SSC,
The airline's reached a transition point, there's no doubt about it. Over the next few months in particular they'll be making some important decisions about their short and longer term direction, including fleet planning, and once they have this sorted out they can build a recruitment plan.
There's no reason why QF mainline can't go back to a growth plan from the end of the year, but I guess it'd need to make some reductions in across-the-board costs and methods of operation before it does.
I'd say we'll know more in a few months when fleet and business planning post-SARS has been completed.
Each year's cadet courses are usually half-half Level 1 and 2. Not sure why NVFR's now a requirement - that might well be a requirement from the participating schools rather than QF, but I really wouldn't know. There are no quotas for each course - they'll take as many people (L1 or 2) as meet the standard they require, and as such the actual numbers and ratios will vary from year to year.
As for the Sep review date, not only will things be a fair bit clearer then from a company point of view, but a new Chief Pilot will start in the first couple of weeks in Sep. As he ultimately gives final employment approval to all pilot applicants, whether DE or cadet, they might well be waiting for him to give the programme the final ok in the light of the general industry situation, and the company recruitment plan, at the time.
Are you applying this year, SSC?
Cheers, ED
(All the above is speculation and general information based on what I've read/can gather. Someone closer to things might well be able to shed a bit more light on both the cadet programme and the current company situation).