Cargolux

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Your exceptional participation and clear rejection vote has had a tremendous impact!

Within hours following the results being revealed to management several wheels started turning. Which resulted in an urgent meeting being requested by the CEO. Since yesterday significant improvements have been offered. We are in the process of preparing a revised proposal for your review in the next days.

A new ratification vote is being organized very shortly.

The results are now confirmed, and the majority has spoken – the proposal from management has been decisively REJECTED by a majority of our members!

99,3% of all our members voted with 92% rejecting management’s ‘final’ proposal. That is a clear signal that the vast majority of our members is willing to go for industrial action, which does not leave any doubts.

When these results are even combined with all LCGB members (including ground staff) the union’s statutory requirements are still surpassed. 95% of all eligible LCGB members voted and 83% of the LCGB members have rejected the proposal.

Today the LCGB union secretary has sent a letter to the national conciliation office (ONC) requesting non-conciliation and Cargolux management has been informed of the ratification results.

Your negotiation team tried to convince management in the last meeting on July 11^th, that their proposal might not pass without certain improvements, but they simply responded that they would “take that risk”. Now it is on their shoulders to assume the load from here.

According to your valued input, the main reasons given for rejecting managements proposal were precisely what the negotiation team forewarned on and they center on five main points:

Cargolux Italia
Unacceptable not to have the cap at 4 aircraft

‘B-scale’ adjustments
No horizontal move when upgraded to Captain and only one TU reduction

Flight Time Limitations
‘How to augment’ – clear rules to avoid excessive numbers of multiple sector FDPs with augmented crews.

Off- Day scheme
No real improvement and possible 11 rather than 12 days off per month and a clear desire for more immovable blocks.

Back-to-back
Must be planned as part of a rotation and a rotation should never be changed to include a back-to-back after departing home base.

We can congratulate everyone for an unprecedented participation where we even have 69 new members join the ALPL since beginning of July so their vote could count. We also would like to thank everyone for their patience during the voting process.

We will keep you informed of any developments.

Yesterday we published management’s ‘final’ proposal which is the result of an extensive negotiation process where the LCGB negotiation team did its upmost to deliver on the claims ALPL members were demanding. As management refuses to move from their current position, it is now time for every member to decide for themselves if this package is acceptable or not.

Should the proposal be found acceptable by our members, then work will begin preparing the actual CWA text for signing. If the proposal is rejected, the Union will request non-conciliation from the ONC and industrial action will be organized.

Please be aware that a ‘reject’ vote is simultaneously a vote for strike. To move down this path, LCGB statutes require that at least 90% of the members participate in voting and 75% must indicate that they reject the proposal. For the pilots, all ALPL members are automatically part of the LCGB and only ALPL members can vote.

You will receive an invitation to the online vote (done via SurveyMonkey) by a separate email shortly.

If your choice in this vote is to reject the package you will be asked to indicate which two points you find unacceptable before submitting your vote. This will give the Union some indication which parts must improve should the pressure of an imminent strike compel management to amend their offer. You must know that at this stage any desired improvements to the package would only be possible through industrial action!

As the ALPL Board, we do not recommend how to vote either way but do feel it is important to point out in neutral fashion the pros and cons to management’s ‘final’  proposal. Please click here to read about these pros and cons.

If you have any questions please send us an email at cvboard@alpl.lu or check the members‘ forum  on the ALPL website, where you will find answers to questions raised by our members.

We would like to provide you with a very brief update following a CWA meeting today with management and to clarify the next steps. Management will not make any further moves from their current position believing their proposed package is generous enough.

This means the ALPL Board will present to its members in the next days details of this package and the factual pros and cons to what management is offering. Each member must then decide to accept or reject the offer.

It is important to be clear even now what your vote will trigger: an ‘accept’ is self-explanatory, a ‘reject’ vote means that the LCGB will request non-conciliation from the ONC and organize industrial action. If a strike should occur, the negotiation team will remain prepared to meet with management until an acceptable package is ratified.

On 4th July 2019 the Unions met with management at the ONC for further last-minute negotiations. Positions were clarified and there will be another meeting next week.

We are hopeful that a package will be presented to all our members for their consideration in the near future.

After several negotiation meetings with management over the past few months (the latest one held on June 13th, 2019) there are still large gaps between the parties’ positions concerning the key claims for both ground staff and pilots.

Since the start of the conciliation process in February this year, we were able to find compromise on some items, but finally had to come to the conclusion that management is either unwilling to close the remaining gaps or does not have a sufficient mandate from the Cargolux shareholders.

The unions will now ask for a meeting with the national conciliation office (ONC) as a final opportunity to reach an agreement or after which point a non-conciliation may be declared after consultation with the members.

At this point, we are still not able to go into details regarding the claims but can touch on the major items where we are stuck:

• Removal of the “B-Scale” (added Time Units, vacation spool-up, career progression including horizontal move when upgraded to Captain)
• Flight time limitations (when to augment and how to augment)
• Cargolux-Italia matter
• Improvement of the off-day scheme with acceptable rules that provide increased roster stability
• Notwithstanding any legal index increase, ground staff has not received a salary increase for 13 years and pilots for 17 years

There will be more information following very soon to let everyone know how to support the continuing efforts of your negotiation teams in order to deliver sustainable CWA conditions.