Originally Posted by
600ft-lb
The argument is that there was work to be carried out (deferred defects, a checks, c checks, storage checks etc), Qantas just chose to not do the work. The precedent set in the past court cases is that a company can't just choose to stand down full time employees when business is slow even if the work isn't considered urgent. If there is work available, you can't stand people down. The ALAEA is arguing that there was work to do from what I understand.
Was it essential work though? If certain aircraft are not going to be flying for a while then those checks don’t need to be completed until close to when the aircraft are ready to return. Or maybe not. Perhaps because of the nature of tasks to be performed the ruling may only apply to engineering, which is maybe why other unions don’t seem to have joined the court action.
Originally Posted by
ScepticalOptomist
Maybe to stand up and pay those that should be, and right size the operation - ie paying redundancy - not just having people sit around on no pay until it suits the company? Don’t know - just thinking out loud...
I think the right sizing (as far as pilots are concerned at least) is mid 2022-2023 as stated in the recovery plan. That’s what all the VR was about. As explained in the previous post there maybe is a case for some engineers to be stood up in the interim to perform certain engineering checks, although pilots won’t need to be stood up until the recency training is needed, a month or two out from when the aircraft is bought back to service.