In yet another desperate attempt to defend the Carriers’ shameless attack on UTU’s Crew Consist Moratorium, BNSF Labor Relations' latest posting plainly reveals the complete absurdity of the Carriers’ position in this issue.

Our original 1980 Crew Consist Agreement provided that trains of up to 71 cars could be operated by a "reduced crew" (one Conductor and one Brakeman), while trains over 71 cars must have a "standard crew" (one Conductor and two Brakemen), unless otherwise agreed by the General Chairman with jurisdiction.

BNSF doggedly asserts that our original 1980 Crew Consist Moratorium was never intended as a bar against the serving of a formal Notice to change crew size (i.e., number of employees on a crew), but that it was a bar against changing these 1980 train length restrictions. In other words, the Carrier could not serve a notice to operate 125-car trains with less than a "standard crew" but was completely free to serve a notice demanding that the "standard" crew size (consist) would be one employee rather than three. The absurdity is obvious.

If the size (consist) of any crew can be changed, what difference does train length make?

Following BNSF's theory, UTU could have served a Notice during President Clinton’s administration demanding that three Brakemen be employed on trains up to 71 cars, and four Brakemen on trains over 71 cars. The cries of foul play from Fort Worth would have been heard in Whitefish.

I have never heard anyone refer to our Crew Consist Moratorium as a "train length moratorium" or a "productivity fund moratorium." The obvious fact that BNSF attempts to ignore is that Crew Consist is, by definition, crew size, and crew size is precisely what the original 1980 Crew Consist Moratorium (reconfirmed in 1993) was intended to protect. Crew size (consist) was "bargained to conclusion" (in the words of PEB 219) in the 1990’s and then placed back under the protection of that original Crew Consist Moratorium (per Side Letter No. 3 to our current Agreement). Attempting to change Crew Consist (size) through brute force rather than voluntary negotiation is exactly what the Crew Consist Moratorium was always intended to prevent. Sadly, what was "bargained to conclusion" then is now under fire again, because the Carriers want to cut employment levels (without reducing officers’ bonuses) to pay for new technology.

It is indeed sad that the Carriers’ unmitigated greed has their top officers sinking in the muck and mire of such mindless absurdity. It is even more regrettable that the possibility for truly voluntary negotiations on a next generation Crew Consist Agreement (with all those lucrative temptations suggested by BNSF management) is being torpedoed by the Carriers’ arrogant assault on a moratorium that any reasonably intelligent person can plainly see was (and still is) a commitment by the parties that they would not seek to force such changes by virtue of their political or economic muscle. That’s no 1930’s canard; that’s the stark reality of today’s railroad management style.