Lawsuit pits pilot vs. pilot
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Delta contract limits regionals
By James Pilcher,
[email protected]
The Cincinnati Enquirer
For the second time in a year, Comair pilots and their union find themselves in a conflict attracting national attention. But this time, the opposition isn't management. It's each other.
A lawsuit by three pilots at the Erlanger-based regional airline against the international offices of the Air Line Pilots Association resumed in the federal courts last month after settlement talks failed.
Comair pilot Dan Ford is suing his union for allowing Delta pilots to negotiate limits on jobs like his.
(Tony Jones photo)
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In a case watched closely by the airline industry, a group of pilots calling themselves the Regional Jet Defense Coalition accused ALPA of failing to represent them fairly and equally by allowing Delta Air Line pilots to negotiate limits on regional jet flying.
Such job protection, or “scope,” clauses are becoming common in pilots' contracts. Mainline carriers want to expand market share with smaller, cheaper regional jets. But their pilots view regional jets as a threat to their jobs.
“These brand-name scope clauses have evolved into a remote control device, and there are no illusions that they protect our pilot group at Comair, even though we had no say in putting them into play,” said Dan Ford, president of the coalition and a 14-year Comair veteran from Burlington. “And the union that we are all paying our dues into ...is refusing to prevent the mainline pilots from limiting our livelihoods.”
The suit could have immense implications throughout the industry, but especially at Delta, with its large fleet of regional jets.
Delta and Comair officials would only say the suit was an ALPA matter. Officials with Delta's branch of ALPA wouldn't talk.
US Airways is also in a bitter fight with its pilots over regional jets, which management sees as the carrier's salvation. Squabbles have erupted at United and America West, while pilots at American Airlines, represented by a different union, also have struggled with the issue.
“If this suit were successful, I don't know what ALPA would do,” said Andrew D. McClintock, an Atlanta-based airline labor lawyer. “These scope limitations are becoming ever-stronger and more prevalent sources of dispute.”
The suit seeks an injunction against the Delta scope clause, which has limited how much Delta can rely on regional jets and how many 70-seat regional jets Delta can buy before adding more mainline jobs. The suit t also seeks more say for regional pilots, as well as more than $100 million in punitive and compensatory damages from the union.
It was filed in April 2001, soon after Comair's pilots went on strike for 89 days. The suit is being heard by a federal magistrate in New York, who has not set a trial date.
ALPA International spokesman John Mazor said the union believes the case “is baseless and without merit” and that the union would be filing for summary judgment and dismissal in mid-June.
“This issue needs to be brought up with the National Mediation Board, not the federal courts,” Mr. Mazor said, referring to the board that oversees labor issues in the airline and railroad industry. “I will say that we are in the process of conducting an examination of the scope issue.”
Regional Airline Association president Debby McElroy said such scope clauses have already hurtregional service. She said American Eagle stopped service to seven cities because scope clauses at the mainline limited regional jet flying.
“This is no longer a theoretical situation,” Ms. McElroy said.
Several pilots at Atlantic Southeast Airlines, a Delta regional subsidiary like Comair, are planning to join the suit within a month.
“There's always been this underlying tone of you're not as good as we are from the mainline pilots who run things at ALPA,” said Ken Cooksey, an ASA pilot who was twice elected chairman of ASA's ALPA branch. “This issue caused me to drop out of union activity entirely, and it needs to change.”
Said Mr. Ford: “We're not out to break the union, and we're not anti-ALPA. But a member is a member is a member, no matter who he flies for. That's why we're in this, not the money.”