"Transforming the Flight Attendant Profession"..........Really?

In what can only be described as one of the most unintentionally hilarious examples yet of the boorish, petulant, adolescent idiocy that characterizes most AFA supporters on social media comes a fraudulent web page meant to mock the FACC’s attempts to effect TRUE reform within the rapidly fossilizing entity that is the flight attendant sector of the CWA.  One need look no further than this collection of myopic, self-aggrandizing shysters and their most ardent adherents to understand why the labor movement has faltered so badly in this country, and why s-United attendants have been so grossly under served since 1973.

Without a legacy of accomplishments upon which to stand, chief of which should have been a series of robust, SHORT-TERM contracts that emphasized flight attendants’ earnings potential while allowing the flexibility that comes from individual choice rather than the corporate dictates of a union management bent of growing their business at all costs, the AFA flight attendant supporters must mock and distract from the litany of failure that clings to everything they do like the chains on Marley’s ghost.

Some of the most contentious legal issues facing flight attendants during the last sixty years when the AFA claims to have been “transforming the flight attendant profession” have actually been initiated by individual flight attendants.  It was only after the fight was enjoined that the AFA rushed to jump on the band wagon and then loudly proclaim their triumph, when in fact without an individual flight attendant’s persistence, change might have been longer in coming, if at all.  The AFA flight attendants have proven again and again to lack the financial wherewithal and legal acumen to pursue the legal issues that should have been the purview of a “union” proactively addressing these matters, and not merely trumpeting their own horn after the fact.

The McDonald flight attendants are so named because of a single flight attendant who sued for redress over the discriminatory policies of the industry when only single, childless women were allowed to be flight attendants.  The “union” did not initiate or lead the fight - they merely usurped it for undeserved credit.  Likewise, the prohibition against men being flight attendants and the weight program were done away with as a result of changing societal mores and the ensuing legislation that resulted.  The AFA flight attendants simply rode the coattails of larger social change and then claimed credit for that in which they did little more than act as cheerleaders.

More recently, the AFA flight attendants stood on the sidelines as a lone flight attendant, at her own expense, took on non-union Sky West Airlines on the subject of lengthy duty times which result in a large of amount of flight attendants’ time at work being essentially unpaid in violation of minimum wage laws.  Compass Airlines flight attendants, prior to their being “organized” by AFA zealots, had mounted a similar legal effort that was subsequently co-opted and quietly ended by the AFA-CWA legal department, since the governing policy of the “union” is that the $1.50 or $2.00 per hour in per diem is adequate compensation for flight attendants at work, performing job duties in uniform, but receiving no wage.

And most stunningly is the settlement recently reached on behalf of California based employees that provided compensation as redress for paychecks being issued without a printed record of hours worked in compliance with California labor law.  This was a lawsuit brought to court through the initiative and expense of ONE flight attendant, yet once the checks were issued, the AFA acted as if they had been at the forefront of the issue, when in fact the flight attendant legal department had neither the money nor the legal knowledge to bring the case to court.  In fact, no local officer based in California was aware of the violation of the labor law until it was brought to their attention by this case.  Had it been left up to the “union,” this would never have been a legal issue, and now they try to claim credit for correcting a situation of which they were completely ignorant.

Yet these are the same “leaders” that mouth breathing, semi-literate cretins on social media continue to make excuses for and exhort others to do the same with time worn, mind numbing clichés like “staying the course,” “being patient,” and “supporting the JNC.”  While we are grateful for the accurate, illustrated depiction of the UAL MEC and s-UAL joint negotiation committee at work as the frontispiece of this telling “article,” it is they, not us and not any WORKING flight attendants at the new United Airlines, who owes an apology. 

THEY owe an apology to the WORKING flight attendants at every airline in this country, but most especially to the cabin staff at United Airlines, where the ongoing debacle loosely called “joint contract negotiations” is following precisely the same well trod path to success that America West and US Airways flight attendants enjoyed over EIGHT YEARS of negotiations.  But more than that,  they owe an apology for forty years of malfeasance that has festered in the midst of the flight attendant profession since a group of flight attendants decided theirs was a higher calling and that mere work in the airplane aisle was beneath their dignity.

And should anyone doubt the total lack of cohesion and direction that characterizes current UAL MEC and international “leadership,” one need only consider the phrase, “when in doubt, stay the course.” This line of reasoning, as it relates to s-UAL attendants, still working under a $1,200 to $1,500 per month penalty thanks to the UAL MEC for as yet unspecified “benefits” and “protections,” would dictate, when speeding toward a cliff and unsure whether to brake, swerve, or leap from the car, simply remaining buckled in, mouth agape, and in a fit of frozen panic, until the car plunges over the precipice.

