schnauzer missed the point completely.
History shows Qantas management has been screwing their staff for ages having one of the worst industrial relations records of any airline.
There has only been one occasion, to my recollection, where the QF pilots had the intestinal fortitude to take any serious action to further & protect their profession.
Pilots in this country once had a professional union which was as strong as the members within it and did very, very well protecting and furthering pilots salary & conditiions; a union is only as strong as its members and unity of those members.
The QF pilots were first to leave for their own perceived selfish reasons & when the whatsit really hit the fan sat by on the sidelines blinded by the observations`it will not happen to us.'
And where is the industry now?
QF salaries & conditions always under serious attack; Aust airlines - lower pay & conditions, Jet* - we will fly for less and on QF mainland routes (would never happen?); and now, wherever the 717 is going we will fly it for less again? For the Ansett integration squabbles insert any airline within the QF group. One only has to read PPRune to observe tha answers.
I have no truck with airline management particularly QF; I ws only stating the bleeding obvious, airline management have the pilots measure, know the weaknesses within particularly the cancer within they created. They have the big stick and are using it very, very successfully.
It is of little use calling for a strong union if you are not prepared to stand up and be counted as one.
Reading the history mentioned illustrates pilots overall have failed to learn the lessons of the past.
The same old arguments about what a Dr. lawyer, tinker, taylor, sailor, crane, train or bus driver are worth have all been done to death before, prove nothing except detracting people from the main point to irrelevant drivel.
You are worth what you and your profession think you are worth and what you are prepred to stand up for and negotiate.
QF management obviously thingk you are worth peanuts and works assiduously towards reluctantly paying you this.
If you think you are worth more, then as ONE you have to stand up, stay standing up and say this is what you WILL pay us for our services! No IFS, no Buts!
Until such time as this happens most of what I am reading is whining which is distracting me from fcuking the prom queen.
DK
PS>> apologies to the guys from Braniff where, if memory serves me correctly, this is where modern airline management, pilot relationships all started. (was Braniff or Continental Lorenzo's originating port?)