WestJet and CUPE reached a tentative agreement early Monday, ending a strike by about 4,400 flight attendants that had grounded the mainline fleet over the August long weekend. Both the strike notice and the lockout notice were withdrawn. The deal goes to a ratification vote. [1]

The paper did not have a WestJet story on Sunday. The nearest aviation note was the Peru Boeing crash, a different kind of failure. Monday's labor story is the North American sequel to Air Canada's 2025 walkout over the same unpaid ground work. [2]

CUPE Local 8125 said WestJet's credit-hour system left boarding, delays, safety checks, and post-flight duties off the clock — on the order of 35 unpaid hours a month, the union has argued, under a regime that also pushed an 80-credit-hour monthly requirement. WestJet said those duties were already paid through credits rather than a clock, then offered what it called a new standard: an hourly rate covering time before and after flights plus a double-digit first-year raise. The union said the offer did not go far enough. [2]

The stoppage began at 12:01 a.m. Mountain Time on August 2. WestJet said Sunday that about 250,000 travelers were hit. Cirium figures cited after the deal put Monday cancellations above 300 flights, around 62 percent of the schedule. Encore Q400s and partner codeshares were supposed to keep flying. Pearson still looked like a lockout. [3]

Air Canada wrote the template last August. About 10,000 attendants struck over ground pay, stranded more than 100,000 people, and watched Jobs Minister Patty Hajdu send the dispute toward a back-to-work order under Section 107 of the Canada Labour Code. The union defied the order. The company came back to the table. The stoppage lasted three days. [3]

That defiance is why Monday's deal matters beyond Calgary. NDP MPs had already told Ottawa to stay out. Unions call Section 107 a tool that ends bargaining. Hajdu said she was disappointed the parties had not avoided a disruption. Transport Minister Steven MacKinnon said talks were progressing and that mediation was in the room. The government of Prime Minister Mark Carney did not have to choose, because the parties chose first. [2]

CUPE president Alia Hussain said the tentative agreement "evolves the flight credit system by recognizing more of the work cabin crew are required to perform" and raises pay for that work. WestJet said the stoppage and the network disruption were over. Residual cancellations continued Tuesday as aircraft and crews were put back in place. [1]

The reckoning is not a Canadian curiosity. U.S. cabin contracts still treat door-close as the start of pay. Gig platforms treat logged-on time the same way airlines once treated the jet bridge: adjacent to the job, not the job. WestJet is the second large carrier in twelve months to learn that passengers notice when the people who brief the exits decide the clock is the story. [3]

WestJet's public release of its offer, which McGill aviation lecturer John Gradek called a tactic to intimidate the union, is part of the same new floor. The company wanted passengers to see a 13 percent raise, a duty premium it valued at another 12 percent of salary, retroactive pay to January, and per diem increases, and to blame the union for the gate. The union wanted the clock. Those are not the same offer with different adjectives. [3]

Encore's exemption was a network design, not a kindness. Regional Q400s keep a map looking alive while the 737s sit. Codeshares do the same. A passenger who did not read the operating carrier learned the difference at security. That, too, is a labor lesson: the brand is wider than the bargaining unit. [2]

Ottawa's unused Section 107 is the ghost at this table. Last year the tool produced defiance, then a deal. This year the parties dealt before the minister had to choose. Cabin crews will remember which sequence paid. So will Porter, Air Transat, and every U.S. local that still treats the jet bridge as a courtesy. [3]

Ratification is not a press release. If members reject the text, notices can be issued again. If they accept it, the credit-hour fiction takes another cut. Either way, the 2025 Air Canada strike is no longer an exception. It is the industry's new bargaining floor. [1]

-- THEO KAPLAN, San Francisco