As an experienced pilot in GA who's hoping in the not to distant future to take the next step in my career (but who doesn't have a spare $30k sitting around to do an ATPL flight test), I find it frustrating to see that most of the airlines in Australia now require applicants to hold an ATPL, even for an FO position. I've just spent 5 minutes looking through the various airline websites, and Jetstar, Cobham, Network, Jetconnect, even RFDS, all require applicants to hold an ATPL. Why do I need to hold an ATPL licence to be an FO, or to fly as PIC in a King Air or a PC12? Surely the fact I have passes in all of the subjects will suffice?
I'm a realist. CASA will not remove the requirement for a flight test to gain an ATPL, and in all honesty, I don't think they need to. The previous system where you could meet all of the flight experience requirements by tooling around in a 210 in the outback wasn't right and needed to be changed but I feel that it may have gone too far.