Gilles Hudicourt wrote:I didn't contradict myself.
I said that as far as I (me Gilles Hudicourt) am concerned, wet-lease pilots should not count in either direction.
Gilles,
You seem to have lost your way.
It is easy to count how many pilots move in and out of Canada for an airline. You have done so yourself.
From what I understand, the number of pilots that Sunwing has sent to work in Europe in the summer and the number of pilots brought in to Canada are roughly the same. Each year is different, but overall about the same. At the same time, Sunwing has grown their number of Canadian pilots from 45 to 170. 120 of the 170 are Captains. And Sunwing hired and trained 20 seasonal Canadian resident first officers this year. A really good step in the right direction. The last three years Sunwing has brought over more pilots than it sent to Europe, but if the Europeans had been as closed as you want things to be, they would have stopped the Sunwing imbalance in the beginning years and maybe jeopardized 170 Canadian pilot jobs. The Europeans looked at the bigger picture, let Sunwing send pilots to Europe and now it has balanced itself out. This program has clearly benefitted Canadian pilots.
And yet, you take the position that, because the Sunwing pilots work wet in Europe and Sunwing brings over dry pilots to Canada (except for one last year), the Canadian wet pilots don’t count towards reciprocity and there is a huge imbalance. You make up an excuse as to why you take this position, but it is an excuse. Hard to count the number, more than one department involved. Whatever. Makes Sunwing look really bad, even though the numbers of pilots moving back and forth is roughly equal. That seems to be your real agenda, making Sunwing look bad.
I then posed a question to you. “How would you feel if Sunwing did 4 wet leases in Europe and brought 13 wet leases in to Canada” – a theoretical question. You ask me if you come across as stupid to me. You say that because that would obviously not be good for Canadian pilots and I agree. But it goes against your position that wet pilots shouldn’t count. If Sunwing started to do this, you would change your position (as is evident by your rhetorical response) because now a different position on the issue makes Sunwing look bad.
That makes things very clear to me. You will take whatever position makes Sunwing look bad.
This is not about protecting Canadian pilots, it is about Transat versus Sunwing. Full stop.
I notice that you have not made a peep, a tweet, a post or a comment about WestJet’s wet lease program. Why is that I wonder? Because you and your employer don’t care about those wet lease pilots. Even though, I might add, your aircraft would be perfectly suited to do a program to Hawaii from western Canada. But not a peep. Only Sunwing’s foreign pilots matter. Because that is your real agenda.
It appears obvious to me that you are working with your employer, sharing information with them in fact, to discredit Sunwing and spread mis-information. You are good at it too. You have a lot of people buying in to your story. But not everyone.
I believe in 1:1 reciprocity. Strongly. I think that everyone needs to look at the big picture and get their own facts, not just what Gilles feeds you. Because you see, he has an agenda. It is all about him and his friends at Transat.
What if I told you that, since Sunwing started, the number of pilots that Sunwing has sent to Europe in the summer and the number they brought over in the winter was roughly the same (wet, dry or otherwise)?
What if I told you that Sunwing has created 170 new Canadian pilot jobs since it started in 2005?
What if I told you that 30 Sunwing first officers got an upgrade to Captain for this winter?
What if I told you that Sunwing hired and trained (without a bond) 20 seasonal Canadian pilots to operate for them this winter? And was planning on having even more next year?
Answer those four questions and ask yourself if what Sunwing has done is good or bad for Canadian pilots. Everyone except Air Transat pilots, that is.
