Thread: QANTAS fleet grounded

Originally Posted by stuee

So they're the best paid airline workers in Australia then?? Airlines are a globalised industry, they aren't a CFMEU worksite competing against only local resources, they are competing in a global market which has become increasingly deregulated in this country, meaning operators who can base their maintenance operations overseas, and pay their pilots less are able to make inroads here in the Australian market because the consumer only wants the cheapest they can get.

Who said they were the best paid?? Not me,.... only the people like Joyce whose personal bonus exceeds the entire amount sort by the workforce. This is ONE of the points leading to industrial action.
Oh how "evil" of Australian workers to stand up and want fair pay for skill.
Of course you wouldnt mind at all when this happens to your area of employment will you?

By the way you wont get cheaper fares because any margin will be paid to shareholders not jo public......... and engineering capabilities and Pilot experience to match ... why do you think Tiger were grounded? Because their cheap poorly trained/checked/ experienced pilots flew below lowest safe altitude on a number of occasions, endangering all on board and on the ground. But hey, who cares about that you got cheap fare didnt you?
Isnt ignorance just bliss. (the above is just one reason)

Always fascinated by people with no idea about Aviation other than finding the cheapest fare, suddenly have an opinion when they percieve themselves to be missing out. Rather easier to apply a broad base swipe at unions than to bother to find out what is really going on eh? BTW I am not in any union and have seen the damage some can do, but also see their value in many circumstances.

No doubt the same people will gladly diregard litigation equally, should there be an accident or even just a little scare to cause them some emotional trauma?

Funny how everybody bitches and moans about crappy mechanics on their vehicles and crappy aftermarket parts and blah blah blah, but suddenly want those same manufacturing countries and workers maintaining the machines that will take them and their families 12kms up and 700km/h for the price of bus ticket, but no way they will put that part on their vehicle or use that mechanic, cos its just not worth the risk!!!

Hmmm folks wont bolt on a chinese winch in case it leaves them stranded for a few hours till help arrives but will take the chance at hurtling towards the ground in an aluminium tube for sake of a few dollars on an airfare.

For those who dont know, aircraft parts are specifically certified and, for the most part for this thread, will come from Boeing or Airbus industries.
So all operators will pay the same price for spares as the next operator. So nothing to be saved o/seas in this department. The difference is in the staff and their training and experience.

Some countries do an excellent job, while many are fraudulent, untrained and use second hand parts despite signatories and certification in maintenance log books stating otherwise.

cheers

Originally Posted by strangy

Who said they were the best paid?? Not me,.... only the people like Joyce whose personal bonus exceeds the entire amount sort by the workforce. This is ONE of the points leading to industrial action.
Oh how "evil" of Australian workers to stand up and want fair pay for skill.
Of course you wouldnt mind at all when this happens to your area of employment will you?

You imply that Qantas are the best paid in Australia when you state that most stay here for family reasons when there are better opportunities overseas. If there was better work here they wouldn't be having this industrial action and the market would dictate wages. Who else pays better than Qantas within Australia??

Originally Posted by strangy

By the way you wont get cheaper fares because any margin will be paid to shareholders not jo public......... and engineering capabilities and Pilot experience to match ... why do you think Tiger were grounded? Because their cheap poorly trained/checked/ experienced pilots flew below lowest safe altitude on a number of occasions, endangering all on board and on the ground. But hey, who cares about that you got cheap fare didnt you?
Isnt ignorance just bliss. (the above is just one reason)

Always fascinated by people with no idea about Aviation other than finding the cheapest fare, suddenly have an opinion when they percieve themselves to be missing out. Rather easier to apply a broad base swipe at unions than to bother to find out what is really going on eh? BTW I am not in any union and have seen the damage some can do, but also see their value in many circumstances.

I'm not sure if your directing this at me but this was my point before, you have low cost airlines attracting a large quantity of consumers taking away from Qantas's profits. Qantas is no longer protected locally or abroad and has to adapt to suite.

For what its worth, I've only ever flown with airlines other than Qantas when I wasnt responsible for booking or flying on routes that Qantas don't fly. I actually find it quite amusing those arguing for pro union action who then go fly to bali with Air Asia or Tiger.

