It was actually the High Court in London, the principal being challenged was Last In First Out when using compulsory redundancies. It all started with Rolls Royce v Unite Union when RR wanted to 'select' who would be made redundant using length of service as just one variable. When my airline was threatening compulsory redundancies the union (BALPA) wanted a LIFO application using the seniority list. The airline wanted to be able to make pilots redundant from specific fleets regardless of time served. Their argument was that 'training' was required to move a senior 747 Captain (dying fleet) over to the A320 (expanding fleet) and therefore it was classified as a 'different job'. So young pilot with 2 years in the job could be retained over senior skipper. The case never came to a conclusion as the Judge on the second day said that with the above case in mind that it could only have one outcome, he then asked the union lawyer if we wanted to continue with the action with it in mind that he was not going to overturn the previous decision. So case over and the airline won the right to treat different aircraft types as 'different' roles within the same airline. No since all this PC garbage is the responsibility of young graduate policy analysts who want to make everything 'fair' I can well imagine someone in the immigration department going 'of course this airline should be given some 457 visas, there are NO suitable candidates for this role as it is a new type in this country and therefore a new job that no one here is qualified for'.
So in answer to the above, if an airline was to purchase a load of 'chinese', 'russain' aircraft then I could see the airline being granted visas to employ people from overseas who have this 'on' their licence.
As I said, it sucks but this is the way the world is going. You can imagine this being of great interest to airlines, why have to type rate people when you can hire someone with experience. Why get rid of the cheap young cadet or first officer when you can make an expensive senior captain or first officer redundant first.