Dragonair Cabin Crew Strike
Flight strike chaos looms
Colleen Lee
The Standard...Friday, August 20, 2010
Dragonair is bracing for its first strike in more than two decades.
It comes after a major labor union representing cabin crew voted to take industrial action this month in a dispute over long working hours.
The Hong Kong Dragon Airlines Flight Attendants Association backed the plan with a near-unanimous vote at a meeting yesterday.
Only one of the 467 members present voted against. Of Dragonair's some 1,300 flight attendants, 800 are members of the union.
"The industrial action we are going to take this month will probably be a strike. We have already held a protest but our demand has not been met," association chairwoman Winnie Poon said.
"The company has shown no sincerity in the negotiations. We are fed up. With insufficient rest time, service quality might be affected."
If the action is taken, it will be the first by flight attendants since Hong Kong Dragon Airlines - or Dragonair - launched commercial flights in July 1985.
The airline is now a member of the Cathay Pacific Group.
Union representatives apologized for any inconvenience the strike may cause passengers.
"We will try to minimize the impact on passengers, so we will not hold the industrial action at the weekend," Poon said.
She said cabin crew grievances have been mounting since June as many of them have to work additional hours they are not originally rostered for.
That means some have to work for 12 to 15 hours on the trot.
The company has proposed an allowance of HK$236 for crew
who serve two more flights soon after flying back to Hong Kong, but the union has yet to accept the offer, she said.
However, Poon also pledged to continue talks with the carrier.
"The details of our industrial action have yet to be decided. It all depends on our talks with the firm."
Dragonair said it regrets the result of the union ballot. "However, the airline is pleased that the union has agreed to continue talks," it said.
It also professed full awareness of the pressures faced by crew and claimed to have introduced or proposed several measures to "address any unexpected demands or challenges faced by flight attendants."
General manager of inflight services Cecilia Leung said: "We are glad the union said it will engage in further discussions with us.
"Dragonair management and the crew union are aligned in their goal to provide a better working environment and an enhanced workflow for cabin crew."
Leung said Dragonair recruited 70 crew members in June who will join the team in October after training, which may help ease the workload.
EGL Tours executive director Steve Huen Kwok-chuen said several hundred clients on dozens of tours bound for the mainland, Japan, Taiwan and Southeast Asia are scheduled to take Dragonair flights this month.
Though there is no "Plan B" in place as yet, Huen is optimistic the dispute will be resolved.
The Labour Department is closely monitoring the issue and is in touch with Dragonair and the union in an attempt to sort matters out.