QANTAS grounded

[Registered Nutcase]

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/ne...passengers-today/story-e6freuy9-1226180303475

I am speechless, after saying the unions were damaging the brand you go and do this!

 

[scuba05]

Yep. Its a bit stupid they do this the DAY AFTER they give all of management pay rises for a business that is clearly going to shit, all because of high management's (and especially that fucking leprechaun's) decisions.

They have just shot themselves not just in one foot, but in both of them. They are now going to be losing $20m a day, everyday that this is happening.

I'm sure that there are bookies somewhere in Australia taking bets on how long before the company folds. My money would be on about 14-21 days.

As I said in the LTYH thread, supposed to be flying to Brisbane and back on Monday for work. Not happening I would suspect (unless I can change my flight, which would be highly doubtful).

Goodbye QANTAS. It is unfortunate that the Irish had to be the cause of your downfall.

 

[rone]

Qantas have been having their arse kicked by the Asian and Middle Eastern airlines for years. They were dated and out of touch long before this.

 

[Spike-X]

I thought the justification for the obscenely high salaries for CEOs is that these people are extraordinarily talented? How much talent is required to avoid a situation like this from occurring, over a measly 3.5% pay rise for the workers? Hell, I can ground an entire fleet of planes while keeping my workers' pay rise for myself, where's my $5 million a year?

 

[Elbo]

So QANTAS have never had a fatal accident, but what airline has crashed in such a spectacular and unbelievable fashion as QANTAS has?

Do QANTAS really think they're going to guilt-trip the unions into stepping down by threatening to destroy their own company?

 

[Steve-0]

I think QANTAS know what their doing. I reckon they will ride it out like a big "Fark you" to the unions and it'll be happy days when half the people get the sack.

The whole thing is stupid. I mean, there's so many people getting sacked daily because of the economic climate and here are these idiots demanding a pay rise? wtf?

BTW. $20m a day is worth not paying the 3.5%. It's a 14-15 Billion dollar business. Go the flying kangaroo! Don't bow down to those fuckwits.

 

[Rider_of_Fast]

Once again unions destroying Australia... no wonder all jobs are being sourced o/s. Besides who the heck doesn't want a pay rise?! I'm sure plenty of other people would be happy to take their places, Qantas should just shaft 'em all. This wouldn't be happening under the libs.

 

[Spike-X]

Once again unions destroying Australia... no wonder all jobs are being sourced o/s. Besides who the heck doesn't want a pay rise?! I'm sure plenty of other people would be happy to take their places, Qantas should just shaft 'em all. This wouldn't be happening under the libs.

No worries, just remember that when you're back to working 12 hours a day, 6 days a week just to keep a roof over your head like back in the days before unions 'destroyed' the country.

 

[cleeshoy]

This thread could get ugly.

 

[Crittski]

I am booked to fly for work with Qantas tomorrow, and I support what Joyce has done here. Workers can strike, but so too can their company... Fancy the workers not having to return to the bargaining table, what crappy legislation...

 

[Mtb1speed]

This thread could get ugly.

Very very ugly - I love it, online left v right.

 

[scuba05]

No worries, just remember that when you're back to working 12 hours a day, 6 days a week just to keep a roof over your head like back in the days before unions 'destroyed' the country.

I'm with you Spike. (Wouldn't stop at 6 day, 12hrs either)

Unions are a necessary evil in the world. They can be bastards sometimes, fighting for things that may not be really necessary (or just to day fuck you to the industries), but they have done many good things that we all enjoy and take for granted.

This being said, I hate the fact that QANTAS is just chasing cheap labour, which has essentially caused what is happening. What makes it worse is that management seem to think they are gods gift to the world, and should be paid excessive salaries and bonuses for basically turning up to work, and saying that the company is shutting down temporarily.
One could draw the conclusion that he is just extorting labour in cheaper countries to help his bottom line, which will probably go straight into his pocket. Yes its not as simple as that, but i comes down to greed.

Greed is why this is occurring (mostly from high up).