These workers may deserve the better pay and conditions but unless a raft of protectionism is bought back in, and foreign airlines booted out then they have to get with the times.

edit* This is essentially my view:
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/new...-1226179961218

I'm yet to be convinced otherwise, but I'm happy to be.

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.

doint think so, BLACK BALLED
and what airline would want to employ that bunch. work 1 hour talk for 5 and flog any thing that isint nailed down for the rest of the day. OH thats when thay are not on work cover.

Originally Posted by strangy

Who said they were the best paid?? Not me,.... only the people like Joyce whose personal bonus exceeds the entire amount sort by the workforce. This is ONE of the points leading to industrial action.
Oh how "evil" of Australian workers to stand up and want fair pay for skill.
Of course you wouldnt mind at all when this happens to your area of employment will you?

By the way you wont get cheaper fares because any margin will be paid to shareholders not jo public......... and engineering capabilities and Pilot experience to match ... why do you think Tiger were grounded? Because their cheap poorly trained/checked/ experienced pilots flew below lowest safe altitude on a number of occasions, endangering all on board and on the ground. But hey, who cares about that you got cheap fare didnt you?
Isnt ignorance just bliss. (the above is just one reason)

Always fascinated by people with no idea about Aviation other than finding the cheapest fare, suddenly have an opinion when they percieve themselves to be missing out. Rather easier to apply a broad base swipe at unions than to bother to find out what is really going on eh? BTW I am not in any union and have seen the damage some can do, but also see their value in many circumstances.

No doubt the same people will gladly diregard litigation equally, should there be an accident or even just a little scare to cause them some emotional trauma?

Funny how everybody bitches and moans about crappy mechanics on their vehicles and crappy aftermarket parts and blah blah blah, but suddenly want those same manufacturing countries and workers maintaining the machines that will take them and their families 12kms up and 700km/h for the price of bus ticket, but no way they will put that part on their vehicle or use that mechanic, cos its just not worth the risk!!!

Hmmm folks wont bolt on a chinese winch in case it leaves them stranded for a few hours till help arrives but will take the chance at hurtling towards the ground in an aluminium tube for sake of a few dollars on an airfare.

For those who dont know, aircraft parts are specifically certified and, for the most part for this thread, will come from Boeing or Airbus industries.
So all operators will pay the same price for spares as the next operator. So nothing to be saved o/seas in this department. The difference is in the staff and their training and experience.

Some countries do an excellent job, while many are fraudulent, untrained and use second hand parts despite signatories and certification in maintenance log books stating otherwise.

cheers

You seem to be missing the part about demanding Job Guaruntees that no ther industry or business in Australia or pretty much the world can offer. That is actually the main stumbling block in the union demands.

As for your rant about the only people taking the business side want cheap airfares what a load of crap i always fly qantas and never shop around.

Originally Posted by stuee

The demanding public are who pays their wage through airfares!!! If you don't satisfy them you don't have a job.

Ok so you are saying it is ok for the public to dictate wage policy? If that is so let me know what industry you are in and we might have to start dictating what you earn and by your statement you would be happy with that.
We are not just talking pilots, but a wide range of jobs. Usually why there is some sort of arbitration, that does not seem to apply here.
It seems there are a lot of people more concerned about inconvenience than standards of living.
There is also a lot of BS about what pilots earn. In this day and age it is not that good, especially when you take into account what it cost them to get their commercial licence for a big jet.
The public will pay airfares, no matter what they are, it is just you people that want the cheap fares inter city. Come to Newman and have a look at what it costs us. A budget fare for us is around $250, normal fare over $600. Most of the flights are full as mining companies pay for these fares.
We all want cheap stuff because asia can do it cheap, but what future and standard of living are we leaving our kids and their kids?

QANTAS grounded its fleet as a tactic as it forces the Fair Work Tribunal to suspend the industrial action by unions and suspends the bargaining periods and will now conduct an arbitrated case on the wage claims.

Fair Work Australia will then arbitrate an award which will be binding on the parties for 3 to 5 years during which time no industrial action or additional claims can be made.

