Another Ansett ???

[Flightsimman]

As reported in news.com.au


Virgin Blue owes staff millions
From: AAP
January 26, 2006

VIRGIN Blue could be forced to pay millions of dollars in back pay to ground staff who failed to receive shift allowances.

The airline accidentally left a shift allowance out of the pay packets of its ground handlers and guest services staff from August 2000 until October 2004.
The Australian Services Union has lodged a claim to have the matter heard in the Australian Industrial Relations Commission in Melbourne on Tuesday.

While ground staff worked an average of eight hours a day, Virgin's pay office miscalculated that staff had worked 7.5 hours, and paid shift allowances accordingly.

The episode had cast a cloud over hopes Virgin Blue had overcome its recent profit slump.



Virgin has declined to comment.

[Fountain Pen]

Wow!!...how can you compare this to Ansett...Ansett was deliberately murdered by Air New Zealand and the Governments of New Zealand and Australia...

All it means is, the workers will have to get back payed by Virgin Blue or its owners...I can't see any problems.....:ok:

[cactusbusdrvr]

And they could make up the pay without paying cash if the unions accepted stock grants.

[MOR]

Ansett was deliberately murdered by Air New Zealand

Yeah, right. Ansett was virtually dead when ANZ got it, all they did was help screw the lid down.

[preset]

Ansett was deliberately murdered by Air New Zealand and the Governments of New Zealand and Australia...

I believe you can lay this one on Mr Abeles & co, aircraft worn out, assets gone etc etc

[Flightsimman]

Ansett was murdered by the government of Australia (& CASA) and Air New Zealand bled them dry !

If only the government allowed SIA to buy some of them it would of have been a different story and that "other" airline would have to have done their business following the old saying: "keep the bastards honest"

:ok:

[RevMan2]

Ansett was badly managed, both prior to and post the Air NZ involvement.

What strikes me as being somewhat strange is that the staff weren't aware of their entitlements and the fact that they were being shortpaid.

No-one claimed or got the union (or staff representatives, if they're not unionised) involved?

[Flightsimman]

When they lost their entitlements the government should of have at least stepped in then !

Why could the government not bail them out and tell AIR NZ to Pi$$ off ??

How many people lost their jobs (not to mention the numbers that took their own lives)!

[nike]

WTF????

Whats with the Virgin Blue newspaper posting if you just wanted to vent some more over Ansett?

[Bumpfoh]

It seems rather unusual that it took so long for the error to be recognised by such a large group of staff.
Or perhaps it was flagged early on by an individual/s and dealt with accordingly by the greenfields management protocols, i.e tuff luck.

This is what the future holds for all Australian workers under the Howard regime! :yuk: :yuk:

[Buster Hyman]

There's plenty of other threads to vent over Ansett & I've seen nothing new here. Same old, same old...

Fancy DJ being 6 years ahead of everyone with the new IR laws...:rolleyes: Maybe, in lieue of payment, the staff get an extra free week on the Staff Island?:ouch:

[rescue 1]

I would agree with Buster - plenty of other chances to discuss Ansett affairs.
My question in this debacle: Why did the staff/union not discover this earlier? 6 years to work out that your pay is incorrect? Come on!!!

[podbreak]

Ansett was deliberately murdered by Air New Zealand and the Governments of New Zealand and Australia...


Rubbish. Ansett was murdered by poor management and outdated policies. The governments simply neglected to throw them a rope (only really commonplace in the states these days). Ansett was virtually gone when ANZ had a dig.

[bushy]

I reckon Ansett was murdered by the Australian Government, because they were operating on overseas routes, and were about to do a deal with Singapore airlines, through Air NZ.
Strange how nasty looking maintenance photos got "Leaked" to the press, by CASA, and killed the airline.

[Fountain Pen]

I will say it again...Ansett was murdered by Air New Zealand, the governments of New Zealand and Australia....and will add... Qantas management was up to its armpits in the medling...

