Originally Posted by
DAWGS
"If we vote no, the contract will be thrown out" is what I heard time and time again from both sides. I heard that also from management types after 9-11, basically end-game in bankruptcy. IOW, it was the main play in their playbook. I believe we should have walked away at the negotiating table and tested it. If the company wants to throw out the contract over 76 seats, let them try. We would then exercise our rights under the RLA. You may argue the judge would force us back to work. I believe we could have fought and won that battle.
My point is that once management and the judge saw the resolve, they would have dropped the 76 seat request. Six seats wasn't worth possible liquidation. We blinked, they didn't. Just because they buy airplanes with that capability, doesn't mean we are obligated to give them what they ask for. I remember the same scenario in C2K with the 70 seater. You are using the same logic that the Malone admin used. An admin, you are often critical of regarding scope, yet you seem to overlook LM's admin.
There was nothing that said they couldn't fly them, the issue was who flies the 76 seater. There were many mainline furloughees that would have gladly taken that seat.
It's all water under the bridge and many ifs and buts from both sides of the argument. I am not saying I am 100% correct or you are 100% wrong. The problem I have with ALPA continues to be they don't fight. A seat at the table seems to be what they aspire to and what they view as successful. Results are how I measure success and the results have been lacking. Success cannot happen without taking risk, something ALPA has seemed to forgotten and management knows all too well.
First I voted no on the agreement for many reasons. However I am not sure what rights you think we had under the RLA. We did not have the right to strike even if the judge imposed a contract. You have a right to strike if management imposes a contract after going through the normal negotiations process. That does not apply in a 1113 situation. The judges first priority is to the creditors. The company was asking him for 86 seats. I think they would have been granted that. As many have pointed out it would have been very hard to push that back down in the next contract. The judge would have never made them fly around a 76 seat aircraft with 7 missing seats. We made the big mistake in allowing the aircraft under LOA 46.