OTTAWA | The Air Canada workers’ union has taken the airline to an arbitrator to complain that it requires too much bilingualism from flight attendants, which hurts monolingual Anglophones.
The Air Canada union, which has been at odds with the company in the case for more than four years, was fired by arbitrator Michelle Flaherty in Ottawa on Tuesday.
From the very first lines of his decision, the arbitrator emphasized that the company had “a legal obligation to provide services in both official languages” and that the employer and union members had a negotiated agreement to ensure that obligation.
The complaint dates back to 2018 after the airline introduced a new flight attendant scheduling system.
According to the union, this system increases the number of bilingual flight attendants and “limits the opportunities for monolingual flight attendants,” the published decision said.
Something that will cringe you knowing that Air Canada is notoriously a dumbass when it comes to bilingualism.
flight pairing
Before the arbitrator, the union party explained that the company is now combining flights, allowing it to use, for example, the same team on a Vancouver-Calgary flight as on a Calgary-Montreal flight.
In such a case, since Montreal is French-speaking, a stop at home requires a higher number of bilingual officers. Due to the doubling of the two flights, the flight attendants will no longer only be deployed from Calgary, but from Vancouver.
The union estimates that in February 2023 no fewer than 2,143 flights had too many bilingual flight attendants, compared to only two flights in October 2022.
Seniority no excuse
As a result of this system, one of the 17 complaining union members, flight attendant Gail Carson, a monolingual Toronto Anglophone woman who has worked for Air Canada since 1974, is no longer able to work on most domestic and international flights despite her age.
For the union, this violates the basic agreement on bilingualism that binds them to the company.
Michelle Flaherty, Industrial Relations Arbitrator
The arbitrator concludes that the system does in fact increase the number of bilingual agents required for flight attendant teams, which may impact monolingual individuals like Ms. Carson.
However, Ms Flaherty notes that this is not against the collective agreement and that seniority cannot be used to override language requirements. She therefore concludes that the company is absolutely right and can continue to act as it is.
What are the rules?
Under the basic agreement linking Air Canada with its union members, detailed by Schlichter Flaherty, flight attendants on flights departing from, terminating in, or transiting through Quebec and bound for Europe, the South or Florida must all be bilingual be.
For international flights, they must have one bilingual agent if the flight has a crew of five or fewer, and two bilingual agents if the crew has more than five people.
However, the company has been repeatedly slapped for failing to meet its bilingual commitments. It was even ordered by the Federal Court of Justice to pay damages to citizens whose rights were violated.
Ongoing debate in Ottawa
The case arises as Ottawa debate continues over the Official Language Modernization Bill (C-13).
The three opposition parties want it changed so that the French-language Quebec Charter applies to all private federal companies operating in Quebec, such as Air Canada. But the Liberals are against it.
The Michael Rousseau saga, a memory
NOVEMBER 3, 2021
Michael Rousseau, Air Canada’s new President and CEO, delivers his first major speech to the Metropolitan Montreal Board of Trade in English only. The Office of the Commissioner for Official Languages received a balance sheet of more than 2,000 complaints.
NOVEMBER 8, 2021
Deputy Prime Minister and Treasury Secretary Chrystia Freeland is writing to the Chair of Air Canada’s Board of Directors to express the government’s disappointment and to ask that fluency in French be an important criterion for promotion.
1ah MARCH 2022
The Minister for Official Languages presents Bill C-13, which aims in particular to strengthen the administration of official languages and to give more powers to the Commissioner for Official Languages. The Bloc Québécois wants the CEOs of federal corporations like Air Canada to be bilingual by law nationwide, but the Liberals and Conservatives oppose this.
– With Raphaël Pirro, agency QMI
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