NO ONE FORCED AIR NEW ZEALAND TO BUY ANSETT!!!!...just about every employee in Ansett did not want a bar of Air New Zealand....Rod Eddington wanted to sell the second half of Ansett to SQ....now read my lips!!!....IT WAS AIR NEW ZEALAND THAT STOPPED THAT SALE TO SINGAPORE AIRLINES and payed an extra 150 million to get it from Murdoch...

Last year in London....Rod Eddinton stated in an address...that Ansett would have still been there had it not been for Air New Zealand....

After full aqusition....Air New Zealand got rid of all Ansett management....there was no management because Air New Zealand wanted it all run from Auckland...I know its a little difficult for some of you to understand....

Then Air New Zealand just dumps Ansett after paying a total of nearly 1.2 billion...then the NZ government pours in another 850 million to keep Air New Zealand alive...wow how bright can the New Zealanders be....all that money to get rid of Ansett...

I don't have to tell some of you what would have been the outcome had Singapore Airlines got their hand on Ansett....so the Australian government saved Qantas' arse as well at the same time...and all at Ansetts expence and its employees....:}

[D.O.G]

Sorry Mr Flightsimman about the hi-jack. However one question I have for the crier of innocence is…. Why didn’t Air New Zealand sell Ansett to SQ after Sept. 11? Even at a bargain price they would have made more than ditching it. Think about it, No compensation to pay administrators and better yet no stink. Or did they deliberately want AN. dead at all costs.

[E.P.]

Well said Fountain pen.

The large tree that was Ansett was not healthy, therefore it needed some dead branches trimmed off and a new gardener in the form of SIA.

Instead it was cut off at ground level (i.e NZ stopped ALL operations)
and poisioned beyond recovery.

The folly now is that Howard is sucking up to SIA to buy into QF after he directly stopped SIA buying Ansett!!:yuk:

[Fountain Pen]

E.P. you obviously are a bit of a thinker...not only the money I just mentioned above...Air New Zealand handed over another 150 million...OK another 150 million on the proviso that the Howard government don't come after them...so to John Howard Ansett was just a nothing...but it was not John Howard that made that decision...it was MAX MOORE-WILTON!!!! with John (fcuk**g) Anderson.....as Howard was in NY on Sept 11th...John Anderson was Deputy PM at the time....

So the New Zealanders as a collective paid out close to 2.2 billion in total to get rid of Ansett...One would think that if you paid out that kind of money you would sell and recoup some.....BUT NO!!!...not the sheep shaggers...you see...if Air New Zealand could not have Ansett...then NO ONE will have Ansett is the ratioanale.....because Dixon and QF were up to the necks in it as well and Dixon had both Anderson and Moore-Wilton in his pockets...

Ansett in the hands of Singapore scared the ****e out of all of them....I remember seeing Dr Chong's face as he could not belive that Air New Zealand stymied the deal as Air New Zealand had the pre-emptive right....

SQ was still interested while the terminals were available...but the message from Anderson to SQ was to keep your hands off and stay away...meanwhile the Bracks government from Victoria was confusing all in Singapore as they were up there to encourage SQ to buy Ansett.....what a lovelly open and honest government we have in this country.....all I can say may they burn in Hell...and that moron Helen Clarke saying on TV..and I quote....."before we bought that lemon"...well who the fcuk had a gun at their heads to do that...may I ask anyone...who had the Gun....No one......just stupid national pride got in the way......:}

[bushy]

Many years ago the NZ govt, and the Australian Govt signed a n "open skies" agreement allowing each to operate in the others skies.
I wondered why NZ did not follow through, and start operating in Australia.The answer appeared quite simple after a bit of thought.
When Compass tried to get started they found that it was almost impossible to get terminal space, or slots. and the FAC had off loaded all the terminal space, and land where terminals could be built, to the existing airlines. Compass finally came unstuck, when a Govt agency parked vehicles to prevent the movement of their aircraft, saying they were owed money for landing fees. A great and effective publicity stunt, that resulted in public mistrust of the airline, and a rush of creditors. The airline was dead.

