Air Canada pilots have ratified the most lucrative contract in the airline’s history.
According to the Airline Pilots Association, 98 per cent of the union membership voted in favour of the four-year deal.
This agreement would see pilots get raises of 40 per cent, and that includes a 26 per cent increase in year one.
There remains a significant gap in wages between junior pilots and those with more experience.
Robert Kokonis, president of aviation consulting firm AirTrav, says this was a deal pilots just couldn’t walk away from.
“The pilots would have been crazy to turn that down, because if you vote that down…there’s nothing to assure the pilot group [in further bargaining] that they would’ve maintained what they had already,” he said.
Kokonis told CHCH News he didn’t think the big wage increase would threaten Canada’s lower-cost airlines.
The contract goes into effect immediately, retroactive to September 2023 and expiring on Sept. 29, 2027.
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