I'll be willing to bet that if QF bought some new iteration of a 777 and placed it on a wet leased outsourced crew arrangement, offering DE commands based in Australia, they would be inundated with type endorsed applications.
Whilst I totally agree that IR would love to try it on how exactly could they do it?
Fair Work Act prohibits it
Contract prohibits it
Call the airline 'terminal' again?
They will play the same two card trick with the 737 replacement; the usual cry of 'A320 to be crewed by the Botswana second XI on food stamps or Jetstar (insert subsidiary) etc. However it would be really interesting to see the argument in court on a transfer of flying 'no disadvantage' Fair Work Act test. Will the pilots believe the sky is falling again??
Furthermore, the 777 would largely replace the existing LH fleets, so I would say go ahead and try it, it is an idle threat. Redundancy payments alone are staggering and for what purpose to deny a career path? There are plenty of career paths outside the group, Qantas is a spent force and idle rhetoric may not hold sway much longer
As framer correctly asserts, there is a tipping point and for many pilots a commuting contract is becoming an increasingly viable alternative to waiting for the formless ( don't spook the market) 50 aircraft Qantas order...