Belonging to the largest and most experienced pilot union in the world—ALPA—provides unique pilot-focused resources and a wealth of benefits and resources for our pilots individually and as a whole. These include:

• Legal representation. ALPA’s experienced legal team protects you in the event of an operating incident or accident, employment grievances, and issues involving Transport Canada.
• A collective agreement. A collective agreement, once voted on by the pilot group, is binding on the Company, provides clear and firm working rules, and a dispute resolution process designed to make a pilot whole when their work rules are not followed. Negotiating a strong contract takes time, dedication, and extensive knowledge. ALPA has a large professional staff of negotiators, financial and other analysts, lawyers, and pilot representatives that help ensure our future contracts are competitive across the industry.
• Job security protection. A lack of job security protection has historically placed pilot groups at risk and pitted them against each other in a “race to the bottom.”
• Merger and acquisition protection. ALPA’s Merger Policy provides a fair and equitable process for negotiation of joint collective agreements and integration of seniority lists.

Submitting a representation card and $5 is essentially a vote for the Air Creebec pilots to join ALPA. Once enough cards are collected, the Air Creebec Organizing Committee and ALPA will submit them to the Canada Industrial Review Board (CIRB). The CIRB audits the cards and then, if all is correct, they will either certify them and name ALPA as the exclusive collective bargaining representative for Air Creebec pilots or conduct a secret ballot representation election.

ALPA will email cards to all Air Creebec pilots we have an email address for, but you can also ask any member of the Organizing Committee or download one at crq.alpa.org. Fill the card out in ink and mail it to the address on the card with your payment of $5. You can also submit a card and $5 to an Organizing Committee (OC) member. Don’t sign the last line for the ALPA representative or the receipt portion on the right side.

No. The card is confidential. The CIRB and ALPA will not share names of those who signed cards to express support for ALPA representation with management.

Union dues represent the fee paid by members to support ALPA’s activities on your behalf. ALPA dues are currently 1.85% of your gross income. More information will be sent out about your dues at a later date.

Approximately 50–75 percent of your dues will remain within your local pilot group, depending on the amount of dues you generate, to be used as the Air Creebec MEC wishes (e.g., Pilot Unity Building events, family events, grievance meetings, swag, etc.).

The remainder goes to your representatives’ support system: the ALPA staff in Canada and the United States, which includes pilot assistance, retirement & insurance benefits specialists, legal, and representation resources as well as aviation safety and security experts. In addition, ALPA provides a life insurance policy to all Canadian members that fly for participating airlines. Additional life insurance and other optional programs such as group auto/home insurance and critical illness insurance are available as well. ALPA also has a strong network of peer support representatives, and the Pilots for Pilots program aids members and their dependents who fall victim to natural disasters.

Please review the ALPA Constitution & By-Laws for income exempt from dues. The vast majority of ALPA workers are in fact unpaid volunteer pilots, like you, who serve as elected board members and committee representatives.Moreover, dues are also tax deductible. Read more on dues from the Canada Revenue Agency. 

ALPA is a unique labour union. In addition to being the largest pilot union in the world, it is pilot-run and staff-supported. We believe that our pilot-led, staff-supported structure built on the local autonomy of pilot groups acting together on behalf of our industry is, hands down, the only choice for pilot groups.

Your union representatives will be fellow Air Creebec line pilots. Under ALPA’s governance, interim representatives are appointed until there can be an election for permanent ALPA representatives by the Air Creebec pilots.

The pilot representatives are fully supported by an aviation- and labour-focused staff in ALPA’s offices in Canada and the United States. These representatives—both interim and then elected—will form the Air Creebec Master Executive Council (MEC), the coordinating body that represents Air Creebec pilots within ALPA.

ALPA is a democratic union organized with pilot members driving decision-making from the bottom up. It is a pilot-run, staff-supported union.

Here’s how it works:

• Local councils are established at most pilot bases, and each local council elects a representative for each status (captain or first officer) or seniority block. As a single-council MEC, the elected representatives from the local council will also make up the Master Executive Council (MEC) for the Air Creebec pilots.
• Each MEC is given primary responsibility for determining its relationship with management, making decisions about its contract and bargaining goals, and is given discretion over dispute resolution and contract administration. ALPA assigns professional staff to work with and advise local leaders, but elected pilot representatives make final decisions.
• At a national level, ALPA is governed by: the Board of Directors, the Executive Board, and the Executive Council. In Canada, the ALPA Constitution and By-Laws also provides for the Canada Board that is made up of three Canadian national officers and the MEC chairs of all Canadian pilot groups. This body’s jurisdiction focuses primarily on articulating all ALPA positions with Canadian institutions and to develop specific Canadian positions on issues of national interest to Canadian pilots.
• The Board of Directors (BOD) is the largest group, and it has the greatest authority. It consists of the local council representatives from every ALPA local council—approximately 225 pilots in total. It meets at least every two years and is responsible for setting the Association’s course, modifying(when necessary) the governing documents, and electing national officers.
• The Executive Board is the second largest group, and its authority is second to the Board of Directors. The Executive Board is made up of the MEC chairs from each airline—so it presently has 43 members. It meets at least twice a year to make sure that the BOD’s decisions are being implemented and to consider certain significant decisions reserved to the Executive Board in the ALPA Constitution & By-Laws and other policies.
• The smallest group, the Executive Council, is charged with overseeing the administration of the union, which includes such things as establishing and overseeing the budget and making day-to-day interpretations of ALPA’s governing rules. In addition, the Executive Council makes recommendations to the Executive Board or Board of Directors for final decision. The Executive Council currently has 16 members: four national officers, the ALPA Canada president, and 11 executive vice presidents elected from “election groups” described in the ALPA Constitution & By-Laws.
• The process for selecting executive vice presidents has changed many times over the years as the membership and needs of the Association have changed. Under the current structure, each airline with more than 4,000 members or $10 million in annual dues elects one executive vice president. Smaller U.S. airlines are placed in one of three election groups, and each of those groups chooses a single executive vice president. Smaller Canadian airlines choose a single executive vice president.
• In the portion of the ALPA Constitution that describes executive vice president elections, the letters A, B, and C are used to designate the different groups from which executive vice presidents are chosen—A for the largest carriers, B for the other U.S. carriers, and C for the Canadian carriers. The letters are just that—letters. They’re not grades or designations of importance.

