TWU - Fear Based Union Leadership and Intimidation
- Thread starter TWU informer
- Start date
La Li Lu Le Lo
Veteran
- May 29, 2010
- 7,380
- 2,648
700UW said:
This should tell you all you ever need to know about 700UW.700UW said:
OP
TWU informer
Veteran
- Nov 4, 2003
- 7,550
- 3,731
- Thread Starter
- Thread starter
- #18
AMFA isn't trying anything. AMFA is the Choice. Is it dues paying TWU members trying to get rid of the failing representation that only holds on by preventing the member from getting the ballot to determine representation of choice.Overspeed said:
How strong can your Union be, if the majority want out of it, and the TWU knows they want out, so ballot prevention is the only way to survive?
You are just making a failing union even weaker.
Reaping what you sow, and taking everyone in the profession down with your rotten fruits.
OP
TWU informer
Veteran
- Nov 4, 2003
- 7,550
- 3,731
- Thread Starter
- Thread starter
- #19
FWAAA said:
It is hard to believe that in the United States of America that obtaining a simple election to determine union representation requires spending hundreds of thousands in legal fees, company interference, and government pandering to the incumbent. The ballot would be quick, simple, and fair. Instead, every method available is being used to prevent that.
The only HUMILIATION that is taking place, is that of our freedom and democracy.
And yes the stooges are jubilant as long as they prevent any form of democratic process. COMMIE BASTARDS
Kev3188
Veteran
^This^
How'd we (working class Americans) allow ourselves to get here? How do we get to where we need to be?
AMFAinMIAMI
Veteran
Overspeed said:
O/S
You can't beat down an organization in which it is not fully involved, IT IS the employees of AA whom are attempting to bring NEW representation to the membership and for you to Gloat over the fact that the wishes of the membership or any part of that is to be beat down just makes a LOUD statement as to the type of person you are when it comes to us.
Our failure to get a vote as many times as we have tried is due to the fear that the TWU has instilled in the membership that without the TWU they will loose their jobs and family security.
You have said that you would welcome a vote, so was that another LIE?
Only then will we know the true wishes of the membership.
The back and forth between the AA/TWU represented employees and the guys who support AMFA only causes more confusion to the floor as where our class and craft is headed. It's NOT AMFA Speaking when people type here it's the philosophy of that union that guys, they believe it's better for our class and craft.
We as union members want a free choice not a dictatorship, even among the supporters there are differences of opinions. But with AMFA those voices can be heard. When a officer fails he can be removed and voted out. Each member can attend the negotiations. With AMFA we can become more like the Pilots a stronger group.
Since we will have a group that we feel is looking out for our best interests.
Each work group can have separate unions, but as long as they support one another against the companies attack the employees win. But as we all have seen here it the IGM attitude of each union, the F/A, Pilots and the TWU here DON'T work together to make it better for all do they?
Why haven't you been posting on that? How the TWU the biggest of the unions here at AA has not reached out and attempted to bring a better quality of life for the working men/woman.
Just like UAL guys did we can also remove AMFA if we think they are failing. But that is a choice we want to explore. You just want the TWU to continue to take our dues keep the back and forth bickering and thus keep the Company at a stronger advantage over us. many dislike the TWU, we all can read this board and we hear it every day on the floor.
You have your opinion and you have the right to have it, but to support a position that will NOT give the members a voice and a choice is DEAD Wrong on your part and shows the rest of the people who read your posts the type of person you are. It's more about the organization (AMFA) or the organizers. The membership, deserves better.
AMFA at AA in 2014
AMFAinMIAMI said:
AMFA’s 50-year record never really amounted to much until their more recent short-lived successes. Only 439 members were onboard in the mid-1990s when traditional airline unions proved unable to stop concessions. Angry and frustrated mechanics looked outside for new solutions.
Thus, a tremendous growth spurt for AMFA began in 1999 when they gained 9500 members by decertifying the IAM at NWA. This was followed in 2003 by a gain of 12,000 members by decertifying the IAM at UAL. An AMFA victory at Southwest Airlines in 2003 gained another 1900 mechanics through decertification of the Teamsters.
In a very short span of time, AMFA represented more aircraft mechanics than anyone else.
But their own members subsequently declared the AMFA experiment, after less than a decade at the helm, a dismal failure. An AMFA offshoot, the Professional Flight Attendants Association (PFAA), was dumped in 2006 by 69% of 9000 flights attendants at NWA after only three years. AMFA itself was decimated at NWA in an ill-advised strike that left only 800 mechanics remaining.