The kiwis had witnessed all this, and were not about to walk into a similar trap, so they sat and thought. And they bought a very sick Ansett, getting the teminals, slots, and infrastructure, aeroplanes, clientle and all, very quickly.

Ansett was an international airline, beginning to compete with the holy Q. And air NZ was about to do a deal with singapore, to get capital

But the kiwis had forgotten about the underarm bowling lesson, and were about to see more of it. Another huge publicity stunt was coming, which would destroy Ansett.

[7gcbc]

There is nothing noble or honest in business.

[pcpilot2]

But the kiwis had forgotten about the underarm bowling lesson, and were about to see more of it. Another huge publicity stunt was coming, which would destroy Ansett.Which was?.Not 9/11 surely.

[Fountain Pen]

Yes that's right Bushy...Singapore wanted 49% of Air New Zealand before it would pour in the money....meanwhile Anderson was lobbying Helen Clarke not to sell....and I would not use lobbying I think he really put the heavy on New Zealand government...and the reason was that Dixon wanted it that way...

Moore-Wilton got his reward by being appointed to the Sydney Airports Corp....all lovely secret deals as now Sydney Airports could break any deal that was in place with Ansett and strike new deals...to the point where Virgin was taking Sydney Airports to court because of unfair parctices against them to the advantage of Qantas....

Now more rewards for Moore-Wilton...as he is now in the stratosphere of the Macquarie bank...as reward for all the dishonesty...Anderson quits for who knows what real reason and so it goes on....meanwhile many in Ansett had lost their careers, and dreams where just thrown out the window....to a legacy of over 40 people commited suicides...and families torn apart...meanwhile Dixon pockets millions of dollars every year as he screws his employees for efficiency gains....

[MOR]

Love your revisionist view of history there Fountain Pen.

Nobody forced the sale of Ansett to Air NZ from the Aussie side either, the fact is that they were comprehensively lied to about the state of Ansett. Whatever else might have been at stake, they bought an airline that was on it's last legs, possibly beyond recovery, whilst being led to believe that it was viable. The cost of keeping it going was almost certainly many times the cost of closing the doors.

All this saga really proves is the depraved nature of business in Australia. Ansett SHOULD have been protected by it's previous owners and the Aussie government. You can hardly blame Air NZ for trying to extricate themselves from a bad deal.

And as for managing Ansett from Auckland... you seriously expected Air NZ to leave in place a duplicate management for Ansett? You only need ONE management, having two is extraordinarily wasteful.

And why you think that Air NZ should have virtually sold themselves into foreign ownership in order to save Ansett, is beyond me.

The responsibility for the demise of Ansett lies firmly on Australian shores.

[Pete Conrad]

MOR, Whats the matter, you overshadowed by the big beautifull country and way of life three hours flight time to the west of you are you? wasn't it the narrow minded greed of Breirly who was so keen to pursue the first right of purchase for the remaining 50% of Ansett? I'm happy to stand corrected if not. And by the way, things are still not so swimingly with your national carrier are they? Now reviewing the domestic network, laying off hunderds of engineers etc. The best Air New Zealand will ever do is play catch up to the rest of the world, indeed the mighty white rat. Sooner or later Air New Zealand will come running to QANTAS cap in hand looking for them to invest in them and save their scrawny ass. Yes, thats right, an Australian company.

New Zealand incompetence, dithering and plain small penis syndrome is just as much to blame for the demise of Ansett pal.

[Woomera]

You lot never cease to amaze me! Thread starts out about VB backpay, and degenerates into a slanging match post-mortem.

You all need to learn a lesson in bulletin board ettiquette: Either stay on the thread topic, or face thread closures:suspect:

It's up to you:*

Woomera (Eastern States)