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Aviation Unions Outline FAA Fixes |
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The nation’s aviation unions told Congress yesterday that the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) must improve its labor management relations after a contentious eight years under the Bush administration; address flight crew fatigue; improve aviation maintenance safety; and modernize the air traffic control system.
At the Senate aviation subcommittee hearing on the FAA reauthorization bill, Patrick Forrey, president of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association (NATCA), told the panel:
A restoration of what was once a great collaborative relationship is only possible with the existence of a collective bargaining agreement (CBA) and a fair process for negotiating future CBAs and other labor agreements. Air traffic controllers have been working under FAA-imposed work and pay rules for nearly 1,000 days.
In 2006, the Bush administration’s FAA rejected NATCA’s call for mediation to settle a contract and walked away from the bargaining table. The agency then imposed a set of work rules and wage cuts that have driven controllers out of the towers. But last month the Obama administration announced it was appointing a team of mediators to help resolve the dispute. Said Forrey:
As the president and the [Transportation] Secretary [Ray LaHood] have repeatedly made clear, a resolution to the dispute is critical to stabilizing the controller workforce, restoring a collaborative working relationship between controllers and the FAA, and successfully implementing the Next Generation Air Transportation System needed to spur economic development and increase the safety, efficiency and effectiveness of air travel.
Tom Brantley, president of the Professional Aviation Safety Specialists (PASS), said change must be made in contract negotiations process with the FAA. For the past six years, four PASS bargaining units have been at an impasse with the FAA.
The goodwill of the current administration is permitting the FAA and NATCA to meet again in an attempt to resolve their dispute, but FAA unions still have no legal means of resolving bargaining disputes. Legislative language is needed to ensure that FAA employees who have chosen to be represented by a union, have the same basic right as every other union member in the our country—the right to real collective bargaining.
Air Line Pilots (ALPA) President Capt. John Prater and William McGlashen, assistant to the president of the Flight Attendants-CWA (AFA-CWA), both called on the FAA to address the issue of flight crew fatigue. Said Prater:
One of the many hardships that the post-9/11 era brought to airline flying was pilots flying right up to the FAA regulatory limit. This has resulted in adverse safety impacts, fatigue, and more stress. Sixteen-hour domestic duty days are facts of life for many airline pilots.
The current regulatory requirement of 8 hours of rest after a 16-hour day has to include travel to and from a hotel, meals, and sleep. So when we see a requirement for 8 hours of rest required for a pilot to operate a flight that translates into only a four or five hour window available for sleep.
McGlashen said fatigue is a “real and serious concern” for flight attendants as well.
As the deep concessions demanded of flight attendants during the recent and ongoing financial turmoil of the airline industry have taken hold, it has become clear that airline management hopes to keep our members working for as long as possible with greatly reduced time off between duty.
Flight attendants are so exhausted that they have informed us that they have in some cases forgotten to perform critical safety functions, including the arming of doors and even fallen asleep on the jump seats. Even more troubling is that the FAA continues to allow the carriers to schedule reduced rest periods, making them more routine, and has failed to recognize or show any concern for the impact that flight attendant fatigue has on the overall safety of the aviation system.
Machinists (IAM) Vice President Robert A. Roach Jr. said many airlines have taken advantage of “grossly unfair bankruptcy laws” to cut wages and break contracts that prohibited or limited outsourcing of aircraft maintenance.
He said IAM mechanics have found U.S. aircraft returning from overseas flights to have serious mechanical problems that were not detected at the foreign repair stations and that inadequate FAA funding and restrictions on FAA inspectors’ access to foreign repair stations must be addressed.
As a consequence of putting dollars ahead of sense, maintenance of U.S. aircraft has been exported across the globe, at a faster pace than the FAA could respond. The FAA needs adequate funding to hire a sufficient number of inspectors to ensure aviation maintenance safety at home and abroad…to safeguard the U.S. aviation industry.
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