Originally Posted by
Oasis
so are you saying that Cathay, when they decide to close Dragonair, should have sacked cx pilots on a visa and replaced them with locals/
pr holders from Dragonair?
Correct me if I'm wrong but I think the real issue is Cathay made a lot of people redundant, the vast majority of whom were PRs. However, the job was not made redundant, the routes and assets were simply painted green like the old British empire with their colonies. I don't think anyone can justify from a business or an immigration standpoint that retraining a 777 pilot (especially a NonPR) and put them on an ex KA 321 flying an ex KA route when there is a "readily available workforce" makes sense. Getting immigration on side seems to be their easiest way of getting their old jobs back, the pilots on work visas at other airlines are just collateral unfortunately.
Leaving the immigration politics aside, let's imagine CX sacking all the Captains saying they weren't needed anymore but at the same time they were going to upgrade half the FOs to fill the gap in the left hand seat, that's pretty much what's happening here. Now if all this happened in my home country I'd be outraged, but then again the politicians there have at least some accountability to the general public.