WARNING: Outsider opinion follows ! Agreement is neither expected nor required.
Alleged pilot “shortages” (an undefined term) today are the result of decisions made up until today rather than the existence or lack of a suitable future pilot supply yet to hit the market…or NOT hit the market
Statements like these below are the typical response from management, i.e., blame everything on someone or something else (no phenomenon is to ill defined or fuzzy to fit the situation):
"One of the biggest issues for us is we are not getting enough pilots coming through the training schools.
The number of pilots coming through is simply not enough to supply the airlines if they continue to grow."
[FWIW, the same allegations are routinely made Up Here where we have vast groves of pilot trees with low-hanging fruit, particularly at the legacy level.]
As merely an observer, I would like to see independent data from someone without anything to lose/gain whatever that data might show. Statements from airline execs and even unions don’t fit that criterion.
Further, I’d ask how many ultimately usable NZ candidates are either viewed and rejected or ignored outright because they aren’t at the moment ideal in the eyes of a company.
Every airline understandably wants ideal people but if there’s a “shortage” threatening the business plan, and management intend to keep that business plan viable, perhaps a company would take some candidates who could be mentored and/or brought along in the monitored, structured environment of an airline and in effect create their own “ideal” result. I’ll bet airlines in NZ are perfectly able to do just that; no one arrives on the property as a finished product nor so they retire as such.
Yes, there might be some people dropped along the way but how’s what management are doing now working for them if they allege a “shortage” ? Something about doing the same thing and expecting a different result comes to mind.
With a lack of reliable Big Picture data I remain a skeptic on the whole issue...but am willing to be educated.