On February 25, 2009, the Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association (AMFA) addressed a letter to the National Mediation Board (NMB), stating:
We are writing to advise you that the Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association (.“AMFA.”) has determined that it would be in the best interests of the employees who AMFA represents at Northwest Airlines, Inc. for AMFA to request revocation of its certification.
AMFA was certified in Case No. R-6621 as the representative of the craft or class of Mechanics and Related Employees at Northwest Airlines, Inc. Northwest Airlines, Inc., 26 NMB 269 (1999). Accordingly, AMFA hereby requests revocation of its certification that was issued in Case No. R-6621.
On the basis of the above disclaimer, the NMB hereby revokes, effective February 26, 2009, the certification issued to AMFA in the NMB Case No. R-6621.
AMFA has also been decertified at UAL, which was their largest unit.
I’ve seen and heard the AMFA rallying cry for most of my career at American. I’d even spoken to Delle on one of his visits to meet with AA AMT’s. I was not impressed with his grasp of the problems we faced, nor how he intended to deal with them. His advice to me then was “Management will recognize that we’re professionals, and address our concerns”. That sounded great, but my experience with management up to that point convinced me he was pretty naïve in his understanding of how to deal with the company.
Subsequent actions by AMFA like the NWA strike strategy that led to the loss of thousands of AMT jobs by blindly walking into a strike they couldn’t win, convinced me I should stay with and support the TWU. There’s no doubt in my mind they were set up by a calculating management, but it was also a classic case where AMFA’s rallying cry of “we never gave concessions” forced him into a corner that he couldn’t get out of.
I firmly believe that the 2010 T/A which was recommended by the TWU, while not all we would have liked it to be, would have addressed some of the issues we needed corrected. I also had a problem with the “just vote no” mentality that many of the AMFA supporters/sympathizers had. It reminds me of Delle’s naïve approach in expecting some miracle to save us from ourselves should the T/A fail, the Judge revoke the contracts, and leave us hanging on the end of a rope while the NMB muddled through some unknown exercise that failed to produce anything of value to us.
Do I believe everything this or any other union does is above reproach, no. But neither do I believe jumping off a cliff just to prove you can, will do anything to enhance our careers and provide for the security of our families.
BTW, I walked the TWU picket line on the 21day strike in 69, and have been suspended for “alleged” job actions, so I have no problem with confrontations. What I do have a problem with is blindly following the pied pipers in our midst who preached the just say no theme without a clue as to how that was going to drastically change the situation we placed ourselves in by turning down the 2010 T/A.
OP
TWU informer
Veteran
- Nov 4, 2003
- 7,550
- 3,731
- Thread Starter
- Thread starter
- #24
Realityck said:
You left out the most important part of AMFA history which is that the AMFA was founded and formed by TWU Members because the TWU was so inept and corrupt. Started as a watchog commitee AMFA quickly formed into a large association because the TWU treated those members similar to the way the TWU treats us today, and that generates more support for the cause for change.
Your diatribe reeks of the problem in a nutshell. You always speak with a view that seperates the union from the membership including your version of AMFA history, and the even way you speak of the TWU here. This ignorance exist only because you have the mentality that the membership is stupid and needs to be saved from itself, and the union is just the pathetic answer to that calling as our savior.
The truth is, that real unionism was always based on membership control of the organization and the leadership is just suppose to be there to carry out those ideas and the path the membership chooses. This creates strength by involvement, participation, and onwership of the organization. It is the industrial unions formed by communist and infiltrated with socialist that has turned the whole concept into this disasterous outcome. And now the membership is nothing more than the dues provider and the "union leaders" are the almighty crowned dicatators.
No wonder organized longer is no longer favored by younger workers even when they are treated poorly by managemnt. No wonder organized labor is being decimated in this country. The whole concept is now so anti-american that no freedom loving American wants anything to do with unions. And that comes from ignorant leadership and paththetic stooges such as yourself, that have been raised, educated, and sold out to the anti-american version, as if it the way it suppose to be and always has been. Not true! Read some labor history and learn the real truth!
OP
TWU informer
Veteran
- Nov 4, 2003
- 7,550
- 3,731
- Thread Starter
- Thread starter
- #26
Got any proof of those claims?700UW said:
Or more kool-aid?
Ozark AMT's were dovetailed into seniority, not stapled to bottom like the TWU did TWA employees.
