Thank you. After 30+ minutes of listening to that guy, then, so see some slob with unbuttoned shirt ask about seniority from someone who really cannot talk about it at all, I'd sooner stick needles in my eyeballs.
Your quote is a paraphrase of what Mr. Parker said, and only after proffering a ton of qualifications that basically negated anything he said about it. Listen to him around the 35 minute mark and see if he really said what you quoted. I think you took your misquote out of context. It would not be for Mr. Parker to comment one way or another about a union "award", even to say whether a union could ignore or not something.