Steve Connell said:
How does that statement represent the TWU sentiment towards it's members Bob? When you state member Bob, do you mean the loyal TWU members Bob, or the AMFA supporters that are still in the TWU Bob?
By your remark you lead one to think that the TWU should assist the AMFA drive, am I reading you correctly Bob? Your payment of 2 hours pay/month does NOT make you a union man Bob.
Give me another reason, say for instance the recall of officers process Bob, show me where AMFA prevails there will you please, then I'll show you my take on it Bob.
Seems you organizers are again grasping at any and all tactics to sway the floor's opinion of you and your drive, a shame Bob.
Steve,
I certianly do not need a management reject to tell me what being a good union man is.
Is the TWU International "Loyal" to the members?
The union is supposed to serve the members, not the other way around.
So, you are admitting that if AMFA was to recieve a list that it would help the AMFA drive. If the TWU was doing a good job then they wouldnt have to worry now would they?
Steve, are you a mechanic?
The AMFA is a union that is committed to elevating the profession. Its their primary mission. The TWU claims that their primary mission is to "save" jobs. Roughly translated that means "preserve the dues flow". The "saving jobs" line is their excuse for the most recent round of concessions, what about the concessions over the last twenty years, a period where overall, job growth was constant?
Over the last twenty years this union has led the way in the destruction of what used to be a great profession. This is undeniable.
The fact is that with the TWU we do not control the process. The process is in the hands of the International, whom we not only can not recall but do not elect.
Even if we did choose our leaders, this unions makeup is so fractured and isolated that a single clear objective as a union is impossible to establish. Promoting the value of our A&P may be good for us, but probably is not seen as important to fleet service clerks and even less so to transit workers, school bus drivers and casino workers. Tell me Steve, how many letters and how much lobbying have YOU done for Flight Attendannt certification? They are even in the same industry yet how often has it been discussed at your union meetings?
The average TWU member earns $15 per hour. How much support can we expect from these workers in our effort to raise our pay and benifitsd when we already make double what they do?
The TWU has attacked the profession and supported measures that devalue, by means of reducing demand for, A&P mechanics. They transferred work away from us and created a permanantly lower paid subclass of mechanics. The creation of this subclass has damaged the profession across the industry, it forced other carriers like UAL and NWA, who had no such subclass in place, to contract out work in order to compete with AA. The fact is that the TWU/AA alliance created this subclass and put it in place while the entire industry was expanding and its presence insured that AA would have an ever increasing competative edge over other carriers. Despite this cost advantage the TWU still brokered and put into effect massive concessions on all of its workers. I believe they did so in an effort to drive other airlines out of business and swell the ranks of TWU members. The TWU was and is willing to lower living standards and eliminate benifits (which they will gladly, and shamelessly then try to sell to the members) in order to grow the union. For the TWU, the TWU comes before the members. Any group, especially A&P mechanics is expendable if it means they could get more members.
Because the TWU is made up of so many different groups with diverse interests, skill levels and payrates the likelyhood of any kind of unified action is minimal. Have you ever seen the TWU International orchastrate a coordinated effective action involving workers from several different locals from different industries? I've been a TWU member for nearly twenty years and I havent. Even when other TWU local in the same city-New York, are engaged in action the International does not encourage inter-local supportive action. I saw this when the Transit workers went on strike and when school bus drivers went on strike. Other locals only found out about it when they saw it on TV.
There are a lot of good people out there trying to make good locals, but their effectiveness at improving the conditions of their members are stifled by the corrupt, inefficient, ineffective International, and of all the divisions out there, of all the members out there, none are more under the thumb of the International than workers at AA. Thats because since we have so many Locals, and none of the locals are party to the contract, the contract belongs to the International. Local representatives are only witnesses to the contract. This point has been made through several court cases by the International. It was made when the Presidents council sued over the creation of seperate locals, when the Boston Local sued over the International seperating Title II and letting them go to Local 562, and even more recently when Local 501 challenged the Kasher decision to strip TWA workers of their seniority.
In all those cases the TWU International maintained that under our Constitution and our contract that those who were elected by the members (local leaders) were subordinate to those who were not elected by the members (International officers) and that Local leaders had no right to challenge the deciosions of the International.
This has great significance, because even if every single AA local demanded Little and Halls resignation due to the concessions they put in place, they would have no power to do so. All the AA votes combined are still a minority of the TWU and our Constitution does not give the members, or their elected representatives that right. So Sonny and Little can screw us all they want and even if every AA member, every local, called for their resignation they could simply ignore us.
