Quote:
USAPA’s manifest disregard for the interests
of the West Pilots and its discriminatory conduct towards them constitutes a clear
breach of duty. Accordingly, we reverse the district court’s conclusion that
USAPA did not breach its duty of fair representation and remand with instructions
to enjoin USAPA from participating in the McCaskill-Bond proceedings except to
the extent that USAPA will advocate the Nicolau Award. On remand, the district
court should consider the West Pilots’ claim for attorneys’ fees.
Definitely complicates things for USAPA. It would seem they must now overhaul their SLI proposal with LAA pilots. Of course, if the East committee is now REQUIRED to advocate for the Nic, I can only wonder to what purpose would be for the requirement for a separate West committee ?Originally Posted by hazrd
http://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastor...6/14-15757.pdf Page 56USAPA’s manifest disregard for the interests
of the West Pilots and its discriminatory conduct towards them constitutes a clear
breach of duty. Accordingly, we reverse the district court’s conclusion that
USAPA did not breach its duty of fair representation and remand with instructions
to enjoin USAPA from participating in the McCaskill-Bond proceedings except to
the extent that USAPA will advocate the Nicolau Award. On remand, the district
court should consider the West Pilots’ claim for attorneys’ fees.
It would seem to me, the two separate committees return to a previous make-up of one committee that includes both East and West pilots along with a new pre-hearing position statement adjusted for the Nic. It's important to note the McCaskill-Bond process is still the controlling guide in this SLI and this latest development does not compel the present arbitration panel to use the Nic. The LAA committee still has a strong argument for pre-merger career consideration and that LAA pilots should not be casualties of this fracas. I think it may have only exacerbated the likelihood of AA/U pre-merger fences though if the SLI panel doesn't prefer a more simple resolution to that disparity.
Still reviewing their pre-merger positions, but I looked to see how I personally would fare in both the LAA and West proposals. Looking at the pilot from the West that is next most junior to me on the LAA proposal which is a West Group II F/O (only a few numbers), that pilot is about my age and whose seniority (DOH) is a year prior to my OCC AA seniority, which I assume is to compensate for "pre-merger" career expectation differences, those being better at AA. I then looked for where the West proposal would place that same pilot (I knew it would be senior to ne, but how much ?). The West proposal places that pilot about 4000 numbers senior to me on the ISL. That means this Group II PHX F/O (absent fences) will be able to immediately bid and hold a 767 Captains status in MIA, a status it would take me about 7 years to match (maybe). The immediate income increase from where this pilots pre-merger career expectation was on 12/8/2013 would be 2.5 times above that he could have reasonably expect to have obtained absent this merger and once he bid that status his income as a result of this merger would FAR outpace mine.....in fact, it would blow mine out of the water.
I found that quite interesting.
The West has a history of advocating and arguing for pre-merger career expectations as indicated in this (and other) documents and it's interesting that in THIS case, they now belittle that consideration as inconsequential. My example of their SLI placement of a similar pilot clearly demonstrates a windfall for him at my expense and it will be interesting to see how this SLI develops. Of course, it will be more interesting in the immediate future to see what USAPA's response will be considering they're on record as saying they will never adopt the Nic.