Alan Joyce Inside Business ABC 10:00 am Sun
"BB" care to expand on yr beliefs that learning to fly a prop is easier than a jet?
'Capt Stoobs' I agree with yr comments. That area Regional flying prop work can be a very high workload indeed.
Cadets have their place in the future of aviation as there is simply not enough of the traditional pilots coming up thru the ranks. Perhaps a cadet-ship with a higher level of training is the answer. Around 200/300 hrs to me isn't enough. The real question is how much (hrs wise) is enough?
Pilots with many 1000's of hrs still fly perfectly serviceable planes into the side of a hill. Hrs is one thing, exposure takes time & airmanship takes a life time!
Wmk2
'Capt Stoobs' I agree with yr comments. That area Regional flying prop work can be a very high workload indeed.
Cadets have their place in the future of aviation as there is simply not enough of the traditional pilots coming up thru the ranks. Perhaps a cadet-ship with a higher level of training is the answer. Around 200/300 hrs to me isn't enough. The real question is how much (hrs wise) is enough?
Pilots with many 1000's of hrs still fly perfectly serviceable planes into the side of a hill. Hrs is one thing, exposure takes time & airmanship takes a life time!
Wmk2
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1500 hr rule comes in - all cadets moved to qantaslink...
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Inflight Mag!
Would the reason for the weak interview have anything to do with the fact that Alan Kohler does the "Talking Business" segment on Qradio (advertised pg 141) or the very large plug for his new book on page 34 of the Inflight Mag (July)?
Shame, shame, shame
Shame, shame, shame
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Qantas management threatens “ruthless” restructure
By Terry Cook
1 August 2011
Qantas CEO Alan Joyce declared at last week’s 2011 Aviation Outlook Summit that the Australian airline’s restructuring strategy—which he had previously described as “ruthless”—would be completed by August 24. His provocative speech was delivered just after Qantas pilots voted overwhelmingly in support of industrial action over enterprise bargaining agreement (EBA) claims.
The Australian and International Pilots Association (AIPA) and three other unions—the Australian Licensed Aircraft Engineers Association (ALAEA), the Transport Workers Union (TWU) and the National Union of Workers (NUW)—want “job security” clauses in all new enterprise agreements with the carrier. These clauses would stipulate that crews employed on Qantas-badged flights or on overseas subsidiaries operating Qantas services, or ground staff contracted to undertake Qantas work, receive the same wages and entitlements as the airline’s mainline employees.
Joyce made clear that these demands were unacceptable and that the planned changes to the airline’s “business model” were “not optional”. Qantas’s restructuring plan is in line with the drive by airlines around the world to maintain “international competitiveness” following the eruption of the global financial crisis in 2008.
Over the past three years, US airlines have axed over 54,000 jobs, or 16 percent of their workforces, while tens of thousands of jobs have been eliminated by European carriers, including British Airways, Lufthansa, Aer Lingus, Air France, Alitalia and TAP Portugal. Increasingly, carriers have also used low-cost offshoots to drive down working conditions and wage levels.
Joyce underscored the magnitude of Qantas’s planned restructuring, saying it would include a review of “non-performing assets” and an increase in the carrier’s “participation in the Asian opportunity”.
Qantas intends to establish an Asian-based full-service premium carrier and is laying the basis for the eventual relocation of the bulk of its core operations to Asia in order to exploit cheaper wages and maintenance costs.
Qantas’s low-cost subsidiary JetStar, which already flies to and from Australia via Singapore using lower cost Singapore-based pilots, is also planning new routes to Beijing, Ninbo and Hanoi and additional flights to six other Asian destinations. Jetconnect, the Australian carrier’s wholly-owned New Zealand-based subsidiary, pays lower New Zealand wages and conditions to operate budget flights in and out of Australia.
Some of the conditions imposed on JetStar’s Thailand-based flight attendants were revealed on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation “Lateline” television program last Wednesday. Attendants hired through a Thailand body-hire agency, which is 37 percent owned by Qantas, are paid just $258 per month, with an additional $7 per hour during flights. They receive no sick leave and only half the annual leave of their Australian counterparts, and can be made to work 17-hour shifts.
