Air Canada faces possibility of having to shut down completely
The widespread industrial action could also leave some 25,000 Canadians abroad stranded. In anticipation of the disruption, Air Canada announced it expects to cancel 500 flights by the end of Friday, having already begun cancellations on Thursday. By Friday lunchtime, 87 domestic and 176 international flights scheduled for Friday and Saturday had been called off, according to aviation analytics firm Cirium. On Thursday, when the airline initiated a "phased wind down" of most operations, 18 domestic and four international flights were cancelled.
Canada's Federal Jobs Minister Patty Hajdu urged a resolution, stating: "We strongly urge the parties to work with federal mediators and get a deal done. Time is precious and Canadians are counting on you."
The Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), representing the flight attendants, declined to voluntarily enter arbitration, insisting: "The appropriate course of action is for Air Canada to return to the table and resume good faith bargaining." The union, which represents about 10,000 Air Canada flight attendants, and the airline cite disagreements over key issues, including pay raises, as having stalled contract negotiations.
Air Canada's chief operating officer, Mark Nasr, indicated that the decision to lock out union members, even if it meant halting flights, would facilitate an orderly restart, which he said would "take a full week to complete" under the best circumstances.
The union and Air Canada have been in contract talks for about eight months without reaching a provisional agreement. CUPE held a vote at the end of July, with 99.7 per cent approving a strike. On Wednesday, it issued Air Canada a 72-hour strike notice. The airline responded with a lockout notice, stating it would prevent flight attendants from working on Saturday. The union confirmed it rejected a proposal from the airline for a binding arbitration process that would have averted a flight attendant strike, preferring to negotiate a deal for its members to vote on. The duration of any grounding remains uncertain.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Guardian
17 minutes ago
- The Guardian
Air Canada flight attendants to defy back-to-work order and remain on strike
Air Canada's flight attendants plan to remain on strike, their union has said, defying government efforts to force them back to work and into binding arbitration over a dispute that has left more than 100,000 travellers stranded around the world during the peak summer travel season. About 10,000 flight attendants who work for Canada's largest airline walked out on the job early on Saturday amid an increasingly bitter dispute over what the union has described as 'poverty wages' and unpaid labour. Around the same time, Air Canada, which operates about 700 flights a day, said it would begin locking flight attendants out of airports. Less than 12 hours later, the Canadian government said it had ordered an end to the work stoppage, leading Air Canada to announce plans to resume flying by Sunday evening. However, that timeline was thrown into question after the union told Reuters it would challenge the return-to-work order, which it described as unconstitutional. It was the latest twist in talks that have dragged on since March as the flight attendants seek to address the fact that they are not compensated for work carried out when planes are not in the air, whether it is time spent on the ground between flights and or helping passengers to board. On Saturday, Canada's federal jobs minister, Patty Hajdu, said it was clear the talks had reached an impasse and that the impact was being felt by Canadians and visitors across the country. 'The talks broke down,' said Hajdu as she told reporters that she had asked the Canada Industrial Relations Board to order an immediate end to the strike and to impose binding arbitration. 'It is clear that the parties are not any closer to resolving some of the key issues that remain and they will need help with the arbitrator.' She appeared to link her actions to the toll that US tariff increases had taken on the Canadian economy. 'In a year in which Canadian families and businesses have already experienced too much disruption and uncertainty, this is not the time to add additional challenges and disruptions to their lives and our economy,' she said in a statement. Hajdu's power to halt the strike stems from a section of the Canada Labour Code, which gives the minister unilateral authority to end work stoppages in order to 'maintain or secure industrial peace'. While the section was rarely used by previous governments, the Liberal government has invoked it several times in the past year, quelling strikes by workers at Canadian ports, the post office and railway companies, prompting analysts to voice concerns that the use of the clause may be undermining workers' rights. The union representing the flight attendants decried the Liberal government for stepping in within hours, accusing it of violating their right to take job action. Air Canada had reportedly previously requested that the government intervene to impose binding arbitration. Wesley Lesosky, of the Canadian Union of Public Employees, said the government was giving 'Air Canada exactly what they want – hours and hours of unpaid labour from underpaid flight attendants, while the company pulls in sky-high profits and extraordinary executive compensation'. According to the aviation analytics firm Cirium, the airline had cancelled 671 flights by Saturday afternoon, leaving some travellers stranded overseas and others scrambling to find alternatives during the busy summer travel season. About 130,000 customers a day could be affected by a disruption, according to the airline. The airline said earlier it had offered its flight attendants 'an increase of more than 38% on global compensation', but the union said the figure failed to fully account for inflation. Air Canada also said it was willing to pay flight attendants 50% of their wage for work done before planes take off, leading the union to reply that its members should be fully compensated for their labour. About 70% of the airline's flight attendants are women, said Natasha Stea, a local union president and flight attendant. She questioned whether they were being treated fairly, given that Air Canada pilots, the vast majority of whom are men, received a significant raise last year. 'We are heartbroken for our passengers,' she told the Associated Press late last week. 'Nobody wants to see Canadians stranded or anxious about their travel plans, but we cannot work for free.'
Daily Mail
2 hours ago
- Daily Mail
KEVIN O'LEARY: I spotted a crushing indicator for the US housing market... heed my advice if you want to survive the financial fallout
There was crushing news for shoppers in the US housing market this week. On Tuesday, a key measure of inflation rose at a faster rate than anticipated. The Consumer Price Index, which excludes volatile food and energy prices, was up 3.1 percent in July.
Reuters
2 hours ago
- Reuters
Air Canada union says flight attendants will continue strike, defy government
MONTREAL Aug 17 (Reuters) - Air Canada ( opens new tab flight attendants said on Sunday they will remain on strike and challenge a return-to-work order they called unconstitutional, defying a government decision to force them back to their duties by 2 p.m. ET (1800 GMT). Air Canada had said it planned to resume flights on Sunday evening, a day after the Canadian government issued a directive to end a cabin crew strike that caused the suspension of around 700 daily flights, stranding more than 100,000 passengers. Thousands of Air Canada flight attendants walked off the job on Saturday for the first time since 1985, after months of negotiations over a new contract. The Canadian Union of Public Employees said in a statement that members would remain on strike and invited Air Canada back to the table to "negotiate a fair deal." Air Canada and a Canadian government spokesperson were not immediately available for comment. The country's largest carrier had said some flights would still be canceled over the next 7-10 days as the schedule stabilizes and returns to normal. It had started cancelling flights on Friday in anticipation of the stoppage. The Canadian Industrial Relations Board ordered Air Canada to resume operations and all Air Canada and Air Canada Rouge flight attendants to return to their duties. The CIRB was acting on a directive from Jobs Minister Patty Hajdu as the government moved to end the strike and require binding arbitration to break a contract impasse, an action that Air Canada had previously sought from Prime Minister Mark Carney's minority Liberal government but unionized flight attendants fiercely opposed. The most contentious issue in the contract negotiations has been the union's demand for compensation for time spent on the ground between flights and when helping passengers board. Attendants are now largely paid only when their plane is moving. CUPE had pushed for a negotiated solution, saying binding arbitration would take pressure off the airline. Air Canada said on Sunday that the CIRB had ordered the terms of the collective agreement between the union and the airline that expired on March 31 be extended until a new agreement can be reached.
