WestJet canceled 407 flights after Union WNET went on strike

TORONTO — WestJet, Canada’s second-largest airline, said it has canceled 407 flights affecting 49,000 passengers after a maintenance workers’ union announced it was going on strike.

The Fraternal Association of Aircraft Mechanics said its members went on strike Friday evening because the airline’s “unwillingness to negotiate with the union” made it unavoidable.

The sudden strike, which affected international and domestic flights, came after the federal government issued a ministerial order for binding arbitration on Thursday. This came after two weeks of tumultuous discussions with the union over a new deal.

WestJet said it will continue to park planes through Sunday during the long weekend that ends with Canada Day on Monday.

The airline has about 200 planes and says it will operate about 30 by Sunday evening.

The airline’s CEO, Alexis von Hunsbruch, blamed the situation on what he described as a “rogue consortium from the United States” trying to infiltrate Canada.

As far as the airline was concerned, the bargaining with the union ended once the government directed the dispute to binding arbitration, von Honsbruch said.

“This makes the strike absolutely ridiculous because the real reason for the strike is that you need to put pressure on the negotiating table,” he said. “If there is no negotiating table then it is meaningless and there should be no strike.”

He added that the union rejected a contract offer that would have made the airline’s mechanics “the highest paid in the country.”

In an update to its members, the union bargaining committee pointed to an order issued by the Canadian Industrial Relations Board that does not expressly prohibit any strikes or lockouts while the court is arbitrating.

Sean McVeagh, an aircraft maintenance engineer at WestJet, who participated in a sit-in Saturday at Toronto Pearson International Airport’s Terminal 3, said the strike is an attempt to force the airline to return to “respectful negotiations.”