Sad facts, but it is the truth, you are so correct, NO UNION is stopping this trend in the industry and even the last best attempt by the TWU to use concessions for jobs will not stop that fact.
Many backshop workers at the Tulsa Base still want to hold onto the idea that AA will not outsource the work. Instead, we should be working towards protecting our interest when that happens, instead burying the head and hoping it will not happen.
AA basically wants the "ability" to eliminate most of the jobs and use that ability to keep our wages and benefits at the bottom of the industry.
Court was an elightening experience and it only proved that voting NO was the right move for us. . They admitted that they did not have RFBs for the work from potential vendors and basically guessed how much outsourcing would cost. So its not as if they could turn around on June 22nd and cut 4600 heads.
The only work that we hear they have made arrangements for are the Widebodies, and that will take time as well.
If we had signed agreed to the ultimatum we would have given them 6 years to find places to do the work we currently do.
As far as outsourcing the company was clear that the percentages only applied to work that we currently do in house, work that we currently outsource or never did, such as A320 and B787s would not be part of that percentage. In court they stated that the A320 would be done at "Market Rates". What that means is open to interpretation and in the media they were quoted as saying that the 787 would be outsourced, we may get some of the Line work. Now all this has to be looked at carefully because, whats hype and whats not? We need to keep in mind that Negotiations is not confined to the table, and the company is going to continue to try and create as much uncertainty as possible in the hopes that they can still walk away with everything they want even if its with just 50% +1.
What we must do as mechanics, regardless of where you stand as far as who should be representing us because 6 years is 6 years and once in place we cant change it, is remain focused and not accept anything less than what United has.
The NO vote has already paid dividends and it will be up to us to capitalize on that by continueing to vote no, regardless of what the court decides until we get something that we are told nobody ever got before ( but the same people who tell us that admit they have never seen a Judge ask another to mediate either, that they never saw a company with $4 billion in cash file C-11 and that they never saw a company in BK come back with a plan to get 17% profits either). The fact that AA filed BK does not change the fact that we need substantial raises just to get us back up to market rate and anything less is unacceptable. One of the things that the NO vote did was force the company to make mistakes in their arguement to the Judge. They built their arguement for abrogation based upon Labor Costs anmd they said that when looking at labor costs that we could not consider the cost of outsourcing. So that changes the "ASK" and the value of it considerably. If the cost of outsourcing is not factored in then under the ASK AA is looking at closer to $1billion in Labor Cost savings from maintenence, not $212 million.
The fact is if they outsource the widebodies, which the union has agreed to, that alone wipes out any labor cost disadvantage that AA has. All the rest was Gross Overkill.
So if we are also losing our Pension, Retireee Medical, putting us way below par compared to our peers at other carriers then there is money for wage increases, restoration of sick time, Holidays and vacation.
Remember the company made the arguement that we should not factor in the cost of outsourcing when dealing with labor costs, they said we have to compare"Apples to Apples".
They admitted that when they compared our Maintenence labor costs to competitors they did not factor in what competitors pay for outsourcing. They used those so called "Apples to Apples "comparisons in court to try and justify their motion to abrogate, that was their arguement to the Judge, so I say fine, lets not factor it in and use those monies to bring us back up to industry standards.
