5/9 SF Day Of Action and Forum For Philippine Airlines Workers & Gerry Rivera PALE President

5/9 SF Day Of Action and Forum For Philippine Airlines Workers & Gerry Rivera PALE President

OCCUPYAIRPORT: 

THE STRUGGLE FOR JOB SECURITY 

AT PHILIPPINE AIRLINES!

http://sflaborcouncil.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/05-09-12PALEA-Forum...

Wednesday, May 9 @ 6:30 p.m. 

UNITE-HERE Local 2 Hall 

209 Golden Gate Ave., SF 

For more than six months, the 

union Philippine Airlines 

Employees Association 

(PALEA) has maintained 

protest camps outside two inter- 

national airports. Hear from 

Gerry Rivera, 

long-time labor activist and 

PALEApresident, and support 

the 2,600 illegally fired workers 

fighting to stop the company’s 

unprecedented attack on labor. 

Forum sponsored by the San Francisco Labor Council (AFL-CIO), Air Transport 

Employees Local Lodge 1781 IAMAW, and International Labor Rights Forum 

ALSO: Please join Brother Gerry Rivera and 

the S.F. labor movement at two important picket 

lines in the Bay Area on May 9: 

* 9 a.m -10 a.m. Air Transport Employees Local 

Lodge 1781, IAMAW, picket of United Airlines 

CEO Jeff Smisek at the Marriot Hotel on Old 

Bayshore Rd. in Burlingame; 

* 3 p.m. to 5:30 p.m., UNITE_HERE Local 2 

picket of Hotel Frank, 386 Geary St. (@Mason), 

one block from Union Square in SF

OUTSOURCED BUT NOT OUTFOUGHT: 

STRUGGLE FOR JOB SECURITYAT PHILIPPINE AIRLINES! 

Philippines Airlines: An Aerial Attack on Freedom At Work 

Ten days after the start of Occupy Wall Street, members of the Philippine Airlines Employees 

Association or PALEAcarried out their own “occupation.” PALEAstaged a sit-down strike at 

the Manila International Airport against the Philippines’ own symbol of corporate greed—the 

implementation of outsourcing scheme at the country’s flag-carrier, the Philippine Airlines 

(PAL). 

PALis the oldest commercial air carrier in Asia. Out of its hubs, the airline serves the 

Philippines and twenty-four destinations including Los Angeles, Honolulu, Las Vegas, and San 

Francisco. 

Until recently, PALand its union workforce, represented by the PALEA, maintained a collabo- 

rative relationship. In fact, after the 1997 Asian financial crisis, PALEAworkers agreed to sus- 

pend their contract and accept across the board wage freezes for more than a decade to help 

the company. 

But after posting record sales of $75.2 million in 2011, PALunexpectedly decided to imple- 

ment an illegal “fire and rehire” outsourcing scheme to cut compensation and rehire workers at 

significantly reduced rates. With the unprecedented blessing of the Philippine Department of 

Labor and the President of the Philippines, PALfired some 2,600 workers and outsourced 

their jobs to subcontractors in violation of the existing union contract. 

Stunned by the collusion between powerful government and corporate elites, which set the 

precedent that Philippine companies can violate both collective bargaining agreements and 

Philippine law regulating the use of labor contracting, the union filed suit in court, where the 

case remains unresolved. The International Labour Organization has raised questions about 

the legality of the government’s efforts to support PAL. 

For more than six months now, over one thousand workers continue to maintain its “occupa- 

tion” outside two of the biggest international airports in the Philippines to protest PAL’s out- 

sourcing scheme and the company’s unprecedented attack on freedom of association. 

Gerry Rivera 

Gerry Rivera, the current president of the Philippine Airlines Employees Association, has 

worked at Philippine Airlines for 28 years. He is also an active leader of Kilusang 99%, a 

recently formed network of workers, farmers, women, indigenous and youth organizations ded- 

icated to promoting economic and policy reforms in the Philippines for the 99%.  He holds the 

position of vice president of the Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (TUCP), the largest 

labor center in the country and he currently serves as the vice chair of the Ground Staff 

Committee of the Civil Aviation Section of the International Transport Workers Federation. 

Gerry is politically active as vice chair of Partido ng Manggagawa, the Philippines Labor Party.