WOW, miss a day and there's a plethora of good posts on the issues. I'm jumping in head on but it will take maybe hours to respond to so many. Here goes nothing.
P38JLightning said:
>>I think they were referring to purchasing job security by means of a scope clause that limits all DCI flying to ASA/CMR and current outsourced levels, not underbidding mainline.
I think you're right about that although how practical it will prove to be is a horse of another color. The idea of "underbidding mainline" is a bad one and I don't see it as part of the equation. On the other hand we have to worry far more about mainline underbiddng us, which is quite likely to happen. There's a better than 50/50 chance that its happening as we write.
You're leaning in the right direction. The "group hug love-ins" as you call them are truly meaningless. That is because they are an "external" idea, invented and promoted by the National union as a cover for the conflicts created by its own policies. "WE", that is the group, are expected to resolve the conflicts that the union's policies have generated, by chatting with everyone except the folks that created these bad policies. It has never worked in the past and it isn't going to work now. When the union gets out of the conflict generation business the "love-ins" may be helpful.
furloughed again is right. there are a lot of senior pilots who would gladly suffer eternal stagnation and perhaps even shrinkage (i was in the pool!) just to avoid even a small pay cut. although i disagree with them, i can't blame them, as they are just expressing their interests.
Furloughed Again is only partly correct, but some of what you say is a natural human reaction. There is little real difference between a senior pilot wanting to hang on to his pay and QOL, which might cause stagnation for a while, and a junior pilot demanding pay cuts for growth so that he can "get his PIC time" to go to another airline. A balance between the two interests must be achieved to maintain the unity of our group.
Those of you that are now considering yourselves "junior" should remember that you aren't the first group of junior pilots in this airline's history. The Comair pilot group does have a history and that history includes the fact that the senior have not yet sacrificed the junior to enhance themselves. That's not my opinion, the record is there to prove it. Those of you that are "post strike" might do well to review how "juniors" that preceeded you have been treated. The record on this "property" is as good as any airline and better than most.
Note for instance that your FO pay is 60% of a Captain's pay. Compare that to other regionals that have traditionally shifted the money to the captains side of the fence and paid the FO next to nothing. WE of Comair were among the first, if not THE first, to break that mold. Had we not done so, captains pay could be much higher at the expense of FO pay being significantly lower. The decision to stop that modus operandi, prevalent at "regionals", was initiated by your MEC in 1990, nearly 14 years ago. The point is that it is unfair for you to infer that Comair's senior pilots are willing to sacrifice our junior pilots. That just ain't so.
What I'm trying to say is this --- Don't sell this pilot group short because of crew-room banter and meaningless rhetoric. Instead of emphasizing that you are "new" and different, try to recognize who we are, who we were before you got here, and learn our culture. YOU are a part of it, i.e., a Comair pilot. YOU are one of US and the overwhelming majority of our senior pilots know that well. Don't sell them short. Our strength is in our unity and nobody knows that better than a "senior" Comair pilot. WE, the seniors, will stand together with YOU the juniors, just as we did before. ALL of us were "junior" at one time. This is not a fly-by-night or come-lately pilot group. I say again, we have a history and a culture, learn it and be a part of it. We're all Comair pilots and we don't leave our own behind.
These are difficult times and they will get more difficult before they get better. We can't help each other by doubting the intentions of each other. Try to put it in perspective and don't let fear of the unknown cloud your thinking. The truth is that a junior pilots' fear that the seniors will forget him is no different than a senior pilots' fear that the junior pilot may not stand tall when the chips are down. Reality is that our success or failure as a group depends on our standing together as we face the challenges ahead. It's not the best way, it's the only way.
