Still flying after Ansett - Vol 3 - if allowed.

[vhxxxx]

The meetings were always a democratic technique Wizofoz! There was never such dramatic events as you described. There was , although , a more sinister technique applied. So called mates that wouldnt even piss on you in the crew room before the dispute, all of a sudden became your best mate during it.

[Rind Skin]

Strange how we get this warning on D&G to behave and be nice. But people like amos who happen to be on a particular side can make posts that "persistently flame" and the like. So what does an 89er or supporter of 89er or in amos's case, wannabe 89er have to do to get kicked out of here?

Amos adds nothing constructive to ANY debate but demonstrates its gross ignorance and contemptible nature by making comments like, and I quote:

"sod off tosser"
"Get a real kick out of setting up and sucking in..."
"you are a complete and utter twit!!"
"...What an idiot you are!!!"
"...puppets name is, to sod off..."
"Jeez!!...what a pathetic twit you are..."
etc

Plus innumerable, highly articulate posts using the word "scab", obviously one of its personal favourites.

Question: Would anyone supporting the other side live as long posting senseless abuse (flaming) ? I tend to think not.

[Eastwest Loco]

Now here is some food for thought for you ALL.

Back in the days when Brian G ran Eeenie Weenie, and the F28's were only just on fleet, there was a TN/AN Pilots strike.

The EW guys decided as a whole not to go out, as it was not of relevance to them and as a generality they loved the Company and their lot in life.

The 6pm rush out of TN gate 10 at Tulla consisted of 2 F27's rolling line astern - one to ABX to connect the F28 to SYD and one to Tas, beautifully orchestrated for the 6.30 news.

The threats started to roll in. Not to the Pilots themselves, but to family members after the pilot had departed home to fly their blocks. It was not just a handful of instances either, as I am sure will be attested to by EW crews of the time. Pilots calling and threatening the families of fellow pilots.

My late mate Peter Watson - ex everything to do with freight,and then EW Cargo and I were walking back to Gate 10 jut passing block 5 which was the TN Loco hideout with a couple of crew heading down to their aeroplane, when a couple of TN flight deck crew appeared ahead of them. They had gained security access on their ID cards, and were attempting to menace the crew.

Watto and I stepped in and offered new and FOC dental patterns and the threat sudenly went away.

This was well pre '89, and I knew both the TN captains involved as they were both ex F27. I later learned that one had gone back and the other stayed out and went overseas.

My point?

I am sure you all consider this to have been unacceptable behaviour, but wait! One was from each side of the fence, and who knows who might have been conducting the terror campaign on wives and families from the anonymity of a phone box.

It was perpetrated, in a visible and open sense by compatriots who later wound up on either side of a much more serious dispute.

How on earth you can justify slagging off at each other 14 years after a dark time for all of us, with a past that included such behaviour as mentioned above is of wonder to me.

For those in the room who were involved in that dispute, I would like to think that none of you were involved in the low acts perpetrated then, but be aware that there is good and bad on both sides of '89,as I am sure some are still out there somewhere. The king of the "embelished" log book was an '89er. The worst Commercial Pilot I have ever had the displeasure of despatching tried to go back, but management knocked it on the head.

I am not without blame either. It is amazing what you can do to the following day's consolidated plan with a bad attitude towards TN (who were giving us hell) ,and a programmers sign-in.

Please look within your own ranks and assess, before you have a go at former mates rather than some that allegedly stand beside you. The vast majority on both sides are good and decent people, but be aware there are some that you would not let slide out of your peripheral vision as well.

Best all

EWL

[permFO]

EWL - Its interesting that no one from the more aggreived side of the fence in this "discussion" have picked up on your point about the many businesses that went bankrupt because of their actions. Its all about "we was robbed" and the the hurt that was done to them and not a mention about the hurt that was done to many, many innocent individuals all because of a 29% pay increase. I also note a reference to the shearers strike in the 1890's and how the strike breakers were never forgiven. The irony in that is that strike was also a catalyst for the formation of the ALP! Also the BIG difference between 89 and Australias military past is that the military fought for their countries national interest and not for self interest.

[Eastwest Loco]

Your points are well taken PermFO, but what I dread now is the incoming.

'89 was the year we ALL lost.

A great deal more than just wages and material things.

