I think yesterdays events demonstrate that Olivia Wirth is an exceptionally dangerous individual when she gets her act together.
She may present poorly on TV, but remember her main job is the orchestration and manipulation of the mass media to the Qantas 'message'. Yesterday was an a-grade example of this occurring.
It started with Joe Hildebrand at midnight exactly and by 8am the key message "Qantas Pilots earn more then the PM" had resonated across all media outlets. Its still on the SMH online website this morning.
All the usual right wing suspects piled in on message, and we are now familiar with how Martin Ferguson has disgracefully caved in to his big business mates as well.
Don't get me wrong, I am supporting the PIA with every ounce of my energy, but I think that in a number of areas AIPA has got it's strategy dangerously wrong.
To Joyce and his organ grinder (Clifford) ultimately this dispute is not about money. If you read the text of Joyce's many speeches since Nov last year, he almost always mentions something like "We will not allow the unions to dictate how we run the business".
This type of theme (whilst false in fact) is like a red rag to a bull at the big end of town. Groups such as the Business Council of Australia believe Australia should be a thinly failed Plutocracy where the occasional democratic principle inconveniently creeps in. There is no place for worker or individual influence on proceedings
Joyce's peer group, the other big business CEO's, will be rallying around him, make no mistake. Because the issue now is wider then cost, the issue now is the implication that someone other then an executive is allowed to have any sort of control over the business.
Having the Tourism Council, the BCA and now the Labour Party in his back pocket means that if Joyce stays on message he will ultimately prevail.
Joyce is an emotional character. He is prone to inflammatory remarks and clearly sees himself as part of a new generation of union busters that the extreme right wing believes Australia desperately needs. By attacking him and the EXCO personally, AIPA's strategy appears to be to try and break Joyce and cause him to resign.
The problem is though, with the whole Australian business community, and now the government behind them, Joyce and Clifford have basically been given the justification and the green light to run the airline into the ground over the issue of 'union influence'.
Unlike other employees who have a significant emotional investment in the Airline, these two are just happy to use the business as an ideological plaything.
Thats what makes this situation so dangerous. You cannot reason with people who make decisions not based on reality, but on ideology and misguided principle alone.