Flight attendant unions demonstrate at 30 airports for salaries, duty rosters and the right to strike – The Militant

CLEVELAND — Hundreds of flight attendants, members of their two umbrella unions, the Association of Professional Flight Attendants and the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, held strikes and rallies at more than 30 airports in the United States, as well as in London and Guam, on June 13. The two unions, which represent more than 77,000 workers, have been fighting for new collective bargaining agreements for five years.

Socialist Workers Party presidential candidate Rachele Fruit joined American Airlines flight attendants and union supporters in a vigorous picket at Cleveland Hopkins Airport. Dozens chanted, “What do we want? A union contract. When do we want it? Now!”

The professional flight attendants’ association, hampered by the notoriously anti-union Railroad Labor Law, is now urging the national mediation board to allow them to strike after recent negotiations failed. But management is confident a strike will not be allowed. “The Railroad Labor Law is designed to minimize very, very, very significantly the possibility of disruption to the transportation system,” said Steve Johnson, vice chairman of American Airlines, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

Among those taking part in the action here were flight attendants who work for United and Frontier Airlines, as well as representatives from the International Association of Machinists and the Amalgamated Transit Union. Drivers of several passing cars honked their horns in support.

Nilda Santiago, who works for Frontier Airlines, told Fruit she was on the picket line to raise awareness about the airline’s newly implemented “turn model,” which many flight attendants oppose. This model, which is already in use on about 85 percent of Frontier flights, requires flight attendants to make round-trip flights daily, eliminating layovers and extra per diems for crew. This saves airline bosses money. Santiago explained that in addition to pay cuts, this can also mean the loss of adequate rest time.

It also means more trips to and from the airport and parking fees.

In addition, flight attendants are not paid for the time they spend boarding and disembarking passengers, but only for the time when the aircraft doors are closed.

Fruit, a hotel worker and member of the UNITE HERE union, was the first woman hired as a tarmac worker for Eastern Airlines at Baltimore/Washington International Airport in Maryland. She told Santiago she knows all too well the exploitation of workers in the airline industry by bosses.

Fruit said her campaign calls for breaking with the Democrats and Republicans and building a workers’ party to mobilize unions and defend workers against such conditions, which she says are dangerous to airline workers and the public alike.

The unions plan to organize further protests.