Originally Posted by
Lewbronski
The sick leave issue for pilots out for an extended period, among many other issues, could have been solved by applying leverage to our contract negotiations. However, again this cycle, we failed to secure solid, specific contract language to address the predicament we now find ourselves in. If you believe SWAPA and 93% of the pilot group, it was at least partly attributable to the belief that we did not have enough leverage to achieve a truly industry-leading contract. That thought was undergirded by an almost complete, and I would say negligent, lack of understanding of the RLA. That, in turn, resulted in a nearly complete failure to leverage the best negotiating environment for pilots since the 1960's or earlier.
As it stands now, the company is not even taking advantage of a loop hole in our sick leave use policy. They are simply applying the policy, as written in the contract, handed to them by 93% of the pilot group who voted "YES!!!"
It's not like management just started acting this way recently. But like an infant playing peek-a-boo, SWAPA and the pilot group seem surprised every time the company pops its head back up doing the same old sort of thing again.
It has been going on at least as long as I have been here - for about two decades. It's pretty comical. We seem to have had the learning lobe of our brains lobotomized when they offered us the kool-aid and Nikes at new hire training.
But it's not funny for the pilots who will be effected by the sick leave use language we agreed to. Now pilots out on an extended sick leave will be sacrificing some or a lot of their vacation accrual, costing them future income and saving the company cash.
And I know we all can't wait to start riding those middle seats on nearly every DH when we go to assigned seating. But that probably won't be all that hilarious either after the fifth or sixth time.
Oh well, there's always 2032.
I’m getting pretty tired of hearing the execs on Facebook tell us “be patient, this is all part of our strategic super duper secret plan!” Strategy implies a desired end state, unless the strategy is just ‘don’t lose my union job.’ I was patient for four years, voted no on what I thought was a substandard contract in spite of the sell job precisely because of weak language in terms of implementation, vacation weeks, sick leave usage during disability, crew meals, and hotel standards, and deadhead language, and now here we are.
The same people who brought us that weak language won’t even defend what we have in light of the company’s failure to live up to their half of the bargain. They wouldn’t even stop an extra contractual pay rate that stopped meltdown 2.0 this past Christmas. The union was too busy counting its 12 million dollar windfall to defend the contract, I suppose.
Getting called a petulant child on the other forum for asking SWAPA to do what we pay them to do is icing on the cake.
If SWAPAs goal is to have the BOD and execs as the only people who show up to any pickets in the future, then they’re doing an excellent job. I know I won’t waste any more time supporting them in contract negotiations after their behavior the last 8 months. I’ll just bide my time, vote no on the inevitable turd, and check out completely from union or company comms.
The 5/20 club goes both ways, SWAPA.