The fact that anyone would think that Qantas regional crews were "substandard" to QF mainline is quite bizarre. QF mainline have a different set of selection criteria, that's all. There is no distinction in the eyes of the public between a 737 bearing a Qantas logo and a Dash 8 bearing a Qantas logo. They're all Qantas - one's a bigger plane going to a major destination, the other's a smaller plane going to a smaller destination.
I wonder how that argument would stand up in court.
QF Management......."Your Honour, the pilots operating our slightly smaller 717 aircraft are not of the same calibre as the pilots crewing our slightly larger 737 aircraft. The incident which happened on the 717 can therefore be explained in terms of the crew being less capable/experienced/educated."
Should the travelling the public be told before they board a QF regional flight, then, that they're travelling on a sub-QF-standard service? Wonder where QF liability would begin and end on this one.
Certainly the current shake-up at Southern might see this myth dispelled as I'm sure there's a strong legal argument for QF mainline to employ the 146 crews.
The 'we're better than you' myth has obviously been perpetrated by QF pilots with large egos who are enjoying huge salaries they need to justify. QF management evidently don't want to bear the costs of retraining crews they've already trained. Hence the drain of pilots off the CRJ.