Why is it so important to have representation?

Another article that discusses why its imperative for Delta flight attendants to have representation.


Delta merger will likely trigger new collective bargaining


Delta Airlines announced last week its intent to pursue a merger with Northwest Airlines. (The carrier’s intent to pursue a combination was inferred from its hiring last year of Richard Anderson, former CEO of Northwest Airlines.)

Standard & Poors Rating Service expressed the concern that a combination could lead to higher labor costs if collective bargaining agreements established in bankruptcy were reopened for bargaining (“Potential Delta Merger Could Lead to Higher Labor Costs”). Under the proper reading of the Railway Labor Act, that will occur with the pilots of the two carriers, and, if other employee groups vote in favor of a union, the surviving carrier will have to engage in bargaining for a new agreement with those employee groups as well.

Delta is nonunion in all “crafts or classes” covered by the RLA except for pilots. In contrast, NWA has unionized employees in all of its large employee groups. Delta’s merger with NWA could trigger “representation disputes” under Section 2, Ninth of the Act before the National Mediation Board for all crafts or classes except mechanics and related employees. (The Northwest mechanics and related are represented by the Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association, which presided over a staggering reduction in M&R headcount at NWA; from over 10,000 to approximately 1,000.) The NMB requires that a labor organization have a showing of at least 35% of employee support among the combined employee groups in order to trigger an election (i.e., if the combined employee group was 10,000, the union representing one of the pre-merger employee groups would need at least 3,500 employees in that pre-merger unit.)
The pilots of both Delta and NWA are represented by the Air Line Pilots Association (5,800 at DAL and 4,500 at NWA). A certification by the NMB of ALPA for the combined pilot group would be a formality.

The Association of Flight Attendants (AFA-CWA) represents the flight attendants at NWA and has tried unsuccessfully to win representation elections for the Delta flight attendants. The NWA flight attendant group is likely large enough (over 7,000) to trigger a representation election when combined with the nonunion Delta flight attendants. The Delta FAs are lower paid than the flight attendants at NWA.

The ramp employees (who handle baggage and various services outside the terminal “on the ramp”) and customer service agents (who work in the terminal and at reservation centers) of NWA are represented by the International Association of Machinists. Delta’s employees in those categories are nonunion. The IAM also likely represents enough employees at NWA to trigger a representation election among these combined employee groups.

The combination of Delta and NWA mechanics, however, will not result automatically in a representation election because the NWA mechanics & related group is too small to constitute 35% of the combined unit. If AMFA or another union collected 35% election authorization cards among the mechanics & related of the combined unit (that would require a substantial number of cards from Delta mechanics) it could file with the NMB to trigger a representation election. It is very unlikely that AMFA could do so, however, as its reputation is in tatters in the industry due to its loss of thousands of jobs at Northwest and Alaska Airlines.

The representation process triggered by a merger would be as follows:
once the two carriers conclude the merger transaction (including compliance with the merger protections for NWA employees provided in the various collective bargaining agreements at NWA), a union seeking to represent the combined unit (it would be the incumbent NWA union almost certainly) would file a “single carrier” application with the National Mediation Board. This would trigger an investigation by the NMB to determine if the two formerly independent air carriers (Delta and NWA) now are integrated operationally and for labor relations purposes into a single system. If such an integration has occurred, then the NMB would find that a new, combined “single” carrier exists (that the carrier might continue to be called “Delta Airlines” or “Northwest Airlines” does not matter for representation purposes).
the NMB would then give any labor organization (including an incumbent) two weeks from the finding of a single carrier to submit a “showing of interest” of at least 35% support from employees of the combined unit to trigger an election. An incumbent union can meet this showing based on the fact that its pre-merger representation constitutes at least 35% of the combined unit.

If either the incumbent or another union meets this showing of interest, the NMB will conduct a representation election among the employees of the combined employee group. If the union prevails in that election (by receiving 50%+1 votes of all eligible employees in the unit), then the NMB will issue a new certification of representation for the combined unit.
So what does this all mean for a Delta merger triggering new collective bargaining? Once the NMB issues a certification of representative for the new combined unit of the single carrier, Section 2, Ninth of the Railway Labor Act, requires the company to bargain with the certified representative over rates of pay, rules and working conditions for the unit. The carrier cannot attempt to impose a collective bargaining agreement from an old unit onto the new representative. (In the case of Delta, it has no collective bargaining agreements for most of its employees.) As the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit found in AFA v. USAir, a representative cannot be bound to an agreement negotiated by another representative. Further, since representatives are certified on a carrier-by-carrier basis, any merger of two carriers into a single carrier necessarily creates a new representative. To permit one representative to bind the newly-certified representative would mean the employees effectively have two representatives. This is contrary to the express language of the RLA which provides for only one certified representative. As the court of appeals noted, you can no more have two representatives for an employee group than “you can have two men on second base.”
The newly-certified representative would bargain in its own right for a contract and that may mean new terms in the agreement. Where the same union represents employees on both carriers, the negotiations may take the form of “contract amalgamation”–negotiating to combine the terms of the two labor agreements in an acceptable way. For a merger involving Delta, however, bargaining would essentially be from scratch, since most of the larger employee groups are now nonunion, again except for the pilots.

Such bargaining will undoubtedly lead to improvements in terms and conditions of employment whether in contract amalgamation by the pilots or in negotiations for a new agreement to cover the combined union/non-union employee groups. Both Delta and NWA cut employee pay and work rules significantly while in bankruptcy. A combination of carriers is sold to the public, Wall Street and Congress as creating a more financially healthy and competitive carrier. Well, a carrier with more money and a stronger competitive position should have better labor contracts, too. That certainly will be the employees’ position if they are wise enough to vote for a union representative. If, however, they unwisely choose the nonunion course that most Delta employee groups apparently favored for many years, they will learn to their disappointment (as Delta employees did in its bankruptcy) that terms and conditions will be imposed by their carrier without bargaining and with regard only to reducing labor costs to the lowest level available–and then they will watch as only the pilots improve their situation.