Furloughed Again is intelligent and experienced, but the truth is he comes to us with the baggage of his previous group as well as his experience. I don't say that as a criticism at all, it is just the truth. As a former USAirways pilot he's accustomed to a disunited pilot group with a dysfunctional MEC that literally needs a roll call vote to determine when it will break for lunch or who will sit where at the table. Well, he's a Comair pilot now and that's NOT how we do things. That baggage needs to be left where it came from (USAirways). We can all benefit from his experience and wisdom about issues, but we can't benefit from a thought process of what happened at USAirways. We have never operated like they do and, in my opinion, we don't need to start.
P38 you are NOT accurate in thinking that seniors don't place a high value on job security. We do. How to achieve it in the convoluted corporate structures that surround us is not quite as easy as some of you seem to think. Let me put it this way: It's a he11 of a lot easier for the Delta pilots to write a scope clause than it is for us.
When they reach a contractual agreement they reach it with Delta Air Lines only. We on the other hand are forced, by our own union, to bargain with Comair Airlines, which is owned by Comair Holdings, which is controlled by Delta Connection, Inc., which is owned by Delta Air Lines, which operates two other airline subsidiaries and subcontracts with an additional three regional airlines and code-shares with a fourth. I'm not saying that the problem is unsolveable for it isn't; however it is much harder than the same problem is for the Delta pilots. They only have to deal with ONE corporation.
You may not realize it but the fact is that when we write a "Scope clause" it would have to be signed by no less than FOUR different corporate entities before it would be fully enforceable. Unless we are allowed, by our union, to negotiate with the one legal entity that controls it all, i.e., Delta Air Lines, it's an uphill battle of monumental porportions.
I'm not trying to discourage anyone. I know as much as anyone in this airline how important job security really is. I also understand how difficult it is to achieve at the bargaining table.
I can guarantee you and Furloughed Again that the reason we do not have adequate job security provisions in our current contract is NOT because senior pilots "sold out" junior pilots and it is NOT because the senior pilots feel secure and don't care about the juniors. The fact is I could write a hundred-page book on that subject alone. I've been here long enough and I know the history. I know also that when I first came here there were less than 300 pilots in all of Comair and 299 of them thought that "Scope" was a mouth wash.
I can also tell you with certainty that one of the principle reasons we do not have adequate job security provisions in our CBA is our own union. Not your MEC, but the National ALPA. Like it or not, the fact is that any security we obtain for ourselves, conflicts with the security of the Delta pilots. When ALPA chooses who it wants most to "protect", airlines like Comair don't come out the winner.
The fact is that ALPA has never supported a scope clause that directly protects the flying of any regional airline that belongs to ALPA. How can ALPA support a scope clause that protects Comair pilots' flying while ALPA is simultaneously supporting the belief and the scope clause that says that ALL Comair flying, ASA flying, ACA flying (for DCI), SkyWest flying (for DCI) and now CHQ flying (for DCI) belongs to the Delta pilots? The answer is they can't and they don't, and they never have!
So, before you question the intentions of our own senior pilots with respect to your welfare, I recommend you make youself aware of the true obstacles to the job security of Comair pilots.
It is not the senior pilots that you have to convince, it is four corporate entities and one labor union.
that doesn't mean pay cuts just to please our fake puppet managers. in fact, we are all united against that from top to bottom. but negotiating for real scope and job protections is something we should be persuing.
One last time. Your local union leadership, the CMR MEC, has been persuing job security for Comair's pilots for no less than 14 years. The question you should be asking is what has your National Union been doing? If you don't know the answer I'll volunteer it; everything it can to prevent it. There is no "full pay til the last day cause I got mine" mentality among senior Comair pilots. That is a creation of your imagination fostered by a lack of adequate information. We don't need that as a group. Not from a "senior" pilot and not from a "junior" pilot. Not from ANY Comair pilot.
Do understand please that this is not a personal attack on you or anyone else. It IS an attack on misinformation and innacurate presumptions. There is nothing more important to me personally than the unity of Comair pilots and I'll fight for that every time. Sometimes a great deal of candor is simply required in the effort to advance that cause.
Sincerely,
Surplus 1