In his speech, Joyce also signalled sweeping maintenance job cuts. He claimed that the airline’s maintenance costs were “among the highest in the world” and that new generation aircraft did not require “the same degree of intensive, repetitive maintenance”.
The unions, Joyce continued, were “simply out of touch and trying to block our use of new business models.” They should “understand the simple logic that new technologies require new work practices.” Two days earlier, JetStar CEO Bruce Buchanan declared that Qantas’s international long-haul pilots’ salaries were “exorbitant” and “out of whack with the market”.
Joyce’s claim that the unions were blocking the company’s new business models is absurd. There is no doubt that the airline unions will play the main role in suppressing the opposition of workers to the company’s attacks on jobs and conditions—using the Labor government’s Fair Work Australia to prevent any unified action.
Like their counterparts elsewhere, the airline unions, which function as industrial policemen, have consistently rubber-stamped company cuts to jobs and working conditions. In 2008, for example, the airline unions endorsed a 3 percent pay ceiling, cuts in conditions of licensed aircraft engineers and long-haul cabin crews, and the outsourcing many baggage handling and other ground staff jobs. The union deal paved the way for Qantas to eliminate 3,340 jobs, or almost 10 percent of the airline’s workforce, over the following 12 months.
The response of the Qantas unions to the latest round of threats and attacks by management has been to divert workers’ mounting concerns into a series of harmless protests while appealing to the company for negotiations in order to better implement its requirements.
Following the pilots’ vote for industrial action AIPA vice-president Richard Woodward assured management that the union would do its “best to minimise any disruptions”. The first “action” taken by pilots consisted of reading a short statement to passengers during flights explaining the current dispute.
Woodward admitted that the union had offered substantial concessions during negotiations, including an 11 percent increase in flying hours and “rostering efficiencies”. These changes will increase pilot workloads.
Two weeks ago, the ALAEA staged a series of token 60-second stoppages while directing two engineers, one in Melbourne and one in Perth, to only use their left hands to do maintenance.
This stunt was preceded in June by a union offer to provide strike-breakers during two-hour rolling stoppages. Those stoppages were then called off to allow Qantas to ferry Tiger Airways passengers after that low-cost carrier was grounded by the Civil Aviation Safety Authority over safety issues.
ALAEA national secretary Steve Purvinas revealed that the union’s decision—in effect, to help Qantas profit from Tiger’s misfortune—followed discussions with the government of Prime Minister Julia Gillard. His remarks gave an indication of how closely the unions are working with the government, as well as management, to stifle the opposition of Qantas workers to the company’s onslaught.
Limited 24-hour stoppages by 300 NUW members in Qantas warehouses in Victoria, New South Wales, Queensland, Western Australia and South Australia over the past two weeks have had no affect on the airline’s domestic and international operations.
As Qantas prepares to unveil its “ruthless” measures, the principal concern of the trade unions is to appeal to management to accept that the union apparatuses are the best instruments for imposing the company’s demands and keeping workers in check.
Qantas workers cannot defeat the next stage of management’s assault while they remain in the stranglehold of the unions, but only in a rebellion against these organisations and the Fair Work Australia straitjacket they enforce. Inevitably that will involve a political struggle against the Labor government and a turn to other sections of workers in Australia and internationally. Such a struggle must be guided by a socialist perspective to unite airline workers globally against the companies and the private profit system.
By Terry Cook
1 August 2011
Qantas CEO Alan Joyce declared at last week’s 2011 Aviation Outlook Summit that the Australian airline’s restructuring strategy—which he had previously described as “ruthless”—would be completed by August 24. His provocative speech was delivered just after Qantas pilots voted overwhelmingly in support of industrial action over enterprise bargaining agreement (EBA) claims.
The Australian and International Pilots Association (AIPA) and three other unions—the Australian Licensed Aircraft Engineers Association (ALAEA), the Transport Workers Union (TWU) and the National Union of Workers (NUW)—want “job security” clauses in all new enterprise agreements with the carrier. These clauses would stipulate that crews employed on Qantas-badged flights or on overseas subsidiaries operating Qantas services, or ground staff contracted to undertake Qantas work, receive the same wages and entitlements as the airline’s mainline employees.