Here's another history lesson:Realityck said:
In the Beginning
O.V. Delle-Femine (pronounced Dell-Fem-a-knee), commonly referred to as "Dell," spent a stint as an Air Force mechanic during the ‘50s, and then was hired by American Airlines for a job at LaGuardia Airport in New York. Naturally gregarious and inclined toward politics, Dell began attending union meetings. The Transport Workers Union (TWU) represented American’s mechanics; back then (and currently), the TWU was a broadbased union that represented more bus drivers and subway workers than aircraft mechanics. In 1968 Dell left American Airlines to devote his time to building a union that solely represents airline mechanics, and thus AMFA the journey began.
In 1961, Dell and two mechanic friends from American Airlines, John Manchester and Dave Herr, became increasingly distraught over the representation of the TWU. “Mechanics were a minority, and we didn’t have the numbers to get a good contract,” Dell recalled. “We’d go to meetings and there would be other crafts there that had nothing to do with us. They wouldn’t even listen to us… I’m not saying we’re elitist; doctors and lawyers are elitist. But mechanics have been shortchanged.” And with this motivation the three founders set out to start their own union. In November of 1961 along with 40 members, they held the first national convention in Des Plaines, Illinois where they named this new organization the Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association (AMFA). At this National Convention, they wrote and adopted the AMFA National Constitution and elected; O.V. Delle-Femine as the first AMFA National Director. The first AMFA chartered was Local 2 (Boston, Massachusetts) in 1963.
By 1964, AMFA had its first successful union representational election, at Ozark Airlines, where it would serve the mechanics for the next 20 years. AMFA’s organizing activities were not welcomed either by the companies or the unions that already possessed mechanic members. “In the ‘60s, during a meeting with American Airlines in Tulsa, the incumbent representatives arrived with chains and baseball bats,” Dell recalled. “There was a case of empty Coke bottles nearby. I was ready to throw them if I had to.” He recounts anonymous calls to his wife: “they told her I was out with another woman. Even women called my house. Fortunately, I had a strong Irish wife who was very tough.”Martin Seham, a New York lawyer, had helped American Airlines’ pilots establish their own independent union. With knowledge regarding Seham’s success with the pilots, Dell and three others (dressed in their work cloths) visited Seham in his midtown Manhattan office to discuss work with AMFA. Martin Seham became AMFA’s attorney in the ‘60s. “They were deferential, they were respectful, and they were absolutely unmovable in terms of the principles they were pursuing,” Seham recalls. “They were in trouble financially and yet at the same time they were getting more and more members.”
Seham says their passion awakened his own dream of helping the working class. The lawyer agreed to represent AMFA and let the union pay him when it could. He would represent AMFA for more than 20 years; his son, Lee Seham, who is widely respected amongst the membership and leadership, serves as AMFA’s general council today.
A showdown occurred one day in the mid-‘60s in St. Louis. Two courting unions and Dell (representing AMFA) spoke to mechanics from Ozark Air Lines, who would soon be choosing a union. The other unions tried to limit Dell’s time at the microphone, but the more they tried to stifle him, the hotter the audience grew. AMFA won in an upset.
Effects of the Airline Industry in the Wake of Deregulation
AMFA soon was winning elections at other airlines beyond Ozark, including Braniff, Hughes Air West, and the Trump Shuttle. The Association was obtaining members raises, better pensions, and pay premiums for special skills. But, success proved elusive.
As smaller airlines merged into bigger ones, the government would hold an election for workers to choose between competing unions (single carrier status election). Since a much bigger airline was always buying the carriers that AMFA represented, the new bigger airline’s union would win those elections. One by one, AMFA lost the smaller airlines it had represented.
AMFA had represented mechanics at Southern Airways and Hughes Air west, which merged with North Central to later become Republic Airlines by the early 1980s. Although larger unions ended up representing mechanics at Republic, AMFA-inspired provisions in their contract remained until the Northwest-Republic merger in 1986.
In 1986, Trans World Airlines gobbled up Ozark, and for the next several years, Dell was a union leader representing only associate members (the backbone of AMFA) who kept the Association alive.
Tough Times
The stories of how Dell sacrificed to build the union, including sleeping in airport terminals on organizing trips when he had no money for a room to living out of a suitcase for over a decade, has won converts at airline after airline. During the two years of Northwest contract negotiations (and the preceding organizing drive), he lived out of a budget motel near the Minneapolis-St. Paul Airport.
