Canadian Airport Thread II

[whatnext]

Originally Posted by thenoflyzone

Agreed. However, arbitration doesn't necessarily mean the flight attendants will get shafted.

I think the arbitrator will give them what AC offered (38% overall compensation increase), plus ~5%. Which is ok, and in line with that the pilots got.

I don’t think there’s anyway back from insisting cabin crew get paid the minute they are expected to show up and start working. Times have changed and some US peers already have that. If binding arbitration ignores that it will just fester until the next contract.

The government made the worst decision possible. Forcing an arbitrated settlement on a union will just help revive the NDP.

[kwoldtimer]

Originally Posted by whatnext

C’est la vie. Air travel is too cheap anyway. That’s why we’re seeing mass tourism protests around the world.

Porter must be shitting bricks now that their flight attendants have signed on to the same union as AC. They’ll be expected to adopt a similar contract.

I completely agree, but I suspect we're in the minority.

[kwoldtimer]

Originally Posted by whatnext

I don’t think there’s anyway back from insisting cabin crew get paid the minute they are expected to show up and start working. Times have changed and some US peers already have that. If binding arbitration ignores that it will just fester until the next contract.

The government made the worst decision possible. Forcing an arbitrated settlement on a union will just help revive the NDP.

Do they?

[whatnext]

Originally Posted by kwoldtimer

Do they?

… Delta Air Lines is one of the only major North American airlines that offers ground pay to its flight attendants, paying them at half their hourly rate for 40 to 50 minutes of boarding time depending on the destination and aircraft.

Pouliot noted that Porter Airlines started paying flight attendants for some boarding duties this year while some smaller carriers — such as Pascan Aviation — pay full salary for ground duties.…

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/flight-attendants-unpaid-work-labour-code-1.7607862

[hehehe]

Well anytime we commoners get a little bit of power or leeway the government has to step in and stop it. We live in a "democracy" for sure. A democracy that caters to the whims and wills of corporations and money interests. People pay 30-50% of their salary in tax, can't even find housing or healthcare, the government then floods the country with temporary visa holders to lower wages, but god forbid new flight attendants make more than 30K a year.

[casper]

Originally Posted by hehehe

Well anytime we commoners get a little bit of power or leeway the government has to step in and stop it. We live in a "democracy" for sure. A democracy that caters to the whims and wills of corporations and money interests. People pay 30-50% of their salary in tax, can't even find housing or healthcare, the government then floods the country with temporary visa holders to lower wages, but god forbid new flight attendants make more than 30K a year.

Well, on the topic of health care, it mostly works. It could work better, but it does work. We have some of the highest life expectancy rates in the western world. Ahead of the US and many European countries.

On the topic of housing. Most people have a house over their heads. Is it overpriced? Yes. With that 66.5% Canadians own their home. This is higher than the US. It is higher than most of Europe.

The Air Canada news release says the average senior flight attended makes $87,000/year by 2027. That is reasonable for a position with limited post-secondary training and relatively few work hours. Sounds like crap salary for those starting out without sonority.

[zahav]

I worked in the airport from 2002-2008 so I have vivid memories of the Air Canada of that era, it was dominated by labour strife and barely surviving. It is actually shocking that they maintained relatively smooth labour relations from like 2004 till now (there has been some isolated job action or "protests" but nothing on this scale). Anyone familiar with early 2000s era Air Canada and their labour relations would know it was so toxic it was palpable. The company turned its position around completely and performed much better than most NA peers. And even more shocking, they won recognition for their service, in-flight experience, and somehow became strong again. Arguably in the last 15 years or so, they have even outpaced Westjet in growth and customer satisfaction. Heck, WS seemed to have far more labour strife in this period as well, something unthinkable in 2002. I think AC's staff have been patient and realistic with the company for a long time as they rebuilt their reputation. Despite Covid challenges and recent US travel interruptions, AC is still much stronger now than in the early 2000s when they were belly up. Demands for higher wages and other goodies from a company that was hanging on by a string, it was a hopeless situation. But this time, I think there was justification for productive bargaining, and an agreement wasn't that far off. I just hope this situation doesn't deeply embitter employees and dog the airline for a longer period. Would be sad to see so much progress unravel and have "the old Air Canada" back...

