United Airlines Flight Attendants Subject To Involuntary Furlough
Date:
January 15, 2014
Management Fails to Recognize Legally Binding Contractual Involuntary Furlough Protection
Washington, DC – United Airlines Flight Attendants,
represented by the Association
of Flight Attendants-CWA (AFA), today calls on management to work
collaboratively to find solutions and prevent any involuntary job loss. After weeks of discussion and tireless work
on behalf of the union, today United management has stated they will involuntary
furlough some of our most junior members. Greg Davidowitch, AFA president at
United issued the following statement:
“At the very basic
level, today’s announcement is a failure by management to recognize protections
of our contract. Despite our
recommendations to pursue options that would mitigate the company’s staffing
overage, management declined to do the right thing and make the right choice
for our airline’s success.
“Successful
airlines do not lay off workers, they work with the union for solutions. We
continue to meet with management and offer creative solutions to an involuntary
furlough; while also addressing the company’s needs to mitigate an overage in
manpower.
“They will try and
create clever terms to justify their choice, and most certainly drop the blame
on the union, but what it comes down to is simply the promise of United’s
merger not being realized.
“AFA will continue
to pursue any and all opportunities that mitigate the devastating effects
this decision will have on those being laid off, and on our company as a whole. We will continue to advocate to management to
find alternatives that avoid job loss, and work collaboratively for creative
and reasonable solutions. It’s not too late to turn this thing around,
management can still choose to do the right thing.”
More than 55,000
Flight Attendants, including the over 25,000 Flight Attendants at United, join
together to form The Association of Flight Attendants-CWA (AFA), the world's
largest Flight Attendant Union. AFA is part of the 700,000 member strong
Communications Workers of America, AFL-CIO. Visit us at www.unitedafa.org.
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