Joyce made clear that these demands were unacceptable and that the planned changes to the airline’s “business model” were “not optional”. Qantas’s restructuring plan is in line with the drive by airlines around the world to maintain “international competitiveness” following the eruption of the global financial crisis in 2008.
Over the past three years, US airlines have axed over 54,000 jobs, or 16 percent of their workforces, while tens of thousands of jobs have been eliminated by European carriers, including British Airways, Lufthansa, Aer Lingus, Air France, Alitalia and TAP Portugal. Increasingly, carriers have also used low-cost offshoots to drive down working conditions and wage levels.
Joyce underscored the magnitude of Qantas’s planned restructuring, saying it would include a review of “non-performing assets” and an increase in the carrier’s “participation in the Asian opportunity”.
Qantas intends to establish an Asian-based full-service premium carrier and is laying the basis for the eventual relocation of the bulk of its core operations to Asia in order to exploit cheaper wages and maintenance costs.
Qantas’s low-cost subsidiary JetStar, which already flies to and from Australia via Singapore using lower cost Singapore-based pilots, is also planning new routes to Beijing, Ninbo and Hanoi and additional flights to six other Asian destinations. Jetconnect, the Australian carrier’s wholly-owned New Zealand-based subsidiary, pays lower New Zealand wages and conditions to operate budget flights in and out of Australia.
Some of the conditions imposed on JetStar’s Thailand-based flight attendants were revealed on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation “Lateline” television program last Wednesday. Attendants hired through a Thailand body-hire agency, which is 37 percent owned by Qantas, are paid just $258 per month, with an additional $7 per hour during flights. They receive no sick leave and only half the annual leave of their Australian counterparts, and can be made to work 17-hour shifts.
In his speech, Joyce also signalled sweeping maintenance job cuts. He claimed that the airline’s maintenance costs were “among the highest in the world” and that new generation aircraft did not require “the same degree of intensive, repetitive maintenance”.
The unions, Joyce continued, were “simply out of touch and trying to block our use of new business models.” They should “understand the simple logic that new technologies require new work practices.” Two days earlier, JetStar CEO Bruce Buchanan declared that Qantas’s international long-haul pilots’ salaries were “exorbitant” and “out of whack with the market”.
Joyce’s claim that the unions were blocking the company’s new business models is absurd. There is no doubt that the airline unions will play the main role in suppressing the opposition of workers to the company’s attacks on jobs and conditions—using the Labor government’s Fair Work Australia to prevent any unified action.
Like their counterparts elsewhere, the airline unions, which function as industrial policemen, have consistently rubber-stamped company cuts to jobs and working conditions. In 2008, for example, the airline unions endorsed a 3 percent pay ceiling, cuts in conditions of licensed aircraft engineers and long-haul cabin crews, and the outsourcing many baggage handling and other ground staff jobs. The union deal paved the way for Qantas to eliminate 3,340 jobs, or almost 10 percent of the airline’s workforce, over the following 12 months.
The response of the Qantas unions to the latest round of threats and attacks by management has been to divert workers’ mounting concerns into a series of harmless protests while appealing to the company for negotiations in order to better implement its requirements.
Following the pilots’ vote for industrial action AIPA vice-president Richard Woodward assured management that the union would do its “best to minimise any disruptions”. The first “action” taken by pilots consisted of reading a short statement to passengers during flights explaining the current dispute.
Woodward admitted that the union had offered substantial concessions during negotiations, including an 11 percent increase in flying hours and “rostering efficiencies”. These changes will increase pilot workloads.
Two weeks ago, the ALAEA staged a series of token 60-second stoppages while directing two engineers, one in Melbourne and one in Perth, to only use their left hands to do maintenance.
This stunt was preceded in June by a union offer to provide strike-breakers during two-hour rolling stoppages. Those stoppages were then called off to allow Qantas to ferry Tiger Airways passengers after that low-cost carrier was grounded by the Civil Aviation Safety Authority over safety issues.
