Ian Porter and his family were in the news a few years ago for taking a year off to fly around the world in a single engine aircraft to raise money for a charity. I don't think you need to worry about whether TC was interrupting his vacation time

It could be that they had concerns that OP were not actually able to fulfill the legal responsibilities of the position if you were unable to return to the country which I think is a reasonable question. Which in turn prompted more time required to investigate whether that was true or not which defi...

Unfortunately it seems like the M1 license just isn't compensated the same way the M2 is. The benefit is that you have more opportunity to work for small companies in rural locations or start or own business if you enjoy that aspect of aviation. I'm sure there are individuals that make good money an...

Free markets only exists when there is healthy competition in the marketplace. Current political climate has allowed allowed companies to form monopoly and monosopy powers which can now only be controlled by government regulation. If we reduce corporate capture of the market then we can definitely r...

I would argue that the fact it's a year+ old doesn't really matter. If voters like myself want to be informed we go to read the actual party platform on their website instead of Facebook and any responsible party would keep their platform conversations current when gearing up for an election this ye...

I was surprised to read that the Conservative Party policy position on air travel in Canada supports trying out foreign airlines operating select domestic routes. It would certainly shake up the industry. I cut and pasted the relevant section from https://cpcassets.conservative.ca/wp-content/uploads...

In general aviation (M1 work) you will probably have more issues due to the wide variety of dust/chemical exposure etc. Not that you can't wear protective masks to protect yourself and you should but just saying that there are probably more hazards in that environment. At the airlines there is very ...

I suspect people don't want to post wages because then existing contractors would ask for the same amount

Our industry tends to really pay apprentices garbage though. It was the mentality that you should be grateful that we are teaching you something and therefore very low pay. Meanwhile I had friends in other trades that were bumping up the pay scale each year by significant amounts. It does suck to ma...

Currently I would say it pays average for the skilled trades but can be harder to apprentice and get licensed due to the industries lack of interest in training and retaining a workforce versus hiring the skills needed immediately. I've heard that with other trades too though, for example a former m...

At most companies the AME's do the maintenance ground runs, and is a pretty standard practice. Like anywhere though the quality of training and the amount of experience can vary greatly which can lead to dangerous situations. Accidents are more likely when someone who hasn't run an aircraft in a yea...

The Westjet spin would be more hilarious if it didn't have the potential to seriously mislead people. The numbers they are offering keep changing daily in their press releases and they are going full bore on the danger to the public now. Thank god there is at least a union to defend the freedom to b...

If you take a look at pilot pay for a 172 and a 737 you can get a rough idea of how the industry values the increased complexity and responsibility. Even with conservative numbers if you say a 172 pilot makes 60k and a 737 pilot averages 120k you can see that 35 an hour to fix 172s equates to 70 an...

If you take a look at pilot pay for a 172 and a 737 you can get a rough idea of how the industry values the increased complexity and responsibility. Even with conservative numbers if you say a 172 pilot makes 60k and a 737 pilot averages 120k you can see that 35 an hour to fix 172s equates to 70 an ...

Me and my wife were discussing what should be considered a fair wage tonight and it's a tough question. I think the answer is the same as the company uses whenever defending their prices. It's whatever the market supply and demand prices it at. Right now we have an unusually low supply of AME's due ...

If you want to read a laundry list of bad faith bargaining on the part of Westjet just take a look at the AMFA response to the CIRB submission asking the government to make a deal for them. Gives you a good idea why the votes are so solid. https://www.amfanational.org/?zone=/unionactive/view_article...

What I don’t understand is how out of touch AMFA was to membership that they would have even brought this deal forward. How does it compare to the going rate in Canada for AME’s ? You can tell the company that the deal isn't going to be accepted and still give people the chance to vote on it in ord...

I've been following AMFA for awhile now and I'm pretty impressed by their performance compared to other unions. They are significantly more transparent, better communicators, and stronger advocates for their members then any other union I've seen in recent history. If they feel that some democracy i...

I've never heard of dropping the union negotiators just because they gave people an offer to vote on unless it was really insulting or you don't trust your union. Take for example just a few months ago when people were striking on the A220 production line. The membership rejected a TA and they worke...

If you vote to reject a TA I think it gives the union an even stronger bargaining position then just a strike mandate. It means you have a decent sized bar that the company now to has to go above to make any further progress. I'm sure there is a lot of money moving around and being renamed so just h...

I think the B1 passes are an odd item to bargain because it costs the company nothing but is done at the expense of other employee groups. It's the equivalent of saying we want better parking spots than everyone else and helps management justify their own privileges that have nothing to do with meri...

I believe Westjet AMEs are overdue for a significant raise in pay that acknowledges their collective work ethic and commitment to the trade. Sometimes companies think that a good business model is hiring the lowest paid people and letting them leave in a few years but in our industry that is a recip...

Maybe someone else can give the exact details but my understanding of it from friends is that Westjet has a much longer progression to get to top rate so a lot of people are paid somewhere in the low 40's per hour.

Canadian North and Porter AMEs have seen their wages increased to $50+ because of the competition for staff. Air Canada also recently gave out an unprecedented $7.50 an hour (roughly 16%) increase to the top end pay effective immediately outside of the current agreement with the only condition that ...

People work at large monopoly style companies because they don't have a choice if you want normal things like steady paychecks, accrue vacation for working X years, pensions, etc. There are not enough good jobs elsewhere for everyone so people are stuck working for a company they don't respect. It w...