EWL

[permFO]

On that I think most will agree. With the advent of low cost carriers and the current downsizing then pilots wages and conditions will be under considerable pressure. The pendulum I think will ultimately swing the other way but not for at least 10 years by which time there just won't be the flow through of self funded pilots and airlines are once again going to have to pay to attract enough people.

[leftfrontside]

That last post of yours leaves me speechless EWL, what were or who were you in a past life.

Sister Teresa!!!!!!!!

How many times do you have to be told

I DON"T WANT THOSE A......H.......s IN MY LIFE EVER, AGAIN

I have got on with mine THERE WILL BE NO RECONCILIATION and I don't need some Psalm singing SOB like you telling me and my compatriates to "kiss and make up"

Get a life EWL

[Rind Skin]

leftfrontside sums it up, really. So why does this thread persist other than as sport for some?

It's plain to see that the 89-ers aren't willing to forgive or forget. And the scabs can't un-do what they did, even if they wanted to. So who cares about discussing it anymore?

Why is EWL pushing this whole thing? Is it a feel-good mission? Give it up and move on to something worth pursuing.

Earlier references to letting this thread go on because "progress is being made" or "we're getting somewhere" or whatever are laughable. It won't end until both sides have been planted. Even then, children warped by endless indoctrination might even prepetuate it. I think this being allowed to continue here is just a way to let one side get their kicks just a little longer through childish torment.

[Wiley]

OK, permFO, I’ll give it a try.

It’s undeniable that the Airline Dispute was the coup de grace for many businesses that did go under in 89-90, but nothing is as simple as it seems. Many people in the tourist industry, particularly in North Queensland, blame ‘the pilots’ for their businesses’ demise, but a closer look will show that many were in serious trouble long before the Dispute, not because of anything the pilots did, but because of poor reading of the tourist market. All too many of the hoteliers had aimed for the top end of the market, providing four and five star accommodation to what turned out to be a majority back packer/economy tourist clientele. In the months before August 89, I heard of average occupancy rates of 30% and some as low as 10% in some of the resort hotels in Cairns (not to forget “the pilots’ good friend”, Keith Williams’ Hamilton Island Resort and other resorts in the Whitsundays).

Many proprietors and businessmen were on very slim operating margins, (like many are at the best of times, but 89 before the Dispute was much worse than usual for many if not most), and even had it lasted only a week or two, the Dispute would have undeniably been the straw that broke the camel’s back for those already hanging on by a thread.

So what would have happened if the Prime Monster had not quite literally thrown the law of the land out the window at the behest of his corpulent mate by ILLEGALY using the military and overseas aircraft and crews? If the RAAF, and later on, the overseas charter companies had not provided a vestige of an air service for those first four months, (for that’s all it was), a conclusion would have been reached within weeks if not days, and many of the businesses that suffered closure would have survived, even many of those already close to the brink.

Would that have meant that the pilots had ‘won’? Probably not. The pilots’ demand was not, as so many insist, a 30% pay rise – it was to be able to negotiate directly with their employers. The 29.47% pay rise was an ambit claim, and anyone with an even passing knowledge of the Australian industrial arbitration system would recognise that.

But the corpulent one didn’t want that. Mindful that deregulation was coming the very next year and rightly concerned because of the overall high AN staff costs (not just pilots) that would give a great advantage to any of the new start airlines sure to come into the Australian market post-deregulation, he’d been planning this ambush for too long to let the chance slip. It’s rightly been pointed out that the catalyst for the Dispute was the TN contract renegotiation and not AN’s, but TN negotiators had been instructed not to even open the file the AFAP presented to them one the first day of the ‘lock in’ at Lorne. They also admitted later in the Dispute that they had been told by senior TN management that “it was Ansett’s show” – that AN were calling the shots right from the start.

The whole idea of the contract negotiations being a ‘lock in’ affair was to force both parties into a quick result. The pilots may well have got their 29.47% pay rise, (although it’s highly doubtful), but they would have had to concede r quite substantial trade-offs, some of which were already in the document the AFAP put on the table – that remained unread by the TN negotiators.

There’s no way the AFAP can evade some of the blame for the events of 1989. Probably their biggest mistake was in not understanding that the people they were negotiating with came to the table in total bad faith, with no intention of reaching a negotiated settlement. Ansett had been planning the confrontation for some years and they had been advised by their highly paid advisors from overseas that, going on their experience in the US with Eastern and Continental, they could achieve total victory in a matter of days. I believe the figure they quoted was four days. And this might well have proven to be true had the companies managed to deliver the personal writs to each and every pilot.

