"On December 19, 2007, I sent a letter to Captain John Prater, President of ALPA,
in which I informed him that the Company accepted the Nicolau Award because it satisfied the
criteria specified for acceptance of a combined seniority list under the Transition Agreement, but
reminded ALPA that “[p]ursuant to the terms of the Transition Agreement, the award will not be
implemented by the Company until we have concluded negotiations over the terms of a single
labor agreement covering both pilot groups.”
Allen Hemenway
"At no time has ALPA (or its successor USAPA) or the Company formally
suspended negotiations for a single agreement per the terms of Section V.G of the Transition
Agreement. At all times, the Company remained ready and willing to meet for further
negotiations for a single agreement."
Allen Hemenway
"Following USAPA’s certification, US Airways and USAPA began meeting
regarding a single collective bargaining agreement on June 16, 2008. In the four and one-half
months since that time, the parties have since met for a total of 21 days, have passed 79 proposals
on 24 of 30 sections of the single collective bargaining agreement, and have reached tentative
agreements on four sections. On September 30, 2008, USAPA passed an initial seniority
integration proposal to US Airways.
Despite these efforts with both ALPA and
USAPA, to date, the parties have not yet reached agreement on a single labor contract."
Allen Hemenway
"That arbitrator, Richard Bloch, is a nationally renown
labor arbitrator with long experience in airline labor disputes; he has already heard four cases, and
is familiar with the Transition Agreement, its bargaining history and the relevant industry practice
in airline mergers.
A set of disputes that Arbitrator Bloch has heard, Transition Agreement Disputes
No. 4-6, involved the requirements for Operational Pilot Integration under Section VII of the
Transition Agreement. In that dispute, ALPA alleged that the Transition Agreement prohibited
US Airways from consolidating certain operations, including use of a single designator in the
reservations system, until Operational Pilot Integration. Arbitrator Bloch rejected this argument,
and in the course of his decision confirmed that under Section VII of the Transition Agreement,
Operational Pilot Integration required a “three-legged” stool -- that is, a single operating
certificate, an integrated seniority list and a single agreement.
Allen Hemway