December 5, 2008

Dear Fellow Flight Attendants,

Yesterday you received an email from Ms. Joanne Smith, using the company email system and perhaps our company mailboxes. Again we are reminded how the new Delta executives feel free to bombard us with messages to make their points, even if they are unsubstantiated or misinformed. While flight attendants are busily preparing for the holiday season, we are getting these constant and pushy directives from the new Delta executives.

Recently, an e-mail from Ms. Smith to all flight attendants and a letter from Mr. Michael Campbell to me, were sent with the intention of pushing us into a seniority list integration process that is not only premature, but also potentially damaging to the careers of flight attendants from both Northwest and Delta.  We have the responsibility to ensure that all flight attendants – and there are 21,000 of us involved in this merger – have ample time to consider all aspects so that we can make informed choices about the future of our carrier and our careers.

The point is that there is a process underway, based on the flight attendants contract at Northwest and on the procedures of the Railway Labor Act, to determine if we have a single transportation system, and how we are to be integrated. The process itself requires time, including the important step of a vote on representation.

Delta executives seem eager to short-circuit this process even though they admit we will not actually be integrated – flying together on the same flights – until the end of 2010. There's plenty of time to work through outstanding issues, and that includes seniority integration.

We intend to follow our legal, binding contract, and the letter of the law, and not let the new company and their executives push us into something that we all may come to regret. The history of airline seniority integration is replete with horror stories of how employees were hurt by a rush to merge lists. That's why our contract offers important guidance, and protection. And that's why all flight attendants at the new Delta need representation by a union.

Ms. Smith and Mr. Campbell, founder of the Ford & Harrison law firm and now Executive Vice President of "Human Relations" at Delta, have contracts (employment agreements) that offer them security along with good pay and benefits.  Many of the flight attendants who have been working for Delta and Northwest have vested many more years to both airlines and deserve more than a promise to do right by executives who just arrived to their corporate suites. 

And now they are informing us of more capacity reductions beyond the already announced reductions for this quarter.  Months ago executives of both carriers made the claim of no frontline reductions "due to this merger" repeatedly to congressional leaders and the public.  Then the price of oil began to rise and we saw reductions due to the "price of oil."  Now we are seeing reductions due to the "global recession."  When are the new Delta executives going to level with us?

We must protect flight attendants who have vested years in this career and this company. That's why "Date of Hire" is the fairest and most equitable process for seniority.  During the merger process, we have heard many scenarios from the Delta corporate team, including Ms. Smith's allusion to the "possibility of date of hire."   Previously we had heard "protection of full seniority" for Delta flight attendants.  Delta LODs hired over the past few years were told they would be exempt from furloughs in the event of downsizing.  Recently, we saw many of the Delta flights that had LODs outsourced via code share to our European SkyTeam partners.  What is the real story?

Flight attendants deserve to know all the facts as we work to integrate two proud traditions into one great global airline.  The process that is underway protects our rights in the future, including our right to vote for representation.  If Ms. Smith and Mr. Campbell really had the interest of the flight attendants at heart, they would write it down and make it legally binding as they do for their own contracts.  That's why representation is so important, and why we must not rush this integration process.

Most of all, we want an integration process that brings this family together.  We do not want the integration process rushed by the few who may be doing so for short-term profits but instead, to be for the majority that are going to be here for decades to come.  We may not have the billions to spend or the hundreds of legal counselors to counter and push this merger through, but we have the resolve to have a voice for our future.

We welcome conversation with Ms. Smith, but that ought to be a two-way street, not just another of those top-down directives through the company email system.  We're always ready to talk.  We'd like to talk about moving forward with Letter 35 – often known to flight attendants as the "me too" letter in the contract.  Flight attendants have been waiting for the improvements given to another union for a long time. 

Enjoy the holidays with friends and families.  Do not let distractions with letters by Mr. Campbell and Ms Smith ruin time with family and loved ones.  A representational election will take place and we look forward to working together with our Delta counterparts as we become the premier global airline with a voice for our futures.

Together we are Better,

Kevin Griffin, President

Northwest Master Executive Council

Association of Flight Attendants-CWA