To add to the confusion was the threat any catch up pay rise would have been to Hawke’s precious ‘Accord’. (And ‘catch up’ it was, for those who pillory the pilots conveniently forget that it wasn’t everyone whose pay had been tied to Hawke’s Accord over the years leading up to 1989, but just ‘the ordinary folks’. Those outside the Accord were giving themselves large, some would say enormous, pay rises – and before someone leaps on me for the pilots putting themselves above ‘the ordinary people’, let me remind them that, rightly or wrongly, the pilots’ salaries had for many years been tied to those of High Court Judges - who were not tied to the Accord.)

Yes, the Dispute put very many good, hard-working businessmen out of business and salary earners out of jobs, but lay the blame where it deserves to be laid, squarely at the feet of those who caused the Dispute to drag on so unnecessarily and for so long – Peter Abeles and Robert James Lee Hawke.

What so many forget in then heat of the argument is that only twelve months later, the ‘Accord’ was assigned to the scrapheap and ‘enterprise bargaining’ became the holy mantra of the Hawke Government. And enterprise bargaining is? –employees negotiating directly with their employers – exactly what the pilots were asking for, and for which they were called every name under the sun.

The other people who should take a major share of the blame are Australian journalists, both television and print. They allowed themselves to be used, and the very few who did seek out the truth behind the airline companies sometimes grossly inaccurate propaganda were silenced without a whimper from the majority, who toed their proprietors’ line, it seemed to me at least, with undisguised glee, happy to be a part of pulling down what they perceived to be undeserving ‘tall poppies’ or ‘fat cats’.

[greybeard]

Wiley,

Well done, thats about the guts of it, sometimes lost in the bitterness and other emotional bits.

The reasons most people stayed out are in your post, we wouldn't work under those rules anymore.

Then along came "Enterprise Bargaining" and there for ALL to see was the agenda, SCREW THE PILOTS.

Those who stayed out were in many ways screwed by the circumstances, those who went back screwed themselves and eventually the whole industry not only Ancs&b.

None of us will forget, FEW will forgive, as to giving the $c&bs a call, forget that.

[sniffer dog]

Great post Wiley, now we shall see what spin the $c%bs can put on that.

With regard to the media one of the worst offenders at that time was non other than one Heather Ewitt - ABC who should be damned to hell for her part - her kick back you ask? Posted to Washington as Chief Political Reporter for the ABC

[OhBehave]

Kickbacks to a rerporter for not supporting your cause. If you want to think that - go for it.

The facts regarding 89 are not really in dispute so much as the personal opinions regarding the actions taken all those years ago.

These can not effectively be debated. My opinion is this - yours is that. 14 years later most people have re-constructed a picture in their mind that fits comfortably with how thay acted.

[sniffer dog]

Kickback or not she did a right hatchet job on the Pilots

Am I wrong in thinking that good reporting is about balance?

It wouldn't surprise me to find out in 30yrs or so (another 16 actually) when all the paperwork comes out;
that, THAT F%$&...g B@$ch was on THE FAT MANS payrole.

[Eastwest Loco]

leftfrontside

I have given up any hope there will be any reconcilliation, however was pointing out that no-one is perfect, least of all me.

Best regards

EWL

[permFO]

Wiley - Thanks for the reply it was one of the more rational and considered posts. I accept your argument that their were a lot of tourism operators who were sailing close to the wind anyway but the basis of any tourism operator is tourists and if they're not provided in great numbers by the airlines then all operators suffer. Some of your points highlight the fact that the AFAP was never going to win because the Government, the airlines and the media were all against you and had actually been planning for it for a long time. That the Government and the PM were less than ethical is beyond doubt. That the Accord only disadvantaged wage and salary earners is also to the ALP's and ACTU's shame. As to the medias bias I think reflects on the general public's attitude "I don't care who gets me there as long as I get there". This misreading of public attitude was best summed up by the airline pilot I met at the time who said "The public want their Federation pilots upfront". No they didn't, they demonstrated that they would even put up with the basic noisy conditions of RAAF Hercs in order to get to their destination. The point about Enterprise Bargaining is also a good one its one that continues to degrade wages and conditions. It doesn't justify the dispute however it just shows that its timing may have been ill considered. All of this is history and can be debated ad infinitum possibly being the subject of a future Phd. All protaginists were caught up in events bigger than they had envisioned and no one could consider themselves to be unscathed. All EWL is suggesting is that with the passing of time consideration should be given for people not let blind hatred consume them. Some won't or can't let that hatred go but I am sure their are moderates amongst the 89ers who could if they are allowed to by their peers.