ALAEA national secretary Steve Purvinas revealed that the union’s decision—in effect, to help Qantas profit from Tiger’s misfortune—followed discussions with the government of Prime Minister Julia Gillard. His remarks gave an indication of how closely the unions are working with the government, as well as management, to stifle the opposition of Qantas workers to the company’s onslaught.
Limited 24-hour stoppages by 300 NUW members in Qantas warehouses in Victoria, New South Wales, Queensland, Western Australia and South Australia over the past two weeks have had no affect on the airline’s domestic and international operations.
As Qantas prepares to unveil its “ruthless” measures, the principal concern of the trade unions is to appeal to management to accept that the union apparatuses are the best instruments for imposing the company’s demands and keeping workers in check.
Qantas workers cannot defeat the next stage of management’s assault while they remain in the stranglehold of the unions, but only in a rebellion against these organisations and the Fair Work Australia straitjacket they enforce. Inevitably that will involve a political struggle against the Labor government and a turn to other sections of workers in Australia and internationally. Such a struggle must be guided by a socialist perspective to unite airline workers globally against the companies and the private profit system.
The preceding was an [un]paid political announcement from the World Socialist Web Site.
Trotsky lives on, apparently.
Trotsky lives on, apparently.
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Cadets have their place in market which is struggling to create candidates . Putting low time pilots in the RHS of either a Jet transport or a Turbo prop is a bad idea and the travelling public deserve better . To say it it is harder / easier to learn to fly a jet or turbo prop is nonsense . They are both different . I have done both . The point is the skills learned to be a competent pilot accrue over time . They are a combination of experience and exposure to those that have been flying for a long time and are professional and good at their jobs . The mindless turnstile managers who require little experience to do their jobs poorly do not accept that experience and competence are desirable attributes in a professional otherwise they would have to disqualify themselves from their own positions .
Cadet pilots seem to do well in an environment allowing them to sit back and learn from those more experienced . The Second officer role is perfect for this . To all cadets I am not putting you down . Most continue on to have very successful careers . It is important for our profession to accept that time is an important factor in developing into a well rounded professional pilot . To rush this process will create an inferior product , regardless of the calibre of the individual concerned.
Cadet pilots seem to do well in an environment allowing them to sit back and learn from those more experienced . The Second officer role is perfect for this . To all cadets I am not putting you down . Most continue on to have very successful careers . It is important for our profession to accept that time is an important factor in developing into a well rounded professional pilot . To rush this process will create an inferior product , regardless of the calibre of the individual concerned.
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My comments on the cadets was based on two things only...
The senate enquiry recommendation was to put it's 1500 Hr requirement on jet transport aircraft... If they can't be on a jet where are they going? Well geewhiz guess that would be a prop...
Secondly sick of seeing "advanced" cadets... Oh by advanced do you mean licenced pilots being taken advantage of... IMHO they would be less likely to think they are in a better position if they had to fork out money to be in the back seat or in a prop... Nothing at all against turboprops vs jets etc... Just the mindset of a few... And the recommendations If adopted by industry.
All pie in the sky and tongue in cheek!
Anyway back to Joyce and clear lack of journalism and media scrutineering... COME ON the general public deserve better. If your going to do fluff pieces at least make them entertaining...
The senate enquiry recommendation was to put it's 1500 Hr requirement on jet transport aircraft... If they can't be on a jet where are they going? Well geewhiz guess that would be a prop...
Secondly sick of seeing "advanced" cadets... Oh by advanced do you mean licenced pilots being taken advantage of... IMHO they would be less likely to think they are in a better position if they had to fork out money to be in the back seat or in a prop... Nothing at all against turboprops vs jets etc... Just the mindset of a few... And the recommendations If adopted by industry.
All pie in the sky and tongue in cheek!
Anyway back to Joyce and clear lack of journalism and media scrutineering... COME ON the general public deserve better. If your going to do fluff pieces at least make them entertaining...
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The crazy thing is only just over 10 years ago the SAL requirements meant you had to have 1500 hours to be in the seat of any RPT aircraft . This has been overlooked as the change away from this is only relatively recent .
