I heard whispers the other day that JQI are considering Thai and Vietnamese nationals in the right-hand seat - yes, cockpit, not cabin...... For a tenth of the going price Australians would demand.....
Ok, it's a rumour, a story, a s#it-stir, I made it up, whatever, but tell me people, exactly what is to stop them doing this if they wanted to try it on? Do you really think the Aussie public is going to care? Afterall, they fly with a myriad of other SEA carriers that do this, why should JQI be patroned any differently by the Australian consumer because they have onboard, say, Thai F/O's with 200 hours total time?
Afterall, it's not like that pillar of everything Australian, namely QF, is employing SEA nationals as S/O's....... yet. If the SIN basing continues to be problematical as it's sounding that just may change...... And you know, I don't think Aussies will exactly chuck wobblies about foreign national S/O's on a QF flight-deck either. They might draw the line at "Captain Wong", however.....