The IR laws apply equally to both "highly skilled" and "unskilled" workers alike... I am not sure of all the loopholes that the company may use to get around them but I would be surprised if it would be that simple....
I was not privy to the last crew voice but I had a question posed on my behalf re compulsory redundancies.... I recieved this reply in my pigdeon hole recently.
"re your crew voice question, No weight in the rumour about forced redundancy. refer to EBA, casuals would have to go first"
Well it doesnt exactly say that but I guess they are reffering to the last point of the redundancy clause.
22. REDUNDANCY
In addition to the provisions of Part C of this Agreement, where Qantas initiates redundancies it will be
in accordance following process:
• Expressions of interest will be called for from all flight attendant categories. Selection for
redundancy from those that expressed an interest will be in accordance with seniority.
• Where there are insufficient expressions of interest, any compulsory redundancies of employees
will occur in reverse order of seniority (that is from junior to senior).
• For this purpose cabin crew employed by Qantas or by any new third party labour provider will be
treated as one group for the determination of seniority.
• Any unbroken period of service in the long haul division or as an ongoing employee with any third
party labour provider to Qantas of short haul/domestic cabin crew, that is continuous with service
under this Agreement will be included when calculating an employee’s seniority for the purposes of
selection for redundancy.
• Qantas acknowledges that prior to any consideration of compulsory redundancies, the continued use of
casual flight attendants must be examined and justified.
TW