The prospect of both the Virgin and QANTAS pilot training academies are certainly quite interesting, especially considering that the locations seem to be in regional cities.
The plus side for the airlines is obviously the amount of cash that the local / state governments are willing to throw in, plus any private money ala the Wagners in Toowoomba.
However I would imagine the practicalities of running flight training schools and trying to retain qualified (and more importantly experienced) instructor and engineering staff will quickly become apparent. Training 100 pilots a year will require in the order of 20-30 Instructors. I simply can’t see where these people will come from. All you have to do is look at CAE and their expansion into Tamworth - they are constantly advertising for Instructors up there, and I believe they are currently flying Flight Test Examiners from Melbourne to do student flight tests. The airlines would have to offer a fairly big carrot to retain staff (essentially they would have to offer positions at the end of a return of service), but I don’t see that as being likely.
It certainly will be interesting to see when these schools will get off the ground, and how they will be travelling 2-3 years into their operation.