Tentative contract agreements between Northwest Airlines and its pilots and flight attendants' unions will impose a harsh new reality on workers.

"Employees have been asked, and frankly steamrolled, to make huge sacrifices in this bankruptcy process," said Karen Schultz, communications director for the Professional Flight Attendants Association, which represents 9,700 members at Northwest.

"The tentative agreement is a painful but necessary part of a successful restructuring of Northwest Airlines," said Capt. Mark McClain, chair of the Master Executive Council for the Air Line Pilots Association at Northwest.

Pay cuts no longer temporary
Most details of the two new agreements will not been released publicly until after they are shared with union members. But ALPA said the agreement makes permanent the 38.9 percent pay cut pilots have endured since shortly after Northwest filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization in September.

Many pilots will take cuts closer to 50 percent, after factoring in cuts in benefits and work conditions, said Wade Blaufuss, an ALPA spokesman. ALPA represents 5,700 pilots ? about 700 of whom are on furlough.

Annual pay raises ? of 1.5 percent for three years, then 2 percent for the final year ? will not resume until after Northwest emerges from bankruptcy, Blaufuss said. In the meantime, in addition to the huge pay cuts, pilots will work more days, work more hours in those days, receive less vacation pay, and pay more for health insurance, among a long list of other concessions.

One concession that passengers can definitely relate to: Pilots also no longer will receive meals.

Fighting off outsourcing
The pilots contract, however, does preserve more jobs than expected under the contract's "scope" provisions. That occurs in two ways, Blaufuss said ? first, through a "substantial reduction" in the number of furloughs that Northwest wanted, second by setting up a framework that allows union pilots to fly, "at industry standard rates of pay and work rules," most of the smaller jets Northwest intends to add to its fleet.

In bankruptcy filings, the airline said it intended to outsource that flying to a new, nonunion carrier.

In addition, the agreement gives pilots a 13.4 percent equity stake in the airline when it emerges from bankruptcy. That ownership share is necessary, McClain said, so that when things turn around, the pilots get something back for their "very large sacrifices."

Flight attendants also fought off Northwest's outsourcing plans, Schultz said, which would have handed work on international flights to foreign nationals. That, she said, enhances job security for flight attendants at Northwest and blocks a precedent for the rest of the industry as well.

Altogether, Northwest wanted $612 million in concessions from pilots, $195 million from flight attendants, and $190 million from reservations clerks, customer service agents, baggage handlers and other ground workers represented by Machinists Air Transport District 143. The concessions are part of the airline's attempt to reduce labor costs by 37 percent, or $1.4 billion, as it tries to return to profitability.

The airline previously reached settlements with three smaller unions, and used the Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association to demonstrate it could made good on its outsourcing threats. Northwest outsourced all 700 cleaner and custodian jobs and outsourced all but 880 of the more than 3,700 mechanics jobs in the striking bargaining unit.

Pilots go past deadline
The flight attendants reached their settlement March 1, just hours before a court deadline allowing bankruptcy judge Allan Gropper to "abrogate" the union contracts. That would have cleared the way for Northwest to impose whatever wages, benefits, job cuts and working conditions it wanted.

The pilots' agreement came March 3, after the deadline. However, with a tactic that had never been used in an airline bankruptcy case, Gropper hit the "pause" button. He issued no ruling; Northwest took no steps to post conditions as long as negotiations continued.

The overwhelming strike authorization by pilots ? 92.16 percent, with more than 90 percent of pilots voting ? raised the risk to Northwest if it acted unilaterally. The airline and pilots finally reached a deal after negotiating for 53 of the final 55 days.

Ratification votes in the wings
The pilots have not set a timetable to vote on their agreement. The Master Executive Council is scheduled to meet March 14-17 to review the agreement and make a recommendation to members.

The flight attendants' executive committee and base representatives have approved the tentative agreement to go to the membership for a vote. Details will be disclosed in a series of meetings between March 22 and April 4. A contract vote has not yet been scheduled.

Meanwhile, the Machinists announced that two units had rejected a tentative agreement with the airline, while two others had accepted it. The airline is likely to ask the bankruptcy court to abrogate the contracts for those units that voted no. The 14,500 Machinists' members at Northwest have not had a general pay raise since August 2002.

The pilots and flight attendants unions say they cut the best deals they could, knowing that the alternative could be far worse if the court abrogated their contracts.

"The bottom line is, it's tough to work out a fair deal under these rules," said the flight attendants' Schultz. "Bankruptcy proceedings are very unfriendly to labor."

Adapted from The Union Advocate, the official newspaper of the St. Paul Trades and Labor Assembly. E-mail The Advocate at: advocate@stpaulunions.org