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United Airlines Negotiations Resume
Rich Delaney, November 15, 2009 — Negotiations with United Airlines will
resume this week in Chicago.
This is the first meeting of the two sides since early October, with the
exception of a two day meeting to review progress and to identify areas
of the contracts that will be addressed next in United Airlines
negotiations.
We have spent the remainder of the month reviewing other airlines and
unions contracts, to see how others have addressed the issue of job
security, and to determine if there are contract provisions in other
agreements that would help us if we included them in our contracts.
Federal Mediator Brown will attend the first day of United Airlines
negotiations, but intends to visit the work sites of ORD primarily, in
order to get a fuller understanding of the work our Members perform
every day and to get a better grasp of the discussions we are having
over job security.
Next week, new discussion
Next week will begin a new area of discussion in United Airlines
negotiations — Insurance coverage.
We expect to hear from United their ideas and proposals for employee and
dependent health care coverage. We presented a proposal at the beginning
of negotiations calling for an improvement in our insurance coverage and
a return to pre-bankruptcy levels of cost.
This week we will listen to the company’s response to that proposal.
As anyone who has followed the news from Washington knows, health care
issues have many components and costs. We understand that this is an
important part of an employee’s life – both while they are working and
raising their family and when they retire from United Airlines.
We are going to listen carefully to the company’s information and rely
on the expertise of the Strategic Resources Dept. of our International
to craft our response. We believe we will be approaching the issue of
insurance from completely different points of view in United Airlines
negotiations – our goal of improved coverage versus the company’s
expected goal of cost containment.
Job security, NMB Voting Rules
Job security remains a priority.
We will continue to discuss and propose changes to our contract that
provide our members with real security for the future. One area that has
been a huge threat to our jobs has been the increased use of United
Express flying. As United expands their UAX operations they also look
for cheaper ways to have the work performed. That usually means the use
of non-union vendors – especially in line stations.
One approach taken in the past by unions, including the IAM, was to
fight back against non-union companies is to organize those employees.
The theory is that if more airline workers belong to unions, then the
wages and benefit levels will rise and there will not be low cost
competition for workers.
This plan has not proven to be successful, mainly because of existing
rules that govern representation votes.
Unlike every other election that is held in America, union
representation votes require a minimum participation – 50% of all
eligible voters must vote in order to even count the ballots. This is an
enormous advantage for companies trying to block their employees from
joining a union, by encouraging them not to vote.
The National Mediation Board recently announced a Proposed Rules Change
that would change this procedure. The new Rule calls for counting the
ballots cast in an election and determining the winner by a majority of
those votes only. This rule change would make elections more fair by
only counting cast votes – no longer claiming an un cast vote is a vote
against the union.
The NMB has given all interested parties until January 4th to comment on
this proposed change. As you would expect, non-union companies, such as
Delta, are very opposed to the change and are working very hard to kill
it. The IAM and other unions are working even harder to try to make this
common sense change a reality. Union reps will soon be asking all
members and their family and friends to sign a postcard urging the NMB
to enact this change. Please take the time to sign a card and get 2 more
signed by people you know. There will be more information regarding this
card drive in the coming weeks.
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