Delta worker's 26-year job is gone in 30 seconds for critical remarks
Article by: JON TEVLIN , Star Tribune
For 26 years, Kip Hedges worked to build a reputation and a job history, loading and unloading planes for Northwest Airlines, then Delta. It was not glamorous work, but it was a good, honest job and it paid the bills. It took less than 30 seconds for it to all go away, over a few seemingly innocuous words uttered to the reporter of a labor publication. Free speech often has a steep price.
Hedges had been part of an effort to raise wages of airline industry workers, the cleaners, bag slingers and wheelchair pushers, to a minimum of $15 an hour. He was fired during a week of actions in which labor activists drew attention to a move to raise wages at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport.
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So, what were the “disparaging” words that Hedges used about this employer?
“A lot of the Delta workers make under $15 an hour,” Hedges told the reporter for Workday Minnesota. “As a matter of fact, I would say probably close to half make under $15 an hour. So there’s a lot of them that understand how important this is. And a lot of the better-paid workers also understand that the bottom has to be raised otherwise the top is going to fall, as well.”
Words strong enough to take down an airline projected to make $4 billion this year, no doubt.
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John Budd, who specializes in labor relations at the University of Minnesota’s Carlson School of Management, thinks Delta’s action was designed to intimidate.
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Even though he has been active previously in union issues and has always spoken out on labor issues, Hedges never saw his termination coming.
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Transportation workers like Hedges are not protected by the National Labor Relations Act like private-sector workers, who can appeal mistreatment in the workplace. If Hedges loses his appeal, he plans to sue for wrongful termination in federal court.
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