HKfooey, read with interest your points about that SCMP script. Might I chuck in a few pennies to consider:
<1) If it is discrimination paying local pilots less, then is it also discrimination not paying upwards of $700,000 HKD to train an expat " off the street " ( I believe only locals or children of permanent ID holders can apply for cadetship ? )>
- Consider the amount than an expat will make over the course of a career at any airline here vs. a local with the current COS in place. The initial investment that the companies make training a cadet is well made up in the space of several years from the cost saving of the extra benefits that the expats would otherwise get, hence the drive to fill up the recruitment quota for both KA and CX cadetships. Might it not be fair to say that after a cadet serves several years and produces a given turnover for the company that makes up for the training costs (forgive me for not quantifying but numbers are not my forte, perhaps someone else can?), and provided that they pass all the requisite checks/exams/interviews as every other pilot must do to preserve their position, that they should be entitled to the same monthly remuneration as the next guy doing the same job, regardless of their background?
2) In KA, JFOs fly from the RHS of A330/320 with less than 200hrs total time, so is it not discrimination against non-locals who have to have 2500 hrs before KA will look at us ?
- Isn't that a bit like comparing apples to bananas? The screening process for DE applicants vs. ab initio starts on different tangents. Granted, 2500 hour applicants have to demonstrate a proficiency commensurate with their experience, but consider that a 0 hour guy has to demonstrate their potential to fulfill a very intensive 14 month course and then some, to obtain a minimum licensing requirement, which most DE applicants would have had years to complete prior to even their first job scud running cheques. Thereafter, their performance is eventually graded to the same standard as anyone else in the company (certainly before they are released to line as an FO). Besides, those 2500 hours might have been on something with bigger cojones than your average ADL fly swat but not necessarily with a turbine. Would it not be fair to say then that cadets and non turbine (though experienced) DE applicants would both have to be educated to understand and get a feel for jet a/c and hence, are starting from pretty much the same page?
<3) Does any sane person really think we would leave our home countries to live 8,10,12 + hours from our friends and family in some of the worst pollution in the world for no reward ?>
- Despite the bitching that we all hear coming from the company reps having to shell out more to attract people from abroad, I can safely say that the vast majority of locals would never want expat Ts&Cs to be downgraded to a local equivalent. There is not one local I personally know who wants to see any of their colleagues' conditions diminish, however they are questioning the validity of their own contracts with regards to performing the same duties as the next person and basically getting paid half the amount, despite also having children to educate, a wife's bag habit to support and rent/mortgage to pay. Most recognise the requirement to fulfill an obligation to recoup their training costs but why should these obligations be stretched out over the course of potentially a 30 year career? I challenge anyone to deny the disparity in equality there.
<I would agree that it is discriminatory if a local pays for his/her own training, gets the required experience for KA/CX direct entry, and then still gets paid local conditions ( which I believe is the case )>
I believe this has happened to an individual who is no longer with us and is in fact is in command of the speed demons over at HKE. In his case, it was a blatant stab on the company's part at sensibility and respect for an applicant's right to the same Ts&Cs as those who were coming in with requisite DE experience levels.
And as a final thought, I have heard on the line from a few about how the cadets deserve what they have because of the opportunity presented to them by the two host airlines, that others joining from overseas have had to toil for years to get to (i.e. the right hand seat of a twin aisled jet). For the record, I went through the cadetship but I had also previously paid my way through to a frozen ATPL and earning food stamp pay doing shuttle runs in rickety buckets of ****. I would gladly have toiled just as much, however political borders being what they are, getting employed long term by anyone short of colombian drug runners as a foreigner was an impossibility. So the concept of opportunity for locals vs. expats runs both ways; few expats have the opportunity to join widebody airlines without requisite hours, but few locals have the opportunity for long stay in countries that have a system for building those flight hours. There is a sob story on every side but in the end, everyone has to perform to pass their RT/PCs for years to come.
Soapbox dismantled......air raid siren on stby, knowing full well that opinions differ vastly in this colourful world.
Lite
Last edited by Mullah Lite; 24th Feb 2009 at 16:51.