WestJet flight delays, cancellations possible; strike called off

WestJet has reached an agreement with its mechanics to end a strike that disrupted the travel plans of tens of thousands of travellers over the Canada Day long weekend.

In a news release posted on its website, WestJet said there will continue to be flight disruptions in the coming week as its planes return to service.

“The damage to Canadians and our airline is enormous, a swift resolution was necessary; we are not taking victory laps on this outcome, but we will sleep better tonight knowing that further damage was avoided,” airline President Diederik Pen said in the statement released late Sunday.

In its own press release, the Airplane Mechanics Fraternal Association urged its members to return to work immediately pending a vote on the temporary agreement.

“We believe this outcome would not have been possible without the strike, but we regret the disruption and inconvenience it caused to travellers during the Canada Day holiday period,” the union said in its statement.

“We are pleased that the strike only lasted 48 hours and that service can now return to normal.

Labour Minister Seamus O’Regan said on X: “The patience of Canadians is running out. Collective bargaining is the responsibility of the parties. The government’s responsibility is to facilitate and mediate those negotiations. The parties have finally done their job.”

Some 680 workers, whose daily inspections and repairs are essential to airline operations, walked off the job Friday night despite a binding arbitration directive from the labor minister.

Since Thursday, WestJet has cancelled 829 flights scheduled between then and Monday — the busiest travel weekend of the season — the carrier said.

The vast majority of trips scheduled for Sunday were cancelled, with WestJet reducing its fleet of 180 aircraft to 32 active planes and leading the global list of cancellations among major airlines over the weekend.

Trevor Temple-Murray was one of thousands of customers who rushed to rebook after their trips were cancelled less than a day in advance.

“We’ll just have to wait,” said the Lethbridge, Alta., resident, who was waiting in the Victoria airport parking lot to try to catch a plane to Calgary, his wife and two-year-old son beside him in the car.

Their 6:05 p.m. flight had been cancelled and they would not know until the evening whether the flight scheduled for 7:00 a.m. the next day would take place.

“There’s a lot of angry people in there,” Temple-Murray said, pointing to the terminal.

Nearby, Marina Cebrian, a 10th-grade exchange student, said she was supposed to be back home in Spain early Sunday but will not return to her family until Tuesday after suffering three flight cancellations.

“It’s a pain,” she said. “I should have been home today, seven hours ago, but I’m not.”

WestJet and the union have both accused the other side of refusing to negotiate in good faith.

The airline’s president highlighted what he called “continued irresponsible actions” by a union that is making “blatant efforts” to disrupt Canadians’ travel plans, while the association said the Calgary-based airline refused to respond to a counter-proposal. In an update to members Sunday, it said the mechanics were “victims of WestJet’s vicious public relations campaign that you are lawbreakers,” citing “smears” against the workers regarding their right to strike.

This is the second interim agreement in the conflict.

Union members voted overwhelmingly to reject a tentative WestJet deal in mid-June after two weeks of tense negotiations between the two sides.

“We will not see any further industrial action as a result of this dispute, as both parties have agreed to arbitrate the contract if ratification fails,” Pen said in the press release announcing the agreement.

As time ticked down to Friday’s strike deadline, the impasse prompted Labour Minister Seamus O’Regan to step in, demanding the airline and union enter into binding arbitration run by the country’s labour court.

This process usually avoids a work stoppage. WestJet clearly thought so, saying the union had “confirmed that it would comply with the directive.”

“In view of this, there will be no strike or lockout and the airline will no longer carry out flight cancellations,” the airline said on Thursday.

The mechanics took a different view. The union’s negotiating committee said it would “comply with the minister’s order and instruct its members to refrain from any illegal action.” Less than 24 hours later, workers were on the picket lines.

A decision by the Canada Industrial Relations Board appears to affirm the legality of their actions, regardless of the protocols surrounding arbitration.

The next day, O’Regan said the council’s decision was “clearly inconsistent” with the directions he had given, but he later added that he respected the body’s independence. He met with both sides on Saturday night.

In a brief filed in court last week, WestJet lawyers said the union was seeking “an unreasonable and exorbitant result” and intentionally maneuvered to place the strike date at the height of summer travel.

The union said its wage demands would cost WestJet less than $8 million more than what the company offered in the first year of the collective agreement, the first contract between the two sides. It acknowledged the gains would exceed the pay of industry colleagues across Canada and be more comparable to their U.S. counterparts.

Before the tentative deal was reached overnight, WestJet said it had offered a 12.5 per cent wage increase in the first year of the contract, and a compounded 23 per cent wage increase over the remainder of the five-and-a-half-year term.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 1, 2024.