Pearl Pilot and AFAP member...
APMR - Congrats on the longest post I have read on PPRuNe in years (ever?)!!!
It has been said to me that some are considering voting for this proposed CA just "to be done with it". That is the worst reason to do, or not do, anything in my book.
Personally, I don't think it will get up. Time will tell. But surely if there was any sense of real negotiation and a desire to reach agreement (from both sides), the thing would have gone to a vote long before the four year mark, yes?
I think in light of the current aviation climate, the agreement does not give enough, for what it seeks to remove. Simple as that.
Do some figures on CPI, versus 2% a year, compounded over the last 4-5 years, to see how far backward Pearl Aviation's T&C has gone. That is the first thing that must be addressed, before even considering:
1) that situation is not to be repeated over the course of this CA
2) all allowances should be indexed per annum to CPI too (not ATO XXX)
3) experienced pilots are generally (or should be!) worth more in the labour market in general, due supply/demand - just as they will be worth less when the market swings back (don't worry it will...)
4) if appreciation is not shown for existing crew (yeah increase the training wage 20%, but give existing crew basically a CPI base rate increase) then you can all expect to read plenty of ads for Pearl crew. Pearl will continue to train pilots (very inefficiently wrt $$$ I might add) who leave and take their training to another operator. It has happened many times now...
Well as I said time will tell - in two weeks we'll know.
CR.