[zahav]

Two of the most prominent Chinese airlines that had yet to restart regular YVR service have now announced their resumption. It's still laughable service levels compared to pre-pandemic, but at least it's a move in the right direction. And both restarting at the same time is nice to see. There's been anticipation for a long time that flights would increase due to some thawing in relations with China and Canada lifting restrictions. But progress has been glacially slow still, with combined Air Canada and foreign carrier service being way below pre-pandemic. But such is reality now, we need to be thankful for any gains in the current climate. Baby steps, I suppose....

CHINA EASTERN RESUMES SHANGHAI – VANCOUVER SERVICE FROM LATE-SEP 2025
China Eastern from late-September 2025 resumes Shanghai Pu Dong – Vancouver route, with first flight scheduled on 25SEP25. The Skyteam member to operate this route twice weekly, with Airbus A350-900 aircraft.

MU581 PVG1320 – 0910YVR 359 14
MU582 YVR1250 – 1615+1PVG 359 14

CHINA SOUTHERN RESUMES GUANGZHOU – VANCOUVER SERVICE IN SEP 2025
China Southern from mid-September 2025 schedules passenger service resumption on Guangzhou – Vancouver route, on board Boeing 777-300ER aircraft. The airline will operate this route twice weekly from 16SEP25.

CZ329 CAN0025 – 2145-1YVR 773 26
CZ330 YVR0105 – 0600+1CAN 773 26

PS>> in typical sketchy fashion, both routes only appear bookable until 4th week in October... This could just be the booking engines not being loaded entirely yet, I know historically there can be oddities with Chinese flight booking availability. Fingers crossed this is the case. If the current availability turns out to be permanent, then it would be a 6 week "resumption" and gone again. That seems wacky even by Covid-era standards. Plus, Jim from Aeroroutes.com is a savvy airline expert, with a strong understanding of schedules and booking logistics. I don't think he'd post these and omit something as critical as a 6-week-only resumption. There must be some information he's aware of that we're not seeing. Or at least I hope!

PPS>> **Attention Wikipedia experts*** I just checked the YVR and YUL pages, and the Airlines and destinations table for both airports is missing Air Canada mainline. Does this mean someone is editing it right now? Or did someone delete by accident? I checked YYZ, YYC, YOW, YHZ in case it was something to do with the strike and someone was adding a general note. But all of those pages still have AC mainline in their tables, it is just YUL and YVR. Anyone have a logical explanation?

[hehehe]

https://www.aircanada.com/media/air-cana...upe-negotiations-to-binding-arbitration/

FA's ordered tp return to work by 14:00 today.

[whatnext]

Originally Posted by zahav

Two of the most prominent Chinese airlines that had yet to restart regular YVR service have now announced their resumption. It's still laughable service levels compared to pre-pandemic, but at least it's a move in the right direction. And both restarting at the same time is nice to see. There's been anticipation for a long time that flights would increase due to some thawing in relations with China and Canada lifting restrictions. But progress has been glacially slow still, with combined Air Canada and foreign carrier service being way below pre-pandemic. But such is reality now, we need to be thankful for any gains in the current climate. Baby steps, I suppose....

CHINA EASTERN RESUMES SHANGHAI – VANCOUVER SERVICE FROM LATE-SEP 2025
China Eastern from late-September 2025 resumes Shanghai Pu Dong – Vancouver route, with first flight scheduled on 25SEP25. The Skyteam member to operate this route twice weekly, with Airbus A350-900 aircraft.

MU581 PVG1320 – 0910YVR 359 14
MU582 YVR1250 – 1615+1PVG 359 14

CHINA SOUTHERN RESUMES GUANGZHOU – VANCOUVER SERVICE IN SEP 2025
China Southern from mid-September 2025 schedules passenger service resumption on Guangzhou – Vancouver route, on board Boeing 777-300ER aircraft. The airline will operate this route twice weekly from 16SEP25.

CZ329 CAN0025 – 2145-1YVR 773 26
CZ330 YVR0105 – 0600+1CAN 773 26

….?

We shouldn’t be celebrating the return of the money laundering express. Vancouvers housing market was devastated by wealthy astronaut families who have a breadwinner making money in China, paying little to no Canadian income taxes and sending their “housewives and students” to snap up real estate. Anything that enables that is bad for Canada.

[casper]

Originally Posted by whatnext

We shouldn’t be celebrating the return of the money laundering express. Vancouvers housing market was devastated by wealthy astronaut families who have a breadwinner making money in China, paying little to no Canadian income taxes and sending their “housewives and students” to snap up real estate. Anything that enables that is bad for Canada.

I am certain the sales guys at the Porsche and Rolls dealerships and card dealers at the River Rock Casino would disagree with you on that.

