'holic,
I attended a Roadshow given by JB a while back (2005?) where he showed us a chart of selected legacy airline's gross salary for Captains. I remember the likes of Lufthansa and BA were at the top, SIA down the bottom and Qantas was almost exactly in the middle. Since that time our pay hasn't kept up with CPI, so unless those other airlines have taken significant pay cuts, I'd imagine we're still near the middle of the pack.
In 2005 the $A bought about 42 pence today it is 65 pence. So all else being equal a Qantas pilot would be getting 55% more in GBP, this undoubtedly has closed a lot of the gap to BA pilots.
I take it that you think the seniority system promotes mediocrity. I find it amusing that in the very same sentence you find it palatable that a mediocre CEO is not penalised for poor performance.
AJ is penalised for poor performance - check what it says in the annual report (although if you earn $3m maybe $1m less due to performance isn't that great a penalty). As for seniority, I'm not convinced it is a great system for either employer or employee, danger is that you end up with disenchanted employees that want to leave but can't afford to.