Air Canada's unionized flight attendants have reached an agreement with the country's largest carrier on Tuesday, ending the first strike by its cabin crew in 40 years that had upended travel plans for hundreds of thousands of passengers.

The airline said it would gradually resume operations and a full restoration may require a week or more, while the union said it has completed mediation with the airline and its low-cost affiliate Air Canada Rouge.

"The Strike has ended. We have a tentative agreement we will bring forward to you," the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) said in a Facebook post, as the strike entered its fourth day. The carrier had earlier offered a 38 percent increase in total compensation for flight attendants over four years, with a 25 percent raise in the first year, which the union deemed insufficient.

The flight attendants walked off the job on Saturday after contract talks with the carrier failed. They had sought pay for tasks such as boarding passengers, which are not remunerated. They are now paid for time when the plane is moving.

CUPE, which represents Air Canada's 10,400 flight attendants, wanted to make gains on unpaid work that go beyond recent advances secured by their counterparts at US carriers like American Airlines.

In a rare act of defiance, the union remained on strike even after the Canada Industrial Relations Board declared its action unlawful.

Their refusal to follow a federal labour board order for the flight attendants to return to work had created a three-way standoff between the company, workers and the government.

Jobs Minister Patty Hajdu had urged both sides to consider government mediation and raised pressure on Air Canada, promising to investigate allegations of unpaid work in the airline sector, a key complaint of flight attendants who say they are not paid for work on the ground.

Flight attendants have for months argued new contracts should include pay for work done on the ground, such as boarding passengers.

Air Canada and its low-cost affiliate Air Canada Rouge normally carry about 130,000 customers a day. The airline is also the foreign carrier with the largest number of flights to the United States.

Its chief executive had on Monday stopped short of offering plans to break the deadlock, while defending the airline's offer of a 38 percent boost to flight attendants' total compensation. (Reuters)
Last updated: 2025-08-19 HKT 18:31