[MTOW]

OhBehave and Sniffer Dog, you’re allowing your stance on this subject to colour your judgement. Think about what you’ve just said and how silly it really is. Substitute ‘promotion for a job well done’ for ‘kickback’ and you are describing all of the capitalist commercial world perfectly. If these journalists did what their superiors perceived to be an excellent job in covering a major story, they would deserve and rightly expect to be promoted, just as you would if you handled your job well.

In my opinion, (but you can bet your last dollar not in some other people’s opinion), Wiley is quite right. The Australian media, with only two or three exceptions, were highly partisan in their handling of the news regarding the Dispute, (whether from ideological commitment or in slavishly following the dictates of their bosses, I’ll leave for the individual to decide). I remember Heather Hewitt as well. I forget the other senior female ABC reporter who was so far in Hawke’s pocket she was in among the lint and small change, but she later became a Labor Member of Parliament, I think in one of the ACT electorates. (Was it Pru Goward? Apologies, Pru if you have not since gone into politics.)

Anyone who lived in Melbourne during those times will remember Neil Mitchell and I forget the other one, both presenters of prime time talk back radio shows on 3AW. Both had been giving the pilots a fair hearing, (to some effect, it would seem), which the likes of John Laws in Sydney and all the ABC presenters were definitely not after the first week or so). It would have been in October of November, (sorry, can’t remember exactly when), they were both sacked on the Friday – and when the ratings came out three days later on the Monday morning, both had secured the top ratings for their time slot.

This seemed very odd to me (and many other people who had nothing at all to do with the Dispute). A mate of mine who dealt quite closely with the media during the Dispute for the Feds told me that he called one of the producers at 3AW (who he’d got to know quite well) and asked her why the pair had been sacked when they’d both just got the top ratings. She told him that airline companies bought advertising time, airline pilots didn’t.

[Andu]

So, “OhBehave”, what you’re really saying is that “Wiley’s” account is pretty accurate but his conclusions don’t fit in with the way you’d prefer to remember them? (“The facts regarding 89 are not really in dispute so much as the personal opinions regarding the actions taken all those years ago. These can not effectively be debated. My opinion is this - yours is that. 14 years later most people have re-constructed a picture in their mind that fits comfortably with how they acted.”)

“PermFO” threw down the gauntletat the end of page 3 and “Wiley” answered it. However, as “410” said on page 3, while his answer might educate some newcomers who are reading this, it won’t change any opinions of those who were actually involved. Both sides have dug their respective trenches and I can’t either ever coming out into “no man’s land” until both sides feel they are confronted by a greater common enemy (which I suspect was the rather quixotic point “East West Loco” was trying to make).

However, even if that hypothetical situation ever was to arise, I can’t for the life of me see how the majority who stayed out in 89 could ever bring themselves to trust the minority who (as they see it) ratted on them then. I know I couldn’t.

[OhBehave]

MTOW. You are entitled to your opinion regarding kickbacks. Fill your boots. I say it sounds very paranoid.

Andu. I agree with a lot of the information presented by Wiley. As I say, there is little point in debating pay clame percentages, tourist industry woes etc. Wiley even had the balls to admit the AFAP was also to blame. Revolutionary.

But signing on the dotted line or standing the picket line are personal choices made in a country where freedom of association prevails. Wileys conclusion regarding the moral implications (as apposed to the factual substance of his argument) is just that - Wileys.

(Wiley, apologies for talking about you in the third person - the question related directly to your comments)

[TheNightOwl]

Just a picky point for the edification of sniffer dog and MTOW - the lady in question goes by the name of Heather EWART, if my memory serves correctly. The fact that you disagree with what she wrote does NOT make her a bad reporter nor a recipient of "kickbacks".

Kind regards,

TheNightOwl.

[sniffer dog]

Thanks TheNightOwl couldn't remember how the B%&#ch spelt her surname.

Just a picky point NightOwl, shes NO lady and she doesn't write.