Originally Posted by
AerialPerspective
Yes, I wouldn't be crowing about this 'victory' if I were the TWU. Any judge in any court on the same day could have seen it differently. That's why there is an appeal process and as you say, it will enable Qantas to refine their argument and I don't expect this to go beyond the first appeal, I reckon it will be overturned on appeal.
Yes, there's certainly reasonable grounds for an appeal.
The appeal will likely turn on the Court's interpretation of the phrase 'substantial and operative factor/reason' as in did the fact that the ground handling function heavily unionised form a substantial and operative part of Qantas's reasoning in determining to outsource it? There's some case law around the phrase and its application but there's a fairly rudimentary test for determining if something is 'substantial and operative'; if that element was not present (that is, if ground handling wasn't heavily unionised) and all other factors remained the same (the commercial/financial factors) would the same decision be reached? Form your own view on that.