Malik Miah, San Francisco
Today four of the top 10 US airlines — United Airlines (UAL), US Airways, ATA and Hawaiian Airlines — are operating under chapter 11 of the US bankruptcy law, which allows corporations to seek protection from creditors so as to "reorganise" to become profitable again.
The employees at each airline are represented by separate unions for pilots, flight attendants and mechanics, as well as for ramp and customer service workers. All the unions, with the exception of the Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association (AMFA), which organises mechanics and related workers at UAL, are affiliated to the AFL-CIO peak union body.
However, the existence of multiple unions is not the biggest problem facing airline workers. Rather, it is the lack of coordination of strategies to respond to management threats to the wages and benefits of the work force. Each union is pursuing its own response to the threat of abrogation of its collective bargaining agreement (CBA) by bankruptcy judges.
Bankruptcy law allows the employers to file for court intervention. Under the bankruptcy code, labour laws are superseded, allowing the bankruptcy judge to rip up CBAs to keep a bankrupt airline in business.
The issue facing the unions is both simple and complex — navigating an unfair bankruptcy process that tilts everything in the bosses' favour. No union actually knows for sure what its legal rights are if the threat to abrogate CBAs is carried out.
Workers at US Airways are in their second round of bankruptcy in less than two years. A Virginia bankruptcy judge is expected to rule on a motion to abrogate several union contracts (only the pilots reached agreement) if consensual agreement to major concessions is not reached by early 2005.
The main flight attendants' union, the Association of Flight Attendants, is pledging to organise a series of rolling strikes if any flight attendant CBA is voided at an airline.
Other flight attendant unions have pledged solidarity.
The airline bosses are threatening court action (restraining orders), declaring ahead of time that such rolling strikes are illegal. Nevertheless, this tactic, first used by Alaska Airline flight attendants and ruled legal by a lower federal court in a CBA dispute under section 6 of the 1928 federal Railway Labor Act, is being publicly prepared.
Under section 6 negotiations, CBAs never expire. They are only amended. What is unknown, since bankruptcy law was rewritten in the early 1990s and has not yet been enforced to abrogate a CBA, is will section 6 apply if a judge voids a CBA? If it does still apply, a strike would be illegal until the federal government's National Mediation Board says there is an impasse.
The bottom line is that the unions don't know what may happen.
They need to prepare for "self help" action and mobilise their members for the possibility that a strike and other industrial protest actions are necessary to defend their members.
On November 24, UAL filed a court motion to void the CBA if the unions do not agree to onerous concessions. Under Section 1113(c) of the bankruptcy code, if a consensual agreement is not reached in 51 days a court hearing takes place (January 10 in UAL's case). The judge has up to 30 days to rule on the motion of abrogation.
In early 2003, a similar threat of abrogation was used to wring out US$2.5 billion per year in labour concessions. The new attack seeks an additional $725 million per year in labour give-backs over six years.
The policy of AMFA in the 1113(c) negotiations with UAL is to stop or at least limit the damage to the mechanics and related groups, but also to advance proposals to put the burden of cost savings on the backs of UAL's top management.
In the 1113 process at UAL, AMFA's leaders are advancing a short-term goal of opposing concessions, and a long-term objective to transform how UAL does its maintenance business. While it is an unusual approach for a union to make a proposal to reorganise the business of an industry in crisis, the bankruptcy context makes it urgent. Simply to say "No to concessions", and nothing more, is not enough of a strategy to protect the interests of the work force.
Furthermore, AMFA's leaders are pursuing a policy of "open negotiations" — keeping the union's members informed of every proposal and counterproposal in the negotiations with UAL. Open negotiations help to make sure that the members are able to see what the negotiators are saying and doing, as well as the company's stance.
AMFA is also preparing for the possibility of "self help" because of the legal uncertainties in the 1113 process. A strike preparation committee has been established, and has initiated a strike ballot that is being sent to every member's home as negotiations unfold. If AMFA's negotiating committee makes the call that an impasse is reached, a vote can be conducted electronically within 48 hours.
[Malik Miah is a mechanic employed by United Airlines and a member of AMFA's negotiating committee for the 1113 bankruptcy process.]
From 91×ÔÅÄÂÛ̳ Weekly, December 15, 2004.
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