On a more serious note. We are in a trade war with both China and the US. All for increasing tourism from China but we need to do it with a high level of caution.

If there are families in China or the US that want to escape totalitarian governments and relocate to Canada we should be open to that.

[Dominion301]

AC’s F/As are electing to remain on strike: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/air-canada-flights-sunday-1.7611078

[Ozabald]

Originally Posted by casper

I am certain the sales guys at the Porsche and Rolls dealerships and card dealers at the River Rock Casino would disagree with you on that.

On a more serious note. We are in a trade war with both China and the US. All for increasing tourism from China but we need to do it with a high level of caution.

If there are families in China or the US that want to escape totalitarian governments and relocate to Canada we should be open to that.

The silence is deafening. China slaps tariffs on Canadian products, especially agriculture, and where are the howls of outrage? No boycott campaigns, no calls to clear the shelves of Chinese goods, not even a whisper from the provincial liquor boards about pulling Chinese liquor. But hey, why bother being consistent when selective outrage and good old-fashioned Canadian hypocrisy are so much easier?

[casper]

Originally Posted by Ozabald

The silence is deafening. China slaps tariffs on Canadian products, especially agriculture, and where are the howls of outrage? No boycott campaigns, no calls to clear the shelves of Chinese goods, not even a whisper from the provincial liquor boards about pulling Chinese liquor. But hey, why bother being consistent when selective outrage and good old-fashioned Canadian hypocrisy are so much easier?

That shows that it is not about the tariffs. Countries play tariff/economic games like this all the time. US tariffs on lumber, steel and aluminum are noting new. Canada retaliates and then negotiations occur.

What caused the outrage was the "51-state" nonsense. It was the threat to start an economic war with Canada with the ultimate goal being annexation of the Canada.

Canada stands to benefit from the trade war between China and the US. We should see more tourists from China in Canada as the US becomes a more difficult country to enter.

[hollywoodcory]

Originally Posted by Dominion301

AC’s F/As are electing to remain on strike: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/air-canada-flights-sunday-1.7611078

Good for them.

Side note, just read that the arbitrator at the CIRB that was selected overlook this previously worked at Air Canada? Isn't that not a conflict of interest?

I too would be defying government orders as well.

[Taeolas]

I agree. IMO, Carney jumped the gun trying to pull them back before even a weekend on the lines. I think it's inevitable that they'll be forced back to work at some point. But you want to give them a chance to be heard, to show the full impact of what they do is.

The Government should have waited until maybe the middle of the week at the earliest to try and pull them back. Long enough to get their message out, and to hurt AC. But soon enough to not disrupt end of Summer/Back to School travel plans too much.

[whatnext]

Originally Posted by Taeolas

I agree. IMO, Carney jumped the gun trying to pull them back before even a weekend on the lines. I think it's inevitable that they'll be forced back to work at some point. But you want to give them a chance to be heard, to show the full impact of what they do is.

The Government should have waited until maybe the middle of the week at the earliest to try and pull them back. Long enough to get their message out, and to hurt AC. But soon enough to not disrupt end of Summer/Back to School travel plans too much.

That's why I said all along it should have been a cooling off period. Now they're going to have to come down hard on CUPE with a court ruling and the chaos and uncertainty for thousands of travellers is amplified. It's also a rather stupid decision on CUPE's part, they'll piss away the public approval they had.

[hollywoodcory]

Originally Posted by whatnext

That's why I said all along it should have been a cooling off period. Now they're going to have to come down hard on CUPE with a court ruling and the chaos and uncertainty for thousands of travellers is amplified. It's also a rather stupid decision on CUPE's part, they'll piss away the public approval they had.

Except from what I've seen its actually been mostly supported by the general public. Seems like AC & the government are the ones taking the piss.

The government effectively added more fire to the issue by stepping in this fast. Hell they didn't react this fast to the Canada Post strike (which went on for nearly a month).

[hehehe]

who knows how long it'll take to get this all sorted out now. yikes. It was a big mistake to order back to work after 12 hours and not at least wait for the weekend to finish

[whatnext]

Originally Posted by hollywoodcory

Except from what I've seen its actually been mostly supported by the general public. Seems like AC & the government are the ones taking the piss.

The government effectively added more fire to the issue by stepping in this fast. Hell they didn't react this fast to the Canada Post strike (which went on for nearly a month).

Correction: the flight attendants started out with a support. Now in one fell swoop they’ve cast themselves as lawbreakers. That’s one thing Canadians don’t like.