An international migrants’ rights group has urged overseas Filipino workers to boycott Philippine Airlines and support its ground crew union in its ongoing dispute with the airline’s management.
Migrante International called on all its member organizations, chapters and networks abroad, including in Canada to boycott PAL and support the Philippine Airlines Employees Association (PALEA) in its fight against “massive retrenchment, union-busting and contractualization.”
The struggling airline depends heavily on the migrant worker flow to and from Canada for its daily Vancouver-Manila flights.
It serves the growing Filipino-Canadian community and a huge influx of temporary foreign workers that seek jobs in Western Canada. Philippines is one of the largest sources of foreign workers in Canada, after the U.S.
“We fully support the fight of PAL workers. This is a clear example of how capitalist interests trample upon labor rights. We salute them for their resolve and commitment to fight for what is just despite suppression and under-handed tactics by the PAL management,” said Garry Martinez, Migrante International chairperson.
Martinez also criticized President Benigno Aquino for “ignoring the demands of the workers and instead taking the cudgels” for PAL owner and business mogul Lucio Tan.
Migrante International said it had more than 200 member-organizations in 23 countries.
Last weekend Philippine Airlines was forced to ground its flights after thousands of workers went on strike in a desperate, last-ditch bid to keep their jobs from being outsourced.
PAL responded to the industrial action by immediately replacing the 2,600 ground staff with the cheaper labour, and used police and private security to clear the striking workers who were staging a sit-in at Manila airport.
PAL said it was aiming to resume services this week, after more than 170 international and domestic flights were cancelled and about 14,000 passengers affected.
 “We apologise profusely to the riding public, and sympathise with those who were affected just as the typhoon struck, but this is a bigger typhoon hitting our lives,” PAL Employees’ Association president Gerry Rivera said.
“We have been trying hard to follow the rule of law, but our backs are pushed against the wall. We will lose our jobs, our livelihoods.”
The ground staff -- who provided the in-flight catering, airport services and call centre reservations -- staged the wildcat strike in protest over plans by the loss-making airline to outsource their jobs on October 1. PAL sent termination notices to its ground staff last month, saying it needed to trim its workforce to save up to $15million in annual operating costs.
The outsourcing programme was a key component of PAL’s “survival blueprint” launched last year after the airline incurred losses of $312million in the 2008-2009 fiscal year.
PAL president Jamie Bautista branded the industrial action illegal and said the airline’s plans to replace the workers had been brought forward in an effort to get planes back in the air as quickly as possible.
He warned the striking workers that they would lose their retirement benefits and face criminal action resulting in up to three years in jail if they refused to give way to the replacement workers immediately.
PAL said the laid-off ground staff had an option to join the various outsourcing companies.
But the union said the new employers were offering salaries less than half of staff members’ current ones, and with no guarantee of ongoing employment because the contracts required six-month trial periods.