Wednesday, September 01, 2021

Southwest Pilots Sue Airline, Claiming Lack of Bargaining in Covid-19 Response

Labor unions have criticized the carrier during this summer’s travel rebound


The Wall Street Journal 
By Alison Sider
August 31, 2021 5:01 pm ET


Southwest Airlines Co. pilots have sued the airline, alleging that the carrier has been making unilateral changes to working conditions, including no longer paying them during quarantines following Covid-19 exposure.

In a complaint filed Monday in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, the Southwest Airlines Pilots Association alleged that the airline acted unilaterally rather than bargaining with the union when the pandemic began to affect travel demand in the spring of 2020. The company has said it doesn’t agree that it needed to negotiate with the union over measures it implemented in response to the pandemic.

Tensions between Southwest and some of its labor groups have flared during the pandemic. Last fall the airline sought pay concessions and threatened to furlough workers, prompting a backlash from unions.

While the airline didn’t end up cutting workers, unions representing pilots and flight attendants have become increasingly vocal about their frustrations, complaining that Southwest hasn’t staffed up quickly enough as it ramped up to meet a surge of demand this summer, leaving workers stretched thin. Pilots have threatened to picket ahead of the winter holidays. The airline has apologized to workers for difficulties this summer and is stepping up hiring efforts.

In the lawsuit, the union cited the extended time-off program Southwest set up last year, offering pilots the option to take time off from flying and forgo pay in an effort to conserve cash, as an example of something that the company and union should have negotiated.

The union also alleged that Southwest made “random and unilateral changes” in implementing its infectious-disease policy, which requires employees to quarantine if they have been exposed to Covid-19. Initially pilots who were exposed to the disease and put into mandatory quarantine were paid for the work they missed, but the union said Southwest changed that policy by June.

The union said the changes violated federal labor laws by changing the terms of the union’s contract in the midst of negotiations.

“This was our only recourse,” union president Capt. Casey Murray told members in a message Tuesday.

Russell McCrady, Southwest’s vice president of labor relations, said it disagrees with the union’s claims that Southwest had to negotiate over its Covid-related changes in recent months.

“Southwest Airlines, like the rest of the industry, has been forced to respond to the unpredictable challenges presented by the global Covid-19 pandemic,” he said, adding that Southwest remains committed to pilots’ health and welfare.

10 comments:

  1. Covid has been used as a control tool excuse by politicians for a year and a half now (and with Delta, perhaps forever with some new "strain" after Delta thereafter). Now corporations are using it as an excuse to wield power over union and non-union employees (with pressure to some degree from their politician donors to be sure). At some point, as John Adams said about the Boston Massacre victims when he was defending the British soldiers who shot them, "at some point when the people feel they are repressed from tyranny, they will rebel." History always repeats itself. The People will not stand for being repressed forever under a hypocritical tyrannical government where the so-called leaders are seen maskless at family and friend gatherings while The People are told by them they can't visit family during holidays. The current US Emperor has no clothes (and the VP has all but disappeared entirely).

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    1. Ah, politics. Same as it ever was. Only the names change every four years.

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  2. VP Harris is actively tweeting on both her personal and VP account, the most recent being around 7pm this evening 9/1. You may not agree with her tweets, they concern the Texas abortion bill and the ending of Afghanastan war, but she is far from invisible.

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    1. She hasn't done anything besides tweet.

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    2. Funny thing about that. She loved being in the camera and limelight before her failed administration botched Afghanistan. She hasn't been seen on TV since except on the other side of the planet (probably a good thing).

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  3. An E-1 in the military would have said "do not pull out the military until you have ALL of the Americans and Afghan Interpreters/Allies out". The fact that Joe didn't know this shows he is incapable of holding the position of President.

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  4. That’s why E-1’s don’t run the military. Maybe they should. The current and past 3 Commanders in Chief have all screwed it up.

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  5. Love history: Adams did indeed start his case with the above lament but his successful arguments were for “the right, no the duty, of a soldier (a government official) to stand his post”. Twice the US Supreme Court has upheld the power of government during pandemics.
    The easiest thing in the world to do is make government fail and is to say, to do nothing.
    Had everyone “done the right thing” from the beginning this whole thing would have passed almost without notice just like SARS.

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    1. "Adams did indeed start his case with the above lament but his successful arguments were for “the right, no the duty, of a soldier (a government official) to stand his post”.

      Duty indeed. Tell that to the imbeciles running the current administration who had a CHOICE and DUTY to not leave Americans behind in Afghanistan including SERVICE DOGS because they wanted a photo op of the 20th anniversary of 9/11 saying "the war is over, let us celebrate" or something similar stupid.

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  6. So true. Be thankful for the fools. If not for them the rest of us would be just average.

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