I personally can't see anything wrong with the workers (baggage handlers, engineers, pilots) wanting a payrise (3.5% is nothing compare to the 71% the friggen CEO has just taken). They work hard for their money, and at the end of the day, they are what allows the company to run. I doubt Mr Leprechaun is going to get out in his suit and start to do some maintenance work, or do some baggage throwing.

The unions in this case have taken a strong line (one could say they have overstepped the line), but I think they are justified in doing so. They are there to ensure their workers get a fair deal.

 

[dunndog]

No worries, just remember that when you're back to working 12 hours a day, 6 days a week just to keep a roof over your head like back in the days before unions 'destroyed' the country.

I've been working 12-14 hr days, 6 days a week (sometimes 7) for 8 weeks right alongside union members. That '40 hour week' bullshit is about 100 years old.
I think the unions have their place, but i also tend to think they are overly aggressive power tripping meatheads with a 'fuck'em' attitude and this attitude is adopted by their members which provides the employer with a workforce who dive headstrong into an us and them mindset at every opportunity. It is not productive and, indeed destructive.
Campaigning for a pay rise is one thing, but backing your members' employer into a corner is not a good idea. I seriously doubt that Qantas will go under because of this, I too think they are playing a brilliant hand here. If Qantas employees are suddenly faced with no employer, i'm sure they will be looking to mediate rather than continue full bore ahead, all or nothing. They still have bills to pay and families to feed, it's a niche industry so they won't want to be taking baggage handling skills out into the world trying to get a job.
And really, if they do, they won't be getting it as good as they have it now, anyone who knows (or is) a Qantas employee would know this. They get it pretty good.
Piss off union mugs, let people do their jobs and run their businesses.

 

[Rider_of_Fast]

I love how left this forum is... just doing my bit to balance it out!

Working 12 hour/6 days per week? - ahhh hypocritical much! Sounds like scare-mongering a bit there. Besides, I did my bit to avoid that by getting an education... Pretty sure everyone is entitled to an education in Australia if you're willing to put in some sacrifices in place early on...

On another note, I do think it'd be a good positive step if Alan rejected his $2M pay rise... but seriously good on him for not bowing to the union thugs demands.

 

[nathanm]

Like most people not directly involved in this situation I believe the media is swaying our opinions largely on this matter. Gruen did a good piece about it when Joyce when to the media with the "death threat" story.

I believe (from what the media has "drip-fed" me) is that one of the biggest issues here is the unions are fighting for a contact clause that prevents job losses. Ultimately Qantas are stating, to stay competitive they have to cut costs, best way to do that is to take jobs OS. We all saw were that got Tiger Airlines.

So if I'm you're a Qantas engineer etc, you're pretty much getting bent over either way. You strike and the company shuts down and tries to either starve you or fire you, or you don't strike and they make you redundant anyway.

Qantas in my opinion are simply playing dirty with a media war trying to get the general public offside with the unions and the employees by impacting them directly. People are now such arseholes that they don't give a shit if someone loses their jobs, family house etc, as long as their flights on time and the peanuts are fresh. Qantas know this and are leveraging it.

 

[durilium]

I wonders what will happen with the Australia Air Express which is 50% qantas and 50% australia post? I actually work for auspost so it will be interesting to see what happens with mail/parcels and all that.

 

[PINT of Stella. mate!]

Whilst the bulk of Australia's media seem to be backing Qantas, it can't really escape from people's attention that across the world people are getting seriously pissed off with over-inflated corporate pay-rises by underperforming CEO's.

If Alan Joyce was a true 'leader' he would be leading by example and foregoing his massive payrise and stop being so blatant about his desire to change the entire airline into an Asian competitor for Air Asia. The man has turned Qantas into a joke! It is now delivering a budget carrier service at premium airline prices. Accidents and incidents due to overseas maintenance have become more frequent in the last few years. Delays are frequent and lengthy. I can expect a better level of service when flying on airlines such as Garuda or Philippine Airways when flying international and even their loudest (and most annoying) supporter John Travolta, seems to have abandoned them.

