Remember, Qantas in their usual conniving way, “un-agreed” to loads of the wins for the pilots, including:- improvements made to salary tables (including the new Year 7 and 10 salaries)
- DHA
- Backpay
- Improvements to the Additional Hourly Payment rate and structure
- RDO provisions – definition of an RDO and restrictions around an RDO
I agree with the gist of what you’re saying BeerBaron but…..would you agree that a full bench might determine that Qantas, having once agreed to those five specific provisions, was ‘engaging in conduct that undermines collective bargaining’ when they ‘un-agreed’ to them? Ie they were not bargaining in good faith?
It was obvious to most what the eleventh hour retraction was designed to do, it was more checkers than chess and it is debatable if the manoeuvre was consistent with good faith bargaining.
Qantas has been caught out in recent times by leaning on the letter of the law and may find that their ‘bundle of contractual rights’ is indeed open to interpretation at the FWC level.
We will soon see if the reciprocity bias that the Chairman’s Lounge activates is more powerful than the moral compass of our bureaucrats.