Dell has been a pillar of strength to all of the mechanics in the airline industry. It is believed that few people, if any, would be able to go through what Dell has gone through personally and professionally, and rebound time and time again. The adjective “tenacious” best describes his character in over 45 years of focus towards AMFA’s philosophies.
The Associate Membership spanning across the United States supported Dell and AMFA in keeping its beliefs alive. Contemplating at one point to concede, Dell’s wife Marie is credited with refusing to allow him to give up.
The Tide Turns
Things began to turn for AMFA in the ‘90s; after a year of deliberations, in 1998 the National Mediation Board in Washington, D.C. ruled that the aircraft mechanics and related could finally be represented solely by the classification of the “Mechanics class and craft.” This ruling made it harder for industrial unions to “inflate” the voting populace with members represented in other classifications; thereby, nullifying AMFA’s representational efforts in organizing their own class of Mechanics and Related.
AMFA was expanding at an increasing rate and was in need of professional administrative support. In 1995 AMFA enlisted the services of the McCormick Advisory Group (MAG) in Laconia, NH to fulfill the administrative aspects of the Association. MAG assisted in all areas of administration from financial services, officer elections, organizing, facilitating the AMFA National Conventions, assisting the NEC, and economic advising during airline contract negotiations. In August of 2006, AMFA National took over responsibility of the administrative functions and moved the National Office to Aurora, Colorado.
AMFA won the right to represent the mechanic & related class at Mesaba, the regional carrier that operates as Northwest Airlink from Detroit and Minneapolis-St. Paul in 1996. Another victory followed at Alaska Airlines in 1998, AMFA was certified as the representational agent for 10,000 mechanics and aircraft cleaners at Northwest in 1999. An industry leading contract was achieved by the members at Northwest on May 9th of 2001. Southwest was won a year later in 2002 in three months. Horizon Air also joined AMFA in 2002. United Airlines was added in July 2003. AMFA, “The little union that could” now represented 3 of the top 5 and half of the top 10 major Airlines in the United States.
Dell (2008)
AMFA National Executive Council in 2004 (from left to right) Back row: Kevin Wildermuth, Region III Director; Jim Young, Region II Director; Louie Key, Region I Director. Front row: Ken Wagers, National Treasurer; Steve Lanier, National Secretary; O.V. Delle-Femine, Founder and National Director; and Frank Boksanske, National Safety & Standards Director.
Although the airline industry and it's unions have faced recent struggles due to the trend towards consolidation, AMFA's members enjoy quality representation from a craft-specific union dedicated to their profession. AMFA’s Constitution is still one of the most, if not the most, democratic in the airline industry today. We honor those countless and nameless volunteers who have personally sacrificed for the Association because they deeply believe in the following AMFA philosophies: accountability, officer recall ability, democracy, professionalism, integrity, knowledge and skill.The Future is Bright
Today, AMFA is proud to represent Aircraft Maintenance Technicians and Related at Alaska Airlines and Southwest Airlines. Our members enjoy industry-leading pay and benefits as well as programs unique to AMFA, such as the Accident Investigation Team, Professional Standards, and numerous other craft-based goals and initiatives. The leadership at AMFA is steadily guiding the Association into the future while remaining aware of the past and never forgetting that together we are strong.
JABORD said:
Some people seem to disagree with some of your statements:
Martin Seham, a New York lawyer, had helped American Airlines’ pilots establish their own independent union. With knowledge regarding Seham’s success with the pilots, Dell and three others (dressed in their work cloths) visited Seham in his midtown Manhattan office to discuss work with AMFA. Martin Seham became AMFA’s attorney in the ‘60s. “They were deferential, they were respectful, and they were absolutely unmovable in terms of the principles they were pursuing,” Seham recalls. “They were in trouble financially and yet at the same time they were getting more and more members.” Seham says their passion awakened his own dream of helping the working class. The lawyer agreed to represent AMFA and let the union pay him when it could. He would represent AMFA for more than 20 years; his son, Lee Seham, who is widely respected amongst the membership and leadership, serves as AMFA’s general council today.
The B-Scale Plague
American Airlines adopted the benchmark B-scale in 1983, permanently reducing pay for newly hired pilots by 50 percent. In fact, under the AA system—negotiated while the Seham firm sat on the labor side of the table—pay rates and pensions for new employees would never merge with those of then-current employees.
Martin Seham wrote proudly of this accomplishment in Cleared for Takeoff: Airline Labor Relations Since Deregulation.
