Originally Posted by Lewbronski

Not necessarily true.

You all have already been in mediation since Jan 2020. That’s nearly three years. If you were to continue in mediation for, as you ponder, another three years, the argument could be made well before that point that the NMB was exhibiting “patent official bad faith” by keeping the dispute in mediation, as a 1970 federal appeals court explained, “on a basis that is completely and patently arbitrary and for a period that is completely and patently unreasonable.” That same court explained that if the NMB exceeded its authority in the manner described, the courts have the right to intervene and force the NMB to terminate mediation.

How is “a period that is completely and patently unreasonable” determined? It’s determined, as more than one other federal court ruling has stated by comparison to “the norm” or “customary” amount of time that the NMB holds other disputes before it in mediation.

Therefore, it’s helpful to have a familiarity with how long the NMB has held other cases before it in mediation. The recent case of the block of twelve rail unions representing 115,000 rail workers was released from mediation in June of this year after spending four and a half months in mediation. It wrapped up its PEB in September and the unions are currently in a self-imposed status quo period as they each vote on their respective TA’s produced by the PEB. Some of the unions are also now resuming negotiations after voting down their TA’s.

The second most recent case that went to a PEB occurred in 2015 and spent about 15 months in mediation before being released. The most recent airline dispute to go to a PEB were the mechanics at United Airlines in 2001. They spent about 14 months in mediation before being released. In 2010, the NMB-commissioned Dunlop II Report stated that the average length of mediation between fiscal years 2004 and 2008 was 758 calendar days. All of those figures are well short of the approximately six years you contemplate being held in mediation.

You don’t “have zero power to secure timely contracts.” The RLA is NOT slanted against labor. Like almost any other endeavor in life, though, it IS slanted against those who don’t take the time to understand the game they’re trying to play or the system in which they’re trying to achieve victory. Unions can, if they want to, use the legal advantages afforded to them by the RLA to create leverage for themselves.

A major problem, though, is that I doubt there are more than a handful of pilots at each pilot group that understand or are familiar with information like the above. On the other hand, I bet most of the negotiating team and their paid airline labor law consultants at every major airline are deeply acquainted with all of the above and all of the case law that bears upon RLA negotiations.

The RLA doesn’t “[give] all the power to the company.” The overwhelming majority of pilots never even once in their careers devote a chunk of time and energy to thoroughly understand the law that plays the starring role in their ability to battle the company in the determination of their career compensation and quality of life (days per month spent at work, hours per day, vacation, benefits, etc, etc, etc). THAT is what “gives all the power to the company.”

Originally Posted by Big E 757

Thank you for posting this! I’m guilty. I have never read the RLA, but everything you wrote isn’t text from the RLA, it’s an understanding of the law, and how the RLA is interpreted through the eyes of lawyers and the courts, right? So, I don’t think it’s incumbent on each pilot to have an understanding of what you wrote, but that we (DALPA) have someone in our corner that understands this. Hopefully we do, because it has been far too long to be stuck in mediation. Maybe if we don’t make progress next week, we will request to be released to self help. It’s past time to get a new contract, and I’m prepared to withhold my services to get what we deserve.

Originally Posted by vyperdriver

Read your post on the RLA. I've also read the RLA. My question then is... if we are waay outside the period of "reasonableness" why hasn't alpa sought legal relief or demanded a release. Seems to me we would be actively pursuing, since we are arguably years past reasonable.

Originally Posted by CBreezy

We would have to determine what is reasonable. The rail unions were released after 4.5 years. We haven't cleared that bar yet.

Originally Posted by WhiskeyDog

So we have to go 5 years, then the next RLA player has to go 5.5? That doesn’t seem reasonable either?

Originally Posted by CBreezy

We would have to determine what is reasonable. The rail unions were released after 4.5 years. We haven't cleared that bar yet.

Originally Posted by CBreezy

No. But we haven't been in mediation for 3 years yet. That's not even close to 4.5.

Originally Posted by Slick111

Well, then clearly the only thing y’all can do is continue to let management stonewall until management deems the mediation period to be “unreasonable”.

Good luck with that, Sparky.

Y’all wouldn’t want to grow a pair and ask a judge of being in mediation for 35 months, with no decernible progress having been made, is long enough.