies and objectives are created. Those are two that just pop to mind.
Not that I agree with any of that but it doesn’t refute anything I said. No MEC is EVER beholden to ANYONE at National. That is a fact. No one at National can tell our MEC what to negotiate, how to negotiate, how to handle management relations, what to grieve, what to send to arbitration, when to picket, how to communicate with pilots, etc. All workings of the MEC and its committees, LECs and their workings and committees are done at the direction of only those bodies. All that is fact.
As for Canadian regionals, last I checked, those 20 airlines have one EVP. The FDX MEC has one EVP all for itself. And I’m pretty sure our BOD members outnumber all their BOD members combined when it comes to 6000 pilots.
Originally Posted by
5millionaire
maybe in a vacuum, yes. But you gotta wonder how many of these guys would love to work at National. So: they are on parade every time they have an interaction with anyone at National. I get what you’re saying, if they choose to be…but that begs the question, how many people that “volunteer” are actually selfless “volunteers”? We ***** about all the independent contractors but aren’t some of the union guys also independent contractors?
I’m all for a union. I’m complaining because I like the thought of someone who goes into an office in khakis, gets paid by US(the pilots), to send a few emails and get a free lunch reading this and feeling ashamed.
That’s a whole different issue. We have a pool of pilots we choose as leaders. Whether we choose good ones or not is not my point. But regardless of the letters in the name of the union, we will still choose from the same pool of pilots.
Originally Posted by
Nightflyer
At least we got to directly vote for the President, VP, and Sec/Treasurer. We don't get that choice now.
Also, what good does the MCF from ALPA national do us, if they won't let us have any of it (2015) because "our" union is so corrupt they won't show them the books?
ALPA national only wants us for our money, plain and simple. What have they done about the "cargo cutout"? Oh, right, we don't really matter to them, now do we?
I wasn’t here but how did that work out for everyone? Seems like that union got democratically voted out. As for the MCF, if our mec decided not to use it when they should’ve, that’s a problem with the MEC members, not ALPA National or ALPA as a whole.
I think people get this wrong all the time. They blame ALPA, the organization, for the errors of someone specifically. Would have the exact same governing body made the same decision under the same circumstances if the letters on the door were FPA?
By the way, I’m all for “one level of safety.” But I’m certain that if ALPA National was successful in helping pass a bill that required us to operate under 117, many would be mad at ALPA for it.