Thread: QANTAS fleet grounded

Originally Posted by strangy

All Qantas engineers will have jobs tomorrow if they want with almost any airline they want. Leaving the Airline in ruins.

With better pay and conditions?? If so then why would they not have moved already??

Great,i have one son in Darwin flying Qantas back here tomorrow & the other in Canberra flying back on Qantas tomorrow as well
Looks like neither of them will be going anywhere.

I just got back from overseas yesterday flying Qantas.
Never-the-less the truth is all other airlines are moving to paying "world award wages" I am not sure of the exact title. Virgin and all other airlines are paying less than Qantas which is why they don't jump ship.
Whilst I believe there is a place for unions, it is time an employer stood up and said enough is enough, this may well cost jobs and only the unions are to blame.
The TWU is the worst of the lot, I have had dealings with them for many years.
Fact: I tried to get the TWU to represent 300+ employees directly employed in the transport industry but they had a sweet heart deal with another union at the time who would not represent these workers on the specific issue at hand.
(note: the "other union" was supported/represented by Penny Wong at the time)
I got legal representation, cost me $3500 personally, proved my point, TWU later took the 300+ employees but still has not paid my $3500 invoice outstanding for over 10 years! They are still active in my workplace and still try to get me to join (fat chance).
I say bring back individual work agreements, (also fat chance but that is because we have too many lazy employees in this country).
I am not a senior manager or major stakeholder in the transport industry.
Sure I would like better pay and conditions and unions have probably had a significant part of getting many of the existing conditions we enjoy today but recently (for a few years now) they have begun to bite the hands that feeds them. Big companies want big profits and those profits often go to rich people who are rich because they put most of that money back into investments that create more jobs.
OK I can feel the knives out already but I feel better for venting!

This employer action was foreshadowed at their AGM in the last couple of days, with the CEO telling all and sundry how much the rolling stoppages cost. How much will this activity cost Joyce and his mates? On whom can he lay blame for this vandalism? No high moral ground here - he's acting to sink the Oz brand and reraise the flag in Asia.

How could you trust this bloke?

Grrr....

Pete

Originally Posted by strangy

good move?....yeah right, what idiots.
Qualified Aircraft Engineers with the appropriate approvals are one of the rarest species on the planet. Something the Airline Execs know has been the case for a long time and not going to improve in the near future.
All Qantas engineers will have jobs tomorrow if they want with almost any airline they want. Leaving the Airline in ruins.

Furthermore Qantas no longer enjoys protection from competition so the ramifications, after Virgin, SIA and others who are ready to jump in on the routes, will be massive.

I think this is just a move in the masterplan to move as much of the operation off shore and restructure through this and Jetstar.

I agree. I remember the domestic pilots dispute back in '90 when the Government (ALP by the way) brought in the RAAF to break the dispute after they could not come to a resolution. As a result we ended up with mostly foreign pilots flying our aircraft and our very experienced pilots went overseas. Shortly afterwards the new pilots received pay rises equivalent to what the sacked pilots were after. The whole thing was a concocted premeditated move by Peter Abeles (TNT-Ansett) and Bob Hawke to break the hold of the Aust Pilots Federation. I don't know whether there is any association like that in this dispute but it smells. Personally I think Joyce and the Qantas board by grounding the entire fleet instead of resolving the situation are using this as an opportunity to either dismiss or force their australian staff into submission and as Strangy said move more of their operations and employment overseas where the labour cost is lower. They already partially do this. If they can afford this massive loss then I feel they could have arbitrated an acceptable resolution for all. After all Mr. Joyce has not been backward in accepting an extra $2 million on top of his exorbitant salary. Perhaps he could donate the bonus to the staff he has put out of work to put food on the table for their families. I don't think Joyce is worth anywhere near what he is paid let alone the extra $2 million. At a time like this it is extremely bad timing for him to accept such a pay rise. As with the way everything is going in this country, before long we won't have any Australian based industries left. I support the unions fighting to get a fair deal.

Originally Posted by stuee

With better pay and conditions?? If so then why would they not have moved already??

Many will. They stay because they are Australian , their families are here etc and Qantas is based in Australia.
Many people have better opportunities in this regard overseas, but don't pursue these for the above reasons and others.

So you stop the Airline to prove how big your jewels are and teach those who keep you in business a lesson?
If Qantas can't afford to pay their staff now it won't matter anyway. If the airline isn't viable it is just matter of time.

Cheers

Sent from my iPhone using Forum Runner

May I ask the silly question of an uninformed what's going on here???

^^^ wondering why this got moved to "outdoor pastimes"...