That is precisely what is being advised by the UAL MEC and the ersatz writers of their fraudulent, dull-witted drivel – to sit idly while impending disaster rushes closer.  The recent announcement of international bases for s-CAL in Los Angeles and Washington DC – with San Francisco soon to follow – speaks volumes to the long term view company management takes of their work force management, while union management at the UAL MEC and international level, play petty games to protect their own fragile egos while the ground shifts beneath them.

The FACC and like-minded flight attendants bent of REFORM are not “in doubt,” and to continue to plead for people to “stay the course,” after an entire generation of flight attendants knows what staying the course looks like is laughable and pathetic.  REFORM is coming, beginning with putting, for the first time, the reins of power in the hands of WORKING flight attendants who will be able to vote for MEC and international officers, but there are always going to be those among us who are comfortable with not thinking too much, and simply believing and doing what they are told.  These are the first ones to festoon their baggage with silly ribbons, buttons, pins, and slogans which do nothing but highlight their own gullibility.

You may choose to stay the course of delay, lies, corruption and incompetence, but the REFORM movement has chosen a new path.

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Not so Subtle Infiltration Attempt at s-CO.....

The CAL MEC has taken great pains in the two plus years since the representation vote in June 2011 to assure and support s-CAL attendants that their contract and culture will be safeguarded. 

 Rest assured that the "old guard" AFA flight attendant “leadership,” in concert with the UAL MEC, is attempting to reverse the growing tide of change that is challenging their entrenched and coveted elitism, by inserting candidates at the local level who will take their marching orders from International Officers determined to keep the status quo intact.  A strong turnout in the EWR vote for candidates committed to change at ALL levels of the CWA-AFA will strengthen the hard won momentum established thus far.

A vote for candidates NOT committed to these changes is a vote to deprive not only EWR attendants the accessible, IN BASE representation to which they are accustomed but will move all CAL attendants toward the unresponsive, heavy handed condescension of current union management that has resulted in years of frustration for WORKING flight attendants and a litany of some of the worst contracts in the industry.

 
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VOTE NOW OR......

 BE FOREVER HELD DOWN BY s-UA'S VERSION OF AFA..........

Everyone should have received their ballot pin number in the mail for elections at s-CO Council 62 and s-UA Councils 21, 27 and 14. If you have not received your ballot pin number please call 1-800-424-2401, Extension 707. If you get an answering machine make sure to include your Name, Airline, Employee ID and a Contact phone number. This office is open Monday through Friday from 9am to 5pm ET. 

The turn out of this election cycle is important. It will determine whether or not the AFA continues down the path of the old guard s-UA MEC or takes a new direction. The choice is clear and there is no doubt the United Airlines management watches the results and makes decisions at the negotiating table based on those results.

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Labor Day Greetings

It has been more than two years since the CWA-afa won the representation election to the collective detriment of the flight attendant work group at United Continental.  But rather than immediately commencing  joint contract talks as ALPA did for the pilot group, the UAL MEC and international officers instead chose to saddle s-United attendants with a six year contract as part of the “stepping stone” approach to improvements to the three current CBA’s.  Such an approach, it was claimed, would lay the groundwork for, among other things, a $64.88 per hour top wage rate, while still retaining whatever inefficiencies and costly provisions of the CWA-afa CBA that the UAL MEC deems the s-United work force wants as a result of a series of fraudulent surveys skewed to illicit certain responses.

The latest joint negotiating committee update has gone so far as to criticize other labor groups at United Continental for quick resolutions to their contracts and who “are now experiencing difficulty regarding the interpretation of new Contract language on any number of issues.”  Such rationalization for the onerous and delay prone approach to everything the CWA-afa flight attendants have done in their past and continue to do as current contract negotiations play out here and elsewhere is such a magnificent display of the pretzel logic that is part and parcel of everything the CWA-afa flight attendants do, that it is impossible to grasp and fully appreciate the self denial and shameless self promotion necessary to write and utter such nonsense with a straight face.

Echoing Sharon McKarcher’s drivel distributed as part of the Coconut Wireless newsletter (s-UA HNL) during the 2012 Board of Directors meeting flight attendants are reminded that “more often than not, negotiations…begin at a slower pace and gain momentum over time.”   But immediately thereafter, while we are told that lengthy negotiations are necessary because “quick and easy (is) not what we’re after,” suddenly, “long negotiation periods can benefit management, because the longer the time before accepting improvement in the Contract, the longer they get to go without paying for those improvements…Management hopes that they can stall us into agreeing to settle for less.”

