Yesterday, the UAL MEC Chairman and UAL local council representatives put out a series of strident blastmails on the subject of the JCBA, SLI and the union’s compensation proposal. In these communications, they seek to place blame on your MEC and its officers for not yet having reached agreement on a JCBA. We are taken to task for being honest about our intent to hold firm in our insistence that a fair and equitable seniority list integration process be followed. They cry foul that we have adamantly held that ALPA merger policy must be adhered to and that the Protocol agreement agreed to by both MECs be followed in its entirety. (The Protocol is available on the CAL MEC Web site.) Please allow me to clear up some of the many inaccuracies contained in yesterday’s UAL communications. The issue we face today with the compensation section is really quite simple. We were told several months ago by UAL MEC members that they had passed a resolution mandating that the B-747 be given premier aircraft status when the aircraft pay groupings were designed. In short, the UAL MEC wanted the B-747 to be the singular aircraft in the highest aircraft category for pay purposes. We had different ideas and insisted that an approach that created the most pay for the most pilots be considered. This issue came to a head in September at a joint session of the two MECs where, at the direction of our MEC, I advised the UAL MEC that we were not interested in the UAL methodology and that we favored allowing the Joint Negotiating Committee to work, unfettered by SLI considerations, on a solution that would be best suited for all CAL and UAL pilots.
Although the UAL MEC did not initially agree to this tack, eventually with the help of ALPA National the JNC was allowed to proceed with formulating a solution absent any SLI consideration. They did so after a few days of work in October. The JNC agreed on the solution, the two MEC chairs agreed on the solution and the CAL MEC agreed on the solution. The UAL MEC said no. With this stalemate hanging over our heads, we received management’s compensation proposal last week. Again, following the meetings with management, the JNC met in an attempt to come up with suitable aircraft groupings. Again, the JNC reached consensus on a proposal to be used to counter management’s proposal. I can only assume, based on yesterday’s missives from UAL, that yet again, the UAL MEC has rejected the JNC’s work. It is very clear that the problem is not with the CAL MEC or the JNC. The problem rests solely with the UAL MEC and their insistence that the compensation proposal enhance their SLI argument.
To further complicate matters, the UAL MEC has proposed a resolution to the ALPA Executive Council suggesting that the Council mandate that the JCBA cannot be used in the SLI arbitration. In essence, the UAL MEC wants to restrict the arbitration panel from hearing the whole truth. They want to carve out parts we believe would be necessary for the arbitrators to understand both pilot groups’ full stories. We will, of course, fight for the truth to be told in its unvarnished entirety.
Interestingly, while Capt. Morse holds up the new DAL contract as the model in her blastmail, she doesn’t acknowledge that the DAL contract has identical pay for the B-747 and B-777 aircraft: exactly what the JNC had proposed and she herself had approved for her MEC’s consideration. Unable to convince anyone of the merits of an irrational argument, now Capt. Morse and the UAL MEC are trying what can best be described as an attempt to shift blame from themselves by providing their pilots inaccurate information.
The CAL MEC believes that ALPA merger policy and the protocols we have agreed upon should be followed as we work to negotiate a JCBA and then an integrated seniority list. The CAL MEC is upholding our agreement – to leave the SLI and JCBA as separate processes. To carve out pay rates (or anything else for that matter), would be the antithesis of those agreements.
To our pilots, the UAL MEC, the United pilots, and to the UAL MEC officers, we will continue to honor the agreements that we have made regarding the JCBA and the SLI processes. We urge you to let these agreed upon processes work as they were designed so that we all can begin to reap the benefits of a new collective bargaining agreement. The goals we established many months ago have not changed. Together, we must work to reach agreement on a new contract that meets or exceeds the demands of our pilot group and to achieve a fair and equitable seniority list integration.
Capt. Jay Pierce
CAL MEC Chairman
Although the UAL MEC did not initially agree to this tack, eventually with the help of ALPA National the JNC was allowed to proceed with formulating a solution absent any SLI consideration. They did so after a few days of work in October. The JNC agreed on the solution, the two MEC chairs agreed on the solution and the CAL MEC agreed on the solution. The UAL MEC said no. With this stalemate hanging over our heads, we received management’s compensation proposal last week. Again, following the meetings with management, the JNC met in an attempt to come up with suitable aircraft groupings. Again, the JNC reached consensus on a proposal to be used to counter management’s proposal. I can only assume, based on yesterday’s missives from UAL, that yet again, the UAL MEC has rejected the JNC’s work. It is very clear that the problem is not with the CAL MEC or the JNC. The problem rests solely with the UAL MEC and their insistence that the compensation proposal enhance their SLI argument.
To further complicate matters, the UAL MEC has proposed a resolution to the ALPA Executive Council suggesting that the Council mandate that the JCBA cannot be used in the SLI arbitration. In essence, the UAL MEC wants to restrict the arbitration panel from hearing the whole truth. They want to carve out parts we believe would be necessary for the arbitrators to understand both pilot groups’ full stories. We will, of course, fight for the truth to be told in its unvarnished entirety.
Interestingly, while Capt. Morse holds up the new DAL contract as the model in her blastmail, she doesn’t acknowledge that the DAL contract has identical pay for the B-747 and B-777 aircraft: exactly what the JNC had proposed and she herself had approved for her MEC’s consideration. Unable to convince anyone of the merits of an irrational argument, now Capt. Morse and the UAL MEC are trying what can best be described as an attempt to shift blame from themselves by providing their pilots inaccurate information.
The CAL MEC believes that ALPA merger policy and the protocols we have agreed upon should be followed as we work to negotiate a JCBA and then an integrated seniority list. The CAL MEC is upholding our agreement – to leave the SLI and JCBA as separate processes. To carve out pay rates (or anything else for that matter), would be the antithesis of those agreements.
To our pilots, the UAL MEC, the United pilots, and to the UAL MEC officers, we will continue to honor the agreements that we have made regarding the JCBA and the SLI processes. We urge you to let these agreed upon processes work as they were designed so that we all can begin to reap the benefits of a new collective bargaining agreement. The goals we established many months ago have not changed. Together, we must work to reach agreement on a new contract that meets or exceeds the demands of our pilot group and to achieve a fair and equitable seniority list integration.
Capt. Jay Pierce
CAL MEC Chairman