Why are any of you surprised?
The entire Qantas group is separated into different groups so they can play you off against each other. It’s only the recent past that pilots were even able to move up to Mainline from the ‘links!!
QF will do whatever they want. Especially in a pandemic such as this.
If you want my prediction, most of the QF work out of Perth will end up being done by Network with 320/F100’s (aka the old Skywest/Virgin relationship). The Mainline base may even disappear and all flights based out of the east coast.