Hi Geoff, On sunrise you stated that Qantas engineers were amongst the highest paid engineers in the world, how did you come by that? Off the top of my head i would say that the average lame earns approximately 110k to 120k which includes shift loading, of course there will be some who earn more, is this based on the strong Aussie dollar? The way i look at it, it's disposable income that matters most, if i was living in a country where housing prices were cheap and cost of living was a lot less you wouldn't expect a high wage, but you have to look at the median wage of other trades ie. plumbers carpenters etc. [ who if make a mistake is not usually life threatening ], take away the shift loading, and you'll find that we are behind. Shift loading brings our wage up, but as has been said before how would you like to have to work nightshift , public holidays, weekends etc. also we find it difficult to take leave on these days as 90% of the time it's rejected due insufficient manpower. In my opinion we work very hard in very trying circumstances with all the obstacles [company made ] put in front of us to get the aircraft out safely, and i for one would forget any payrise if as a trade off we could get rid of all the idiots that are trying to pull Qantas engineering down and then let us get back to doing what we do best and return us to the world's best and safest.
Rant over.