As general counsel to the Allied Pilots Association (APA), the independent certified representative of the American Airlines pilots, I was close to the negotiations that resulted, in 1983, in the earliest realization
Although B-scales were not a new concept, their initial format was unique to the airline industry. Following American’s lead, other airlines began to demand similar packages—forcing the entire airline labor movement into a new era of concessions. Good for management; bad for pilots, flight attendants, mechanics, and all of the airline industry’s workers.
While ALPA pilots were forced to deal with this blight brought to the industry by APA and the Sehams, not one ALPA pilot group accepted a non-merging two-tier scale. The clearest example of this was the ALPA strike at United in June 1985, when the pilots refused to agree to a non-merging two-tier pay scale.
ALLIED PILOTS ASSOCIATION
December 14,1992
Mr. O. V. Delle-Femine
National Director
Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Assoc.
P. O. Box 39
Fayetteville, GA 30214
Mr. Delle-Femine:
As the senior member of the Allied Pilots Association (APA) Board of Directors, I consider your November 17, 1992 letter to APA President LaVoy nothing more than a personal, political attack on behalf of Messrs. Martin Seham and David W. Gould, APA’S VicePresident. It is unthinkable that you have the audacity to question the prerogative and right of the President of APA to change General Counsel. Your intrusive meddling into APA's affairs, business, and policy is a most appallingly deceitful and cowardly act. When did our President or Association ever question or meddle in your association's affairs?
Since you have decided to interfere by making erroneous and disparaging political statements against our President and Association, allow me to respond. Mr. Delle-Femine, there are six billion people in this world. It is an amazing coincidence to me that you courtesy-copied your letter only to David W. Gould, the only person who has stated his intentions to lead the recall of President LaVoy. The Vice President has neither a legal say in, nor a vote in the selection of APA's General Counsel. This being the case, the sole purpose for copying Mr. Gould is obvious to even the most naive political observer: to help him undermine President LaVoy.
This is not the first time Mr. Gould has been the ringleader of a political circus. During a Department of Labor-supervised election, Mr. Gould tried to seat himself prior to the election certification, even though the premature-seating was ruled out of order by the parliamentarian and the chair. That fiasco cost the membership approximately $50,000 for the special Board Meeting Mr. Gould's adherents called.
Currently, the smoke screen for Mr. Gould's divisive political agenda is the General Counsel issue. Once again, the membership will foot the bill for Vice President Gould's politica1 activities. Confrontational behavior and zealous, self-righteous ranting seems to have become Mr. Gould's trademark. Let's examine Mr. Seham's record a little more closely; unlike you, I was there.
1983 CONTRACT
After deregulation, the APA leadership had it's first chance to show their negotiating skills and determination. With Mr. Seham's counsel and help, they created the most anti-union “B Scale” ever devised. The A-Scale pilots' pay would be subsidized by the B-Scale pilots, or, as Mr. Seham said, the A-Scale pilots kept their present level of-pay and benefits "all at the cost of reduced salaries for newly-hired pilots." Essentially, the negotiators and Mr. Seham agreed that professional pilots at American Airlines were worth less than half of their current wages. Next came the classic management tactic of "divide and conquer” in the form of Supplement B, written by Mr. Seham. Basically, Supplement B stipulates that A-Scale and B-Scale pilots shall never be equal. Mr. Seham drafted management’s dream come true - a permanently divided union at a time the Company was under no financial difficulty.
1987 CONTRACT
Having set the stage in 1983, the big payoff for management was the 1987 contract. With the union now divided, APA negotiators agree to gut our work rules, granted a less than one and one-half percent pay raise per year for the A-Scale pilots, and compensation for the B-Scale pilots far below the market level. As the icing on the cake, they gave away our scope clause, to allow management to buy and operate commuter airlines flying up to seventy-seat aircraft. The Company was in an excellent financial position after APA negotiated a contract that put our pilots behind in pay and benefits to everyone except Continental Airlines, so senior AMR management rewarded itself with a lucrative stock bonus plan. Mr. Seham called it a victory; for whom was it a victory?
1990 CONTRACT
By this time, senior A-Scale pilots at AAL were flying "wide-body" aircraft for narrow-body pay rates, B-Scale was on the verge of being institutionalized, and management intended to "re- vamp" our medical benefits, once again at the expense of the new-hire pilot. Through a grassroots campaign, which climaxed in the firing of our negotiating committee, we turned things around. In the middle of a recession and war, we negotiated the best contract in seven years, while Mr. Seham had to be dragged along throughout the entire process.