So in the beautifully duplicitous manner that the CWA-afa flight attendants have honed to a fine art, in one sentence, “quick and easy” contract resolutions are anathema to flight attendant “leadership,” and , indeed, have led to trouble for the other groups who have settled relatively quickly.  But in the same breath, it is then claimed that “long negotiation periods…benefit management” because lengthy negotiations also preclude the need for companies to absorb the extra cost associated with improvements. 

But airline managements across the country have little to worry about here, since the CWA-afa has NEVER managed to negotiate anything approaching real value when it comes to contractual “improvements,” chief among them being retroactive pay.  Retroactive pay is meant to be a punitive incentive for efficient negotiations by avoiding a large pay out upon ratification of a contract well past its amendable date but which the CWA-afa has consistently bargained away for pennies on the dollar.

Underpinned by two different operating philosophies, the CAL and CMI CBAs stand in stark contrast to the overwrought, micromanaged CWA-afa CBA, but it is the egos of the three negotiating team members for s-United who have defined in their minds what is “management’s terms” and what is theirs.  From the ten year debacle of a contract Kevin Lump-sum negotiated in the mid 1990s which has hamstrung s-United flight attendants’ economic well being for the last two decades, to Jack Kande’s and Greg Davidowitch’s Swiss cheese “stepping stone” contract of 2012-2016, the three caballeros have something to prove to themselves and one another, and whether that benefits s-United attendants in the long run or not is of secondary concern.

The fact remains that it is the CAL CBA that will remain standing in some slightly altered form after all is said and done, and s-United attendants in the meantime will continue to be denied the hourly wage rate enjoyed by their counterparts on the CAL/CMI side while the s-United negotiating committee play acts for the next several years. The difference between the work groups, especially ALPA, that have come to terms with the new United management, despite any perceived nuisances or inconvenience that may arise “regarding the interpretation of new Contract language,” is that job security protections are now in place for everyone but s-United attendants.

 

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KEPT IN THE DARK

An organization that consistently pats itself on the back for up to the minute news and carefully controlled “transparency” should be more sensitive to their websites, like Negotiations Update, that haven’t seen an update since March 28, 2012.  It provides an unintentionally hilarious snapshot of the neglect and lack of importance assigned to ongoing negotiations across the CWA-afa spectrum, and stands as a glaring example of the attempt to control information within each individual airline, thereby limiting the ability of casual observers to obtain a true picture of the “representation” provided by the CWA-afa flight attendants to cabin staff throughout the country.  Instead of updated, real time information on the state of negotiations at various airlines, the CWA-afa relies on password protected conduits of information available only to members of that particular carrier, discouraging cross comparisons that would be readily made if general update pages were kept current.

http://www.afanet.org/negotiations/

 

 



 

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Bad Politicians are Elected by Apathetic Non Voters.....

"When you blame others, you give up your power to change."
*Robert Anthony

The fact that 89 out of 100 workers in the US have no voice in the workplace ostensibly through union representation was the clarion call for this year’s biennial CWA convention – paid for with the collective dues dollars of the telephone workers, health care employees, publishers, printers, newspaper employees, public safety officers, and flight attendants that make up the amalgamated representational mess that is the CWA, arguably one of the most corrupt labor unions in America today.

Men and women around the world have DIED through the years fighting for the right to organize and belong to labor unions and have fought far more formidable opponents than ANY labor union in this country faces today.  Yet the language of victimization and blame runs rampant throughout the labor movement, and it stands today as a distant and fading echo of its former self – and much of that blame lay at its own feet.

There is no group that has raised this language of victimization and blame to an art form better than the CWA flight attendant sector, formerly the flight attendant association, formerly the airlines stewards and stewardess division of ALPA.    Stuck in the Jimmy Hoffa era of the 1970s when labor unions grew into the corrupt, excuse-making machinery they are today, labor unions must change their current path, or this country will soon face a day when that 89 out of 100 becomes 99 out of 100.  No amount of banner carrying, pin-wearing, ribbon tying demonstrations has prevented the corporate greed and filthy excess that has repeated itself throughout America’s economic history.  For America to thrive it must have a growing, robust middle class supported by a vibrant labor movement.

But that labor movement CANNOT exist if it continues its short-sighted myopia that has simply created another managerial class on the back of employees already overburdened with excessive corporate layers.  Yet that is precisely what has occurred at the CWA-afa and what continues to occur.  Members who engage in vigorous debate and protest should be welcomed and celebrated – not threatened with expulsion because certain individuals had their feelings hurt and egos bruised.  Debate is a true democracy’s immune system, and the CWA-afa is incapable of accepting and embracing that fact.  Change must occur, because current involvement is pathetically low.  Participation in local election results, which, in a time of volatile change at American Eagle, for example, was 11% - hardly an engaged electorate.

 

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