In what stinks like a sad and desperate attempt to erase irrefutable and comparable facts with angry rhetoric and innuendo, NWA AFA MEC President Janette Rook’s October 6 letter to the membership insults every Delta flight attendant by suggesting that AFA’s legacy of failure would be superior to the higher pay and better working conditions pre-merger Delta flight attendant already enjoy.
Despite whining about the “volume of misinformation, distortions and even out-right lies being presented as ‘facts’ in our representation election,” Janette doesn’t bother to address any of those so-called distortions and lies, and instead rambles on about flyers, mailers, DVDS and Facebook pages, ignoring AFA’s own well-vamped and slick mass media campaign. Janette conveniently ignores the millions of dollars that AFA has spent on organizing the Delta flight attendants, despite being rebuffed by them twice before.
Apparently, Janette doesn’t recognize that as our MEC appointed president it is her responsibility to address and correct what she describes as “every wild claim.” Instead, she moans that it would be impossible to “address virtually hundreds of skewed semantics and inaccuracies.” Instead of rolling up her sleeves to do the real work it would take to put out a comprehensive side-by-side comparison of facts, pay, work rules and benefits (which Delta has provided), Janette prefers to throw her hands up and play the victim. That’s not the action of a strong leader. Good leaders don’t bemoan the impossible. Imagine where this country would be today if our history was rife with leaders who did nothing but complain about what was “impossible” for them to do. Imagine where the labor movement would be. If anything, Janette’s latest missive is yet another good indication of why AFA is unable to perform for us at the negotiations table and why they should NOT represent the Delta flight attendants. Picture four more years of Janette’s whining, even as no work gets done at the negotiations table, and no real, factual information makes if from AFA to the membership.
So Janette, what exactly is your job then, and what have we been paying you to do for the past three or so years? AFA has managed to drag out this election a year past AFA International President Pat Friend’s original promise to hold a representational vote in fall 2009, so you and AFA have had more than ample time to prepare comparisons and list achievements. So why now at the midnight hour must you insult us by urging us to “cut through the slick, glossy material” yet offer no side-by-side comparables to our own contract?
Janette laments that “if our contract is inferior – why would they do this?” The answer is simple Janette (and it’s alarming that such a simple answer escaped you). There are lots of costs associated with AFA that don’t translate into benefits for the members. Costs associated with frivolous lawsuits and disingenuous arbitration filings. Costs in poor labor relations, due to AFA constantly whining and ranting about how horrible everyone and everything is and failing to provide any solutions. Costs associated with the membership letdown as AFA breaks promise after promise and then tries to blame others for its own failures. In but one tragic example, AFA called the October 1 pay raises that the PMDL flight attendants received “Ye Olde Bait and Switch Tactic”. It seems that nothing anyone does is right for you or AFA. If there’s no raise you complain and if there is a raise you complain. Don’t you get how your constant whining and carping and bleating create a bad work environment that affects the service we provide the customers who ultimately pay our wages?
Knock it off, Janette, and knock off the invasive phone calls asking flight attendants to divulge their confidential votes to you. Individuals have the legal right to the privacy of their votes, and it is pushy and desperate of AFA to be calling members in an attempt to divine this information. It’s hypocritical of you to be complaining about company mailings to flight attendant homes while at the same time endorsing your own telephone intrusions into our lives.
If the pre-merger NWA contract is superior, why can’t you offer some irrefutable proof and comparisons? Where is your side by side comparison Janette? All you and your side can talk about is uniform points, while ignoring the $11,000.00 in pay and benefits the AFA contract is costing each one of us, compared to the Delta work rules. That $11,000 per year would buy a lot of uniform pieces.
If you can’t provide an objective comparison, then quit wasting our time, and quit lying about negotiations. There’s absolutely no comparison between pilot negotiations and what might happen should AFA win the representational election. Both pilots groups (Delta and NWA) were already union (ALPA), and therefore only had to merge contracts (which wasn’t completed overnight). On the other hand, per AFA’s own Constitution both flight attendants groups must be surveyed, negotiators must be appointed (and trained), and then the company and AFA must agree to meeting dates and begin negotiations. Negotiations involve give and take, and the pre-merger NWA contract has 33 sections alone. All of the sections will have to be opened, language would have to be exchanged, debated and then tentatively agreed to. And negotiations don’t take place daily – even at AFA represented UAL, United and AFA only negotiated for three days in September. So are you willing to promise in writing to us that AFA can negotiate a contract in under a year – and are you willing to promise in a legally binding contract with the membership that AFA will self-decertify if you fail to achieve within a year that “industry-leading” or “World-class” contract you’ve promised?
You are asking the Delta flight attendants to hand over $11 million per year in dues without any contract – without any guarantees from you or AFA. Doing so is highly dubious and is not good business sense, nor is it logical.
Sincerely,
Jose Arturo Ibarra
Here is her letter: http://www.nwaafa.org/docs/3825_001.pdf