As members of ALPA, Air Creebec pilots have democratic control over their activities and will decide on issues that are important to them, including negotiations and merger issues. Internal elections among the pilot group who are members of the union will be held to elect individuals to serve on the MEC.  The MEC will select Air Creebec pilot volunteers to represent you on a Negotiating Committee to negotiate a collective agreement.

The Negotiating Committee, assisted by experienced professional negotiators, lawyers, and other staff from ALPA, will negotiate based on your representatives’ direction and with assistance and input from the Air Creebec pilot members. Eventually, a tentative collective agreement will be brought back to the members for ratification before it can be finalized.

Once ALPA is certified as the trade union for Air Creebec pilots, ALPA will appoint interim pilot leaders to begin work on behalf of our pilot group. Most important are:

1. The steps to put democratically elected permanent representatives in place, and
2. Preparation for work to address key concerns in negotiations

Very soon after CIRB certification, the ALPA Executive Council will create a local council for the pilot group and appoint interim representatives. These representatives will also serve as the initial Air Creebec ALPA Master Executive Council (MEC) as a single-council MEC.

The MEC will establish committees in its first few months of operation. These committees are likely to include Safety, Retirement and Insurance, Negotiations, Scheduling, and others. ALPA professional experts in each area will meet with the committees soon after their formation to outline resources available, provide training, and outline the committee’s goals and work schedule.

The interim local council representatives will get things started, but as soon as a strong majority of pilots have become members, an election process will begin so that we can choose our own representatives. That process starts with a nominating meeting. It’s critical for all pilots to submit membership applications as soon as possible after certification to attend local council meetings and vote to elect representatives.

Under Section 37 of the CLC, a trade union, including all of its union representatives, is bound to provide a duty of fair representation to all employees it represents. Oversight of this duty is provided by the CIRB that hears cases involving the duty of fair representation.

Your ALPA Air Creebec representatives will have the ability to legally and collectively represent the Air Creebec pilot group as a whole. In addition to the protections that association members have contained within the Canada Labour Code, your representatives are also bound to the ALPA Code of Ethics and Constitution and By-Laws. As per the ALPA Constitution, representatives can be recalled by the membership.

Issued to all ALPA members, the “orange card” contains contact information for the ALPA Worldwide Accident/Incident Hotline, which connects members to immediate support and professional assistance. This critical service is one of the fundamental reasons for ALPA’s existence. If you are involved in an aircraft accident or incident, you are entitled to and will receive extensive professional legal and technical representation. The hotline is staffed 24/7/365 by knowledgeable experts who have extensive experience in aircraft operations. They will provide you with guidance on how to proceed and, if necessary, immediately dispatch a team of legal and technical experts to assist you. An ALPA accident investigator will be assigned to the Transportation Safety Board (TSB) investigation on your behalf, if approved by the TSB. Companies often say they will look after you in the event of an accident, but the end result can be quite different. ALPA is completely committed to supporting your needs, and the protection it offers continues—even in the unfortunate event of your death, protection will be extended to your estate.

No one can make you join. However, you will be required to pay dues in accordance with the Rand Formula, which was established in 1946 by Justice Ivan Rand of the Supreme Court of Canada. If you choose not to become a member, you will not receive many of the benefits that members receive. In addition, a nonmember will not be able to vote on matters affecting the union. Under Canadian labour law, union dues are mandatory regardless of the worker’s union status to ensure that no employee will opt out of the union simply to avoid dues, but still reap the benefits of the union’s accomplishments, such as ensuring higher wages, better job security, or other benefits and protections.

The ALPA Constitution requires applicants to pay, or make arrangements to satisfy, past financial obligations to ALPA before they can be accepted into membership. Arrangement plans are available for past obligations.

Under current law the affected companies are under no legal obligation to discuss the impact of a merger/acquisition with you or any of the other pilots in your airline prior to any decisions being made. Your seniority may not be protected and you could end up being severely disadvantaged. However, if you are represented by a certified union, under the Canada Labour Code, your company will have an obligation to confer with your union. This obligation is often included in the collective agreement between your union and the employer.

Now imagine that your company were taken over by another larger airline. How do you think things would work out if the new company decided that certain positions were now considered redundant and wanted to trim the workforce to gain cost-savings? Furthermore, what would happen if the other company’s employees were unionized and your company’s were not? Obviously, the pilots with union representation would have a voice to be heard during the merger process in both a prospective and a reactive sense. This would represent a significant advantage over employees with no union representation.

Additionally, if both the Air Creebec pilots and the pilots of the acquiring airline are all represented by ALPA, our Merger Policy would apply. That policy mandates a fair process for combining contracts and integrating seniority lists.

No. Members’ dues are not used for political donations in Canada or the United States. How ALPA spends its funds is determined by the members and outlined in its Constitution and By-Laws. When you become a member of ALPA, you become a decision maker as to how ALPA spends its money.