Local 4070 Clarification related to Scope Bargaining as related to Swoop

Dear Members,

Next week marks an important milestone in the development of CUPE Local 4070 for our Members at WestJet. The WestJet Bargaining Committee and our Employer are meeting to discuss monetary items for the first time.

For those Members unfamiliar with the process, this signals that the Bargaining process is entering the homestretch. We’ve had a few unresolved issues that remain to be addressed, but the Committee is working toward getting you the absolute best protections we can in the form of a solid Collective Agreement and a fair grievance process, which will be the foundation of our ability to protect our Members’ rights moving forward.

In light of what lies ahead, the Union and Bargaining committee feel it is time for us to begin to elaborate on some of the details of Swoop's expansion into Toronto. We have been unable to share this with you until now due to the confidential nature of Collective Bargaining.

The primary issues we’ve been unable to reach a deal on in bargaining, currently are the Commuter article, which deals primarily with establishing protection of the current ACM policy, and Scope language.

The Scope language pertains to protections around Swoop growth, and limiting the ability of the Employer to transfer work from WestJet Mainline to a lower-cost workgroup. This is counterproductive for both our WestJet Members, as well as to our Swoop Members, who have told us they want an ability to flow to WestJet. The ability to negotiate Scope language like this is also fundamental to why Swoop is a part of Local 4070.

We’ve heard our members loud and clear. There was a miss on the Union’s part in terms of our communication on the subject of Swoop.

When the expansion into YYZ was brought to us by the Employer, we received certain assurances of what the Swoop expansion into Toronto would mean. Our communication with the members was based on those assurances.

Following those initial conversations, not much time passed before it became apparent that the Company’s assurances were hollow. In early September, the Union began to consult with CUPE legal about our options, at which time we learned that we do not have the legal ability to challenge the employer on existing WCCA language. That, quite simply put, is not an option for us. We recognize that many of our Members feel that we should have somehow been able to prevent the Swoop expansion to begin with, but we have never had a legal avenue by which to do that. What we need is a permanent solution that would result in the protections we require moving into the future. The only path we’ve had to address these concerns is at the bargaining table. That is exactly what we are doing.

Even if we had the ability to challenge the Employer on what our Members feel is a violation of the statutory freeze, which our legal team maintains we do not, a CIRB win on a stat freeze complaint would only result in protections until ratification of a Collective Agreement. At that point, the statutory freeze ends, and is replaced with the terms of the CA

As we reach the end of the collective bargaining process, we may need to call on our Members to lend their voices to our cause. We are absolutely not prepared to present our Members with a Collective Agreement that does not include meaningful and enforceable restrictions on WestJet’s ability to transfer work to Swoop, in order for them to run similar operations at a far lower cost.

Conversely, we also do not believe this protection harms our Swoop Members. We’ve heard our Swoop Members loud and clear as well, and what they want is an ability to further their career which involves flow to WestJet.

We maintain, and have maintained since Scope discussions began, that the transfer of our labour to a lower cost work-group, which we believe is managed by the same true employer, is an issue foundational to our members. We have every right to bargain protections for this. That said, it is abundantly evident that we’ve not communicated those points to our Members explicitly, nor have we explicitly condemned the actions of our Employer, and we recognize that this information is vital for solidarity within our Local.

With this communication, we hope to clear up some of the confusion that exists within our Membership, so that we may all row in the same direction moving forward.

Our power comes from your support, it is fundamental to the bargaining process. Having our Membership divided, and angry at the Union, often plays right into a Corporate strategy in Collective Bargaining.

If we want the protection we hear our Members are asking for, we need your continued trust and support in order to achieve this in a meaningful, and enforceable way, through the ratification of our first WestJet Collective Agreement.

We know this communication has been a particularly lengthy one, but for those still reading to the end, thank you for reading, and we hope these words will help bring some clarity to long misunderstood topics and division among our work groups.

If you have any questions on any of the above, please reach out to your Union. For bargaining-related questions, you should contact weare4070@cupe4070.ca directly for the most accurate information.

In Solidarity,
Your CUPE 4070 Executive Team