ADMINISTRATION PROPOSAL TO ALLOW GREATER FOREIGN CONTROL OF U.S. AIRLINES AND OUTSOURCING OF FLIGHT ATTENDANT JOBS THREATEN U.S. SAFETY AND SECURITY
INCREASED FOREIGN CONTROL OF U.S. AIRLINES
On November 7th, 2005, the Department of Transportation (DOT) issued a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) that would change longstanding policies supported by Congress regarding limits on the foreign control of U.S. airlines. For several years, the DOT has tried to persuade Congress to pass legislation to change the statutory requirements concerning foreign ownership control and investment. The DOT has failed repeatedly to convince Congress that action is in the best interests of the American public. Now, through this NPRM, their proposal effectively usurps the power of Congress in setting aviation policy. Under the DOT proposal important decisions, including day-to-day operations of the airline, market strategy and purchase of aircraft, would be put into the hands of foreign officials and foreign corporate executives.
Department of Transportation Proposal Usurps Longstanding Congressional Authority
Congress has maintained a long record of requiring that the U.S. aviation system remains a U.S. citizen owned and controlled enterprise. Congress first enacted citizenship requirements for U.S. airlines in the Air Commerce Act of 1926, which required U.S. citizens to own at least 51 percent of any individual aircraft in order for the aircraft to be registered in the U.S. Under the Civil Aeronautics Act of 1938, Congress required that U.S. citizens own or control at least 75 percent of the voting interests of U.S. airlines. The Civil Aeronautics Board (CAB) went beyond the statutory requirement and required that U.S. interests be in "actual control" of the airline. These policies were continued by the Department of Transportation (DOT) when it took over CAB's responsibilities in 1985.
Furthermore, in 2003, Congress passed an amendment requiring the DOT to maintain the standard that U.S. airlines must be under the actual control of U.S. citizens thus preventing any foreign interests from exercising actual control over U.S. airlines. These standards remain in effect today and are codified at 49 U.S.C. 40102. By codifying this control test policy developed by CAB and the DOT, Congress made it clear that the policy implemented by the CAB and the DOT - that U.S. interests control economic and competitive decisions of the airlines, as well as safety and security decisions -must remain in force.
Increased Foreign Control Threatens Safety, Security and US Jobs
The Association of Flight Attendants-CWA (AFA-CWA) strenuously opposes increasing the control of foreign interests over such vital economic U.S. aviation decisions. Foreign control of airlines would create issues that could lead to negative repercussions not only for employees but also for the entire U.S. aviation system. Allowing such control could lead to a foreign airline investing in a U.S. carrier and eventually changing its international route structures to directly benefit the foreign airline and lead to further job and revenue loss for the U.S. carrier and its U.S. employees. Allowing for foreign investors to have direct control in airline purchasing decisions, could lead to a dramatic decrease in purchases of U.S. manufactured aircraft and aircraft components. A foreign investor could make decisions that would limit the airlines ability to provide aircraft for the Civil Reserve Aviation Fleet (CRAF). CRAF is a vital program for U.S. military security as it allows for airlines to voluntarily provide aircraft to ship U.S. troops overseas. And allowing for a foreign investor to decide which rural communities get served and which do not could lead in a drastic decline in crucial air service to those communities.
More importantly, this proposal is a blatant attempt to bypass Congressional jurisdiction and is a total disregard of over 60 years of aviation policy. If this proposal were to be implemented, it would directly overturn several Congressional mandates. Such a dramatic change of Congressionally regulated policy should be made by Congress and not through an arbitrary decision of the DOT. This effort to enact policy changes bypasses the formal Congressional process and disregards decades of sound aviation policy. Clearly, the DOT has overstepped its authority in its effort to revise Congressionally mandated requirements that U.S. citizens maintain "actual control" over U.S. airlines. That is why CWA strongly encourages Members of Congress to cosponsor H.R. 4542 and S. 2135. This legislation would:
For a period of one year, prohibit the DOT from issuing any final decision or final rule on the NPRM that would change its interpretation of what constitutes "actual control" of a U.S. airline.
Make it clear that any final rule issued by the DOT is subject to the Congressional Review Act, which allows Congress to disapprove major regulatory rules issued by federal agencies.
Require the DOT, within 90 days of enactment, to issue a report to Congress that assesses the impact of the NPRM on all aspects of an airline's operation, including national defense, safety, security, competition, domestic access for small communities, and airline employees.
OUTSOURCING OF FLIGHT ATTENDANT JOBS
As part of it's concessionary demands to its Flight Attendants, Northwest Airlines has recently presented a number of proposals that would affect thousands of jobs for Northwest Airlines and threatens the jobs of many more U.S. Flight Attendants. Specifically, Northwest has proposed to:
Outsource 75 percent of the flight crew positions to foreign nationals on flights entering and leaving the United States from Asia and Europe.
Outsource 100 percent of crews on flights to and from India.
Reduce the Flight Attendant position on Asian routes in/out of Japan to just one U.S. based Flight Attendant.
This proposal would result in tens of thousands of lost U.S. Flight Attendant jobs
If Northwest Airlines is allowed to go ahead with this outsourcing scheme, the jobs of approximately 3,000 Flight Attendants will be immediately turned over to foreign nationals. The loss of just these Flight Attendant jobs at Northwest alone will have an untold ripple effect across the entire country as yet another profession is targeted to be replaced with cheap foreign labor. The ripple effect will hit communities hard as it has been shown that one airline job supports 18 additional jobs in a community. Also, as we at the Association of Flight Attendants (AFA) have especially learned over the past several years, when one airline finds a way to substantially slash its labor costs – no matter what the impact on society or communities – that move is quickly copied and implemented at another airline. We fear that if Northwest is successful in this effort, all carriers will attempt to replicate this horrendous proposal, resulting in the loss of tens of thousands U.S. Flight Attendant jobs.
Outsourcing these jobs threatens the safety and security of the U.S. aviation system
The full-scale replacing U.S. Flight Attendants with foreign nationals raises serious safety and security issues that must be addressed by the proper federal agencies. For example, Flight Attendants are currently required to undergo 10-year criminal background checks. The question must be asked if the TSA has the ability and resources to conduct these background checks on foreign nationals, if they even can be conducted with the assistance of various foreign law enforcement agencies. Should we be opening up our aircraft to potential terrorists serving as Flight Attendants?
Also, there are serious safety issues that must be addressed. At a time when a significant amount of the maintenance performed on U.S. aircraft is done in foreign countries, should we now be replacing the in-flight safety professionals with poorly trained foreign nationals? Will these foreign nationals be held to the same level of safety and security training standards as U.S. Flight Attendants? Also, there is currently no standard for English language proficiency for foreign nationals working as flight attendants. If widespread outsourcing of this position is to take place, the FAA must develop an English language proficiency standard to ensure that foreign national Flight Attendants will be able to communicate with the cockpit and passengers in an emergency situation.
These are just a few of the concerns that must be addressed by federal agencies and regulators before these crucial in-flight safety and security positions are outsourced to foreign nationals. The outsourcing of Flight Attendant jobs must be prevented in order to protect jobs and the safety and security of the U.S. aviation system.
We urge members of Congress to contact Northwest Airlines and urge them to reconsider their proposal to outsource these critical aviation safety and security jobs.
For more information contact:
Shane Larson
AFA-CWA Director of Government Affairs
202-434-0573
slarson@afanet.org