Fair Work Australia are not likely in my experience to grant anything other than CPI increase to Unions unless they can demontrate a change in skill or technology to justify the increase.

Fair Work won't be granting anything on Union claims restricting QANTAS rights to engage contractors or force QANTAS to pay non QANTAS staff working in its off shoots like Jetstar equal pay to QANTAS staff rates like the pilots are demanding.

QANTAS grounded the fleet today as it was Friday, Fair WOrk convened the first hearing of arties tonight in MElbourne at 10, orders will be likely issued over the weekend and the planes will be back in the air by Monday at latest.

Aust Govt is likely to repeat Bob Hawke move and have airforce fly surplus passengers affected domestically by dispute and or allow foreign international to use spare seats on domestic flights to carry Australian domestic passengers.

If you have a IR system which we have had since 1994 which says the parties are free to bargain over anyhting they want wihtout restriction and take IR action in support of those claims without interference from IR Tribunal unless it affects the national economy or community OHS then you have the sort of QANTAS campaign in large companies of death by 1000 cuts by Unions and the only action an employer can take is lock out his workforce and shut down his business in response. As neither party can refer the dispute to an independent tribunal for resolution or conciliation, unless of course the dispute affects the Nation etc and that requires a reference from Minister.

So people QANTAS has played its tactical card to force the Govt to refer the matter to the IR Tribunal and suspend IR action by Unions and get an arbitrated pay claim only decision.

As for outcomes, we are in global economy and we are competing ourselves downwards to the lowest cost provider of goods as the consumer wants the cheapest goods and you can look at manufacturing textile industries electronic and white goods to see that is true as all those industries that used to employ people in Australia in the 1950's and 1960' s under tarriff barrier have all but disappeared since tarriffs were reduced in 1970's by Gough and abolsihed for free trade agreements in the 1980's and 90's by Hawke Keating and Howard Costello.

Mining pays high wages as no comptetion but even mining companies going towards robot replacement of high cost labour and will over the next 20 years replace their workforces which they deunionised in the 90's by individual agreements and offering over award wage rates.

Suggest people look at USA to see same destruction on massive scale of their industrial based and impact on their manufcaturing cities where nealry 30% and more of cities like Detroit are now derelict and abandoned.

Where prior to 1965 95% of clothing was made in USA and now less than 5% is made there.
,

a lot of these CEO's don't or won't realize is that the moment you outsource your work you lose control over it and no longer have an effective say in ANY aspect of that work.
i have seen this happen many a time, it all looks great on the bottom line but its murky on the way there.

Originally Posted by CraigE

Ok so you are saying it is ok for the public to dictate wage policy?

If the public pay for your service then yes. This is what drives the world around, if the consumer doesn't pay for their service they're left without a job. If that's unacceptable, change industry or job.

Originally Posted by CraigE

If that is so let me know what industry you are in and we might have to start dictating what you earn and by your statement you would be happy with that.

I work in oil and gas, I moved after the last company I worked for (a vendor) wasn't offering what I could get elsewhere and was starting to outsource engineering to India.

Originally Posted by CraigE

We are not just talking pilots, but a wide range of jobs. Usually why there is some sort of arbitration, that does not seem to apply here.
It seems there are a lot of people more concerned about inconvenience than standards of living.
There is also a lot of BS about what pilots earn. In this day and age it is not that good, especially when you take into account what it cost them to get their commercial licence for a big jet.
The public will pay airfares, no matter what they are, it is just you people that want the cheap fares inter city. Come to Newman and have a look at what it costs us. A budget fare for us is around $250, normal fare over $600. Most of the flights are full as mining companies pay for these fares.
We all want cheap stuff because asia can do it cheap, but what future and standard of living are we leaving our kids and their kids?

I don't fly enough to be inconvenienced and as I said I always fly Qantas where possibly, its not me you have to convince to support the Australian based airlines. And I agree whole heartedly that by demanding the cheapest stuff we can get we are moving towards equalising the standard of living with 3rd world countries. But I see the world we live in and reality is, that airlines are competing on a global playing field and driven by consumers wanting more for less, they are affected more than a number of other locally based industries because they compete directly with cheaper labour.