Judge Rules NWA F/A's Can Strike

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NWA flight attendants can strike, judge rules
A New York bankruptcy judge ruled this morning that Northwest Airlines flight attendants have the right to strike against the carrier, which is a big win nationally for organized labor.

Liz Fedor, Star Tribune
Last update: August 17, 2006 – 11:48 AM

Judge grants attendants right to strike

A New York bankruptcy judge ruled this morning that Northwest Airlines flight attendants have the right to strike against the carrier, which is a big win nationally for organized labor.

"The judge took a fair look at the law and he agreed with us," said David Borer, general counsel for the Association of Flight Attendants (AFA).

Previously, a judge had not ruled on whether workers have the right to strike against an airline in bankruptcy.

Northwest imposed pay rates and work rules on the attendants July 31 after unionized attendants rejected a second tentative contract agreement.

The Northwest branch of the AFA has threatened to use sporadic strikes beginning late on August 25.

"For labor everywhere, this is a significant victory. And in today's America, we need it," said Mollie Reiley, interim president of the Northwest branch of AFA.

Flight attendants have talked about using a strategy called CHAOS - Create Havoc Around Our System. "You could see a systemwide strike for 15 minutes or maybe two hours," Reiley said.

The union also could target specific flights on a given day, but passengers and the airline's management would not know in advance when and where the walkouts would take place.

Ultimately, Reiley and Borer said AFA leaders want to negotiate a new deal with Northwest that flight attendants can ratify.

Attendants have said their compensation has dropped by 30 to 40 percent under the terms imposed by Northwest.

Management at Northwest had asked U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Allan Gropper to issue a preliminary injunction barring the flight attendants from striking or engaging in other job actions that would disrupt flight operations.

But Gropper ruled in favor of the union.

His decision was released late this morning. Northwest Airlines had not issued a statement as of 11:30 a.m., but the carrier is expected to appeal.


Liz Fedor • 612-673-7709 • lfedor@startribune.com
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I just saw that; the only thing that concerns me is the replacement FA's that NWA has trained. Hopefully the FA's can make a stand. NWA is getting out of control, and it'll bring the rest of the industry down further if they get what they want.
 
wheelsup said:
I just saw that; the only thing that concerns me is the replacement FA's that NWA has trained. Hopefully the FA's can make a stand. NWA is getting out of control, and it'll bring the rest of the industry down further if they get what they want.
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My friend in I.T. is not too excited about leaving his desk job to go fill for the F/A's. A job he doesn't want coupled with disgruntled PAX makes for a bad combination. If they strike......there could be some empty gates at MSP.....
 
Besides that, how does the rest of the company run when all the IT guys are serving drinks on airplanes?

Glad to see a win for labor. We need it. I think NWA will "sweeten" the offer at somepoint rather than allow the whole airline to go down the crapper. Just my opinion....
 
Actually, when the 'replacement workers" get a taste of just how challenging the job actually is, it might actually galvanize support.
 
DE727UPS said:
Besides that, how does the rest of the company run when all the IT guys are serving drinks on airplanes?

Glad to see a win for labor. We need it. I think NWA will "sweeten" the offer at somepoint rather than allow the whole airline to go down the crapper. Just my opinion....
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:yeahthat: It doesn't make any sense for NWA to hang itself over a few bucks to the FAs. They'll settle.

JEP -- is your friend aware that he will end up on the Master SCAB list if he crosses the picket line? He's in a tough spot, but a scab is a scab.
 
Minnesota_Flyer said:
:yeahthat: It doesn't make any sense for NWA to hang itself over a few bucks to the FAs. They'll settle.

JEP -- is your friend aware that he will end up on the Master SCAB list if he crosses the picket line? He's in a tough spot, but a scab is a scab.
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But, he's in IT .. where the concept of scab lists is non-existant. He mya not very nice commercial flights for the rest of his life but beyond that there's really nothing that could/can be done to him.

But as DE pointed out ... so you have other workers trained to voer FA spots ... who covers THEIR jobs? Hmmmmm?
 
I imagine part of the reason the union thought up CHAOS was because of the cross-trained NWA employees. What is NWA gonna do, have IT folks sit as reserve FAs all over the country to try and cover random work strikes? Never gonna work.

NWA would be stupid not to settle now.

Nice win for a labor group.
 
Ripper3785 said:
What is NWA gonna do, have IT folks sit as reserve FAs all over the country to try and cover random work strikes? Never gonna work.
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you'd be surprised to learn NWA actually DID do that last year. wouldn't surprise me if they did it again. talk about wasted $$...
 
During one of the FA strikes several years back, SWA had mechanics and rampers slinging peanuts around on the flights. It was funny.
 
wheelsup said:
you'd be surprised to learn NWA actually DID do that last year. wouldn't surprise me if they did it again. talk about wasted $$...
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Could they have enough to cover all the flights? You know they aren't going to strike flights that are easily covered...like stuff in MSP Or "okay they got enough folks to cover 20 flights, let's strike 40". etc. But what do I know.
 
killbilly said:
During one of the FA strikes several years back, SWA had mechanics and rampers slinging peanuts around on the flights. It was funny.
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You mean NWA, right?

To me knowledge, there has never been a strike at SWA. There have been close calls, but never a work stopage.

This will be interesting. I'd say before NWA dug its heels in and threw out that ridiculously outdated "here's how to live on poverty wages" booklet, they might have been able to shorten the contract length and get a deal. Now, I think they've burned that bridge pretty badly. The fact that they imposed the FIRST proposal instead of the most recently negotiated one also won't help.
 
NWA better settle. There is all sorts of bad publicity already with their "how to live on poverty wages" book and if they start to lose pax who get pissed off at Miltons on the planes instead of people who are trained as FAs....
 
I read on another message board that CHAOS will be starting tomorrow, Friday the 18th, not the 25th in celebration of the judges ruling.
 
blee256 said:
I read on another message board that CHAOS will be starting tomorrow, Friday the 18th, not the 25th in celebration of the judges ruling.
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That's not good, I have tickets on Mesaba for the 21st and 24th to go to Wichita...oh well!!! More power to the F/A's!!!!!!!
 
kellwolf said:
If it's all Mesaba, you should be cool. It's only mainline that's doing the CHAOS thing.
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Yeah, but if mainline isn't flying, why keep the small guys going? They are supposed to feed the big guy, right? I know it's supposed to be a sporadic strike, but if done right, I could see this pretty much shutting down the system.
 
I doubt it will shut down the whole system. It'll delay a lot of flights, cancel a lot of flights and cause hell with the customer service people. Ya know, things that'll cost NWA $$$.
 
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