"take the job on the employer's conditions, hope to get some hours on a nice plane"
This is one of the basic fundamentals of the capitalist system. To think that the market will move forward while being held to ransom by employees is ludicrous. Such forces may have been tolerated in the protected environment that Australia once was but this is no longer the case. Global capital currents will naturally flow in the direction of countries with pro-business industrial laws and low labor union participation (amongst other things).
The airline industry in Australia (like the US) is going through a long awaited rationalization. The outcome will be market dominance by new, lower cost operations with less industrial baggage and fewer impediments to rapid market response.
QF would be following the likes of AA, UA and DL were it not for generous government protection.