Now, I've got Gold frequent flyer status with Qantas so I know all too well just how much the service has suffered in the last few years. The good thing is the competion (Virgin) have really started getting their shit together these days. Last month they launched a promotion where they would match any rivals frequent flyer status. As a result I'm now Gold with Virgin - presumably so are hundreds - if not thousands of other passengers.

If Gillard caves in and Joyce wins this one, it's Virgin (and unfortunately their f***ing pesky Pure Blonde) all the way for me!

 

[tc2233]

The media seem to be getting a few things wrong. All the Engineers and the pilots want is to be able to fix and fly the new 787 when Qantas receives them and to prevent New Zealand based Pilots and Cabin Crew from flying 737's on Australian routes (which is prettty much job security). Thats why the pilots do the speech on the PA each flight. Qantas current plan is for the 787 to be flown and fixed by Singapore based Pilots. When Qantas retires its 767 and 747 fleets there will be several 1000 pilots and Engineers out of jobs because they wont be upgraded to the 787.
I really do hope that the Government does something about making Qantas keep a certain % of jobs onshore or something to reduce the amount of jobs that are going to be lost at Qantas over the next few years. (I dont think this will happen but still).

Some of the people in the thread think all of this is the unions fault but you have to realise how bad Qantas management is. Dad has been an Engineer at Qantas for 35 years and all the outsourcing they have done has cost Qantas more than what it has saved. For example, Qantas offshored its Australia's based Engine overhaul facility. Before they offshored the engine overhaul facility they would have 1 engine failure a year on average. Now, they have an Engine failure every month. Qantas used to have spare engines for the A330 fleet in Sydney. To save $4 million they sold all their spare engines. Last month an A330 needed that spare engine and it was grounded for 2 weeks costing Qantas $14 million. There is so many examples of cost cutting and outsourcing I could list that has ended up costing the company more money.

This is what currently happens on Australia to New Zealand Flights.
[video=youtube;68f_JdPmvlM]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=68f_JdPmvlM&ob=av3e[/video]

 

[scuba05]

Whilst the bulk of Australia's media seem to be backing Qantas, it can't really escape from people's attention that across the world people are getting seriously pissed off with over-inflated corporate pay-rises by underperforming CEO's.

If Alan Joyce was a true 'leader' he would be leading by example and foregoing his massive payrise and stop being so blatant about his desire to change the entire airline into an Asian competitor for Air Asia. The man has turned Qantas into a joke! It is now delivering a budget carrier service at premium airline prices. Accidents and incidents due to overseas maintenance have become more frequent in the last few years. Delays are frequent and lengthy. I can expect a better level of service when flying on airlines such as Garuda or Philippine Airways when flying international and even their loudest (and most annoying) supporter John Travolta, seems to have abandoned them.

Now, I've got Gold frequent flyer status with Qantas so I know all too well just how much the service has suffered in the last few years. The good thing is the competion (Virgin) have really started getting their shit together these days. Last month they launched a promotion where they would match any rivals frequent flyer status. As a result I'm now Gold with Virgin - presumably so are hundreds - if not thousands of other passengers.

If Gillard caves in and Joyce wins this one, it's Virgin (and unfortunately their f***ing pesky Pure Blonde) all the way for me!

Here here POSM!

If Joyce has ANY chance of getting the business back on track, I think he has to decline the pay rise and get his shit together. He can't justify that kind of money for a business that's doing nothing.

Good on Virgin for picking their game up. They are going to be very busy in the next few days and weeks, and if they get through it without too many hiccups, I dare say they will take over as preferred airline for many. Especially if they are doing the deals with frequent flier points.

At least the poms (Branson) can run a business properly


TC2223 - Good to hear from someone inside the industry. It doesn't take Einstein to work out the company has been going to shit, but those kinds of figures just reinforce it.
And that video is very, VERY interesting. Unlike commercial media, it is by the ABC, so is USUALLY a bit less bullshit, a bit more informative.

 

[cleeshoy]

Besides, I did my bit to avoid that by getting an education... Pretty sure everyone is entitled to an education in Australia if you're willing to put in some sacrifices in place early on...

couldn't have said it better myself....