Air Canada Industrial Relations Essay

6,800 of Air Canada’s flight attendants were set to go on strike in 2011. However, the dispute between the union and the management escalated and got sent to the Canadian Industrial Relations Board (CIRB), and resulted in prohibition of work stoppage. Unwantingly, the employees had to resume daily operations at Air Canada. The main issues the employees brought to the table during the negotiations were: job protection, wages, working conditions and pension changes. Air Canada was planning to launch a low-cost carrier using lower paid new hires. This alarmed the current workers and resulted in job insecurity. The employees felt that this “discounted carrier” could potentially convert into a mainline carrier over time, which will jeopardize their
Management claimed to have been generous in the last agreement offer, where they met 80% of the worker’s demand, but the agreement still got rejected. The union argued that the key issues were not kept in mind while constructing the agreement that was offered. The negotiations soon ended and the situation was then handed over to an arbitrator, who forced a settlement that was similar-to the last agreement offer that was rejected. Air Canada stated that they felt like the arbitrator favoured the union due to their preference of gradual change over radical change. However, the union felt that the government interference in the situation favoured Air Canada. The two parties clearly had different priorities for the collective agreement. The management claimed that the union was not clear and concise with what they wanted out of the negotiation. The language used by the management or the union in this case did not necessarily matter at the end because the decision was made by the arbitrator. However, during the initial negotiation I feel like both parties came off very strong. The union members were extremely frustrated with their circumstances, which resulted in the management to become