Pilots’ union loses illegal dismissal case vs. PAL

Manila Standard Today
June 20, 2011
by Rey E. Requejo

THE Supreme Court has affirmed a 2003 Labor Department decision favoring Philippine Airlines over a wrongful dismissal suit filed by its pilots.

The Court’s First Division also sustained a Court of Appeals ruling on the same case on Dec. 22, 2004, which ruled that then Labor secretary Patricia Santo Tomas and acting Secretary Manuel Imson did not abuse their powers when they denied a plea by the Airline Pilots Association of the Philippines to find out who among its officers and members had actually participated in a June 5, 1998 strike.

The controversy arose after the pilots’ union filed a notice of strike on Dec. 9, 1997 over the airline’s alleged unfair labor practices.

Citing the public interest, the Labor secretary assumed jurisdiction over the case and prohibited all strikes and lockouts at the national flag carrier, but the pilots struck anyway.

Two days later, the Labor Department issued a return-to-work order, but the pilots reported for work only on June 26, prompting the airline to refuse to take them back.

The pilots filed a complaint for illegal lockout against the carrier, but the National Labor Relations Commission eventually dismissed it for lack of merit. It also upheld the dismissal of the union officers and members who joined the June 5 strike and defied the government’s return-to-work order.

The pilots’ petitions before the Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court were similarly denied, but in a bid to revive the case in 2003, the pilots’ union asked the Labor Department to conduct proceedings to determine who among its officers and members should be reinstated or deemed to have lost their employment with the airline, since “a significant number” of members did not join the strike.

Imson merely noted the union’s request and did not act on it because of the final nature of the Supreme Court’s decision, prompting the pilots to file a case against him and Sto. Tomas for grave abuse of discretion.

The Court of Appeals dismissed their petition on Dec. 22, 2004.