By Skies Magazine | May 10, 2021 Estimated reading time 6 minutes, 5 seconds.
Unifor, on May 8, 2021, responded to “unwelcome” comments from the Air Line Pilots Association, Intl. (ALPA) regarding the current bargaining process with cargo and charter airline, Cargojet.
ALPA on May 7 expressed concern to Cargojet and the union representing its pilots, Unifor, regarding their “ill-advised plans” to “weaken the newly developed Canadian flight, duty, and air safety requirements.” In a recent statement, the U.S.-based pilots association urged the airline and union to end any efforts supporting exemptions immediately.
ALPA president Joe DePete sent letters addressed separately to Cargojet and Unifor. He expressed “grave concerns” over Cargojet’s plan to seek exemptions to Canada’s “hard-fought” rest and safety rules “designed to keep the skies — and our pilots — safe.”
In December 2018, new changes to Canada’s flight and duty time regulations were finalized to include “modern fatigue science and international standards to limit the amount of time a crew member can be on the job.”
Under the new flight and duty time rules — which came into force for Canada’s 705 operators in December 2020 — the flight time limit is 1,000 hours in any 365 consecutive days with a maximum of 112 hours per consecutive 28-day period. Regulations also now enforce a maximum nine- to 13-hour duty period.
Additionally, ALPA said it recently learned that Cargojet may also be using “efforts to intimidate or unduly influence” its pilots to cooperate. DePete said he is “deeply troubled that Cargojet may be using the threat of layoffs and downgrades to convince pilots to support this plan that would weaken safety and put pilots at risk.”
In a letter to Unifor national president Jerry Dias, DePete noted that Unifor “may be in favor of Cargojet’s expected request for exemptions to Transport Canada regulations regarding flight, duty, and rest requirements.” And if this is to be found true, it would be “an extraordinary betrayal of the hardworking women and men you purport to represent,” wrote DePete.
“Our members have reported that these science- based rules, while not perfect, represent a significant improvement over the previous set of regulations in Canada. Any exemption, waiver or weakening of these regulations would undermine safety and be a slap in the face to those who fought so hard to have them enacted in the first place.”
Dias on May 8 responded to ALPA’s “ill-informed” comments, which he said are interfering with Unifor’s democratic and pilot lead bargaining process with Cargojet: “To have the president of ALPA preach from Virginia to our pilots on the bargaining committee about fatigue rules and safety is condescending, arrogant and disrespectful.
“Captain Joe DePete knows full well that 130 Canadian pilots stand to lose their jobs, and he is standing by to take their dues if operations move to the U.S. where Congress has exempted cargo airline operators from some fatigue rules, giving them a competitive advantage over Canadian operators.”
Unifor Local 7378 pilots are currently in the process of voting on a tentative agreement with the carrier – “bargained by pilots, for pilots, with no intention of allowing unsafe flight and duty time regulations.”
Captain Mike Powers, president of Unifor Local 7378, said: “To suggest that our committee would agree to any exemption not based on safety and fatigue science is another example of an American association trying to interfere with our democratic collective bargaining process.”
Unifor, which represents more than 16,000 members working in the air transportation sector, referred to ALPA’s public statement as “self-serving.” The union also suggested that ALPA has hit “new lows” since the pandemic caused mass layoffs, calling out ALPA’s lack of interest in smaller operations such as Cargojet — which are “deemed too small for their corporate model.”
“It’s clearly an association and not a union,” added Dias.
Skies reached out to Cargojet for comment on ALPA’s statement and is awaiting a response.
