A source said that Oldmeadow Consulting believes that QF management have missed the opportunity to hammer the QF engineers and pilots (thanks to the successful PIA undertaken by the ALAEA a couple of years ago). They are not flush with cash to undertake a protracted dispute and they don't want to burn a number of premium passengers as they did last time.
Obviously, they are not going to admit this which is why they make statements like,
A large number of these claims are simply unachievable for Qantas, and to implement them would have a serious impact on the long-term viability of Qantas Engineering as a whole. We made these concerns known to the ALAEA during the meeting.
Essentially, they are playing poker holding zip in their hand.