LUMP SUM ARBITRATION: Mr. Seham lost the Lump Sum Benefit arbitration award on the merits of the ease. The arbitrator awarded the benefit “only" to pilots hired prior to 1983 due to Supplement B, which was drafted by Mr. Seham. Four years after creating the B-Scale, one more wedge was driven into the membership by Mr. Seham's hand. It was President LaVoy, while a member of the new negotiating committee, who was able to secure the Lump Sum Benefit for all pilots and bring the members together, not Mr. Seham.
MIA TDY: Mr. Seham lost the MIA TDY arbitration case that was initiated by the former president.
APA EAGLE STRUCTURE: Under Mr. Seham's counsel in 1986, the former
negotiating committee gutted our scope clause to allow the Company to buy Eagle commuter airlines. Later in 1987, the former APA president appointed an Ad Hoc committee (two of the members were also negotiators), to determine if Eagle pilots
should be APA members and sit on the APA Board of Directors. With the advice and counsel of Mr. Seham, they took in the Eagle pilots and created the structure currently in place.
APA DRUG TESTING AGREE'MENT: With Mr. Seham's counsel, his son helped negotiate our drug testing agreement. Mr. Seham boasted how his son did a “bang up job". The Sehams did a bang up job all right, but tor managemcnt, not the pilots. The agreement must be an historic first. The union actually negotiated to fire it's own pilots. The agreement includes no rehabilitation for it’s pilots as does other airlines, and is far more restrictive than the government regulation itself. Management loved it so much,they gave this agreement, paid for by our members, to all other employee groups.
Do you think Mr. Crandall is relieved because he does not have to face "the man who beat him at every turn"? Sir, all I can say is, you don't know Mr. Crandall. It is my opinion that he would love to keep Mr. Seham for the next round of negotiations.
After twenty-five years of Mr. Seham's counsel, the Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association actively represents no one. Essentially, your union is "on paper" only. Such a record speaks volumes about your choice of counsel.
Sincerely,
Captain Dennis Petretti
Chairman, LGA
WIKIPEDIA - What is the Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association?
AMFA was created in 1962 but did not represent any carrier until 1964, when it won recognition at Ozark Airlines. AMFA has since won bargaining rights at Alaska Airlines, ATA, Horizon Air, Independence Air, Northwest Airlines, Southwest Airlines and United Airlines. AMFA traditionally favors high wages in collective bargaining, often trading away the right to subcontract in return. The union has also garnered their membership from other unions like the International Association of Machinists and Transport Worker's Union, a practice the latter view as membership raiding. The role of the McCormick Advisory Group, a real estate agency operated by Kevin McCormick in Laconia, New Hampshire, has also been attacked by AMFA opponents. They have pointed to the role of McCormick Advisory in funding AMFA's early activities and collecting over one million dollars annually in vague services rendered to the union. AMFA's national office is also quartered with that of the McCormick Advisory Group in Laconia. Notably, AMFA's sister union, the Professional Flight Attendant's Association (PFAA) recently rid themselves of McCormick over fears of corruption.
Most recently, AMFA launched a strike against Northwest Airlines on August 19, 2005. The strike failed to significantly disrupt flight operations, as Northwest, in preparation for a strike, organized for replacement workers to immediately begin performing maintenance at hub cities. In the subsequent months, hundreds of AMFA members have crossed their own picket lines and returned to work at the airline, rescinding their membership of the union. Union leaders have been quick to brand anyone crossing their picket lines negatively. AMFA Local 33 in Minneapolis St-Paul has taken pictures and listed names of "Scabs" who crossed picket lines, by listing these people on their website. However, many who have crossed and others who have not point out that AMFA refused to allow its members a vote on any of the company's first three offers. Critics have also pointed to voting irregularities when AMFA finally did allow a vote on Northwest's fourth proposal in December. The offer was rejected.
AMFAinMIAMI
Veteran
Realityck said:
Realitycheck
Eastern Airlines employees represented by the IAM went on strike in 1989, yet Eastern flew for several more yrs, The IAM had scabs and Eastern brought in guys to do my job then as well.
The TWU gives in to the company so "NO" strike would be necessary. When the Union leaders don't bring an offer back it is their choice, since they are in power at that union.
The TWU's Jim Little signed papers before he left and we are stuck with it. Did we get a voice inn this Assoc. deal? "NO"
The IAM had a scab list as well after the Eastern strike and I would think that most unions would keep track of that no matter what industry.
So your Point is what?
