I agree. Very good post. Maybe if some of the anti-AIPA brigade here started thinking with their heads we could get somewhere.
By using your heads I mean this; the company's main industrial tactic post Workchoices is going to be divide and conquer. That will only work if your allow your predjudice's to be confirmed by what you choose to hear.
But consider this;
AIPA is the only organisation that has legal coverage of the Qantas group. If we are ever going to be united it cannot be with a mish mash of representational organisations. If that means going to the BALPA umbrella model where every company has its own council which does the industrial negotiations for its particular company, so be it. At least the negotiations would be to a master plan of refusing to allow pilots to be played against each other.
Those of you who bring up ancient history in your zeal to keep AIPA away are playing into the hands of management. No-one is saying that AIPA couldn't have done it much better with the benefit of hindsight. But if we are ever to break this cycle that management plays on ad infinitum, then pilots are going to have to be as smart and professional industrially as the forces pitted against them.
That means using your heads for once.