Analyze this.
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Analyze this.
Analyse this.
What is the future of the profession of airline pilots?
Is everyone currently in or coming into the industry at airline level, hell bent on flying regardless of the contempt managements hold for them.
Why has the profession been under constant remunerative attack for the last thirteen or more years?
Well, the primary reason is that pilots are such a fragmented group.
Threads in D & G often appear making comparisons between the pay and maybe conditions of QF and VB.
Would there be such a wide discrepancy if pilots were less fragmented and more unified.
In primitive, even recent times, families blended into tribes, which gave them the benefit of security and social order.
The problem was that across the valley there was another tribe with different priorities of security and social order, and conflict often resulted.
So it is with pilots today.
In Australia, the security of the AFAP tribe was fragmented with the departure of the Qantas sub-tribe in the early 1980’s. Genius was not a requirement to understand the long-term result of this dissection.
Then the 1989 dispute further fragmented the tribe into what we now know as the scabs and the 89er’s.
The demise of Ansett was not attributable to the pay levels of pilots.
The productivity of pilots has increased enormously over the years, yet the profession continues to be under attack, and the Cathay pilots are the most recent group to find the anti pilot management firing broadsides them.
So, the purpose of this post is this:
All you professional pilots sit down and have a think of your long-term futures, and not just the next hour you put into your logbooks.
Realise, that despite you being a professional, in a highly productive capacity, you cannot, in the airline industry, be self-employed. You therefore need to be associated with your fellow professionals through an organisation such as that which the ilk of the late Dick Holt established in the AFAP.
Unless, and until, you realise that this can be the only successful course for a long term highly regarded professional career, then your futures will steadily become untenable, and you will leave the industry, perhaps at the end, disillusioned.
And a word of advice for the new CPL’s whose desire to get those logbook hours knows no bounds. Remember, you have already invested a considerable amount of time and money into getting to the first base of this profession. Your services are worthy of payment. Any employer who exploits your keenness to fly for nothing makes extra bucks on your back. That money belongs to you as a payment for your services. That is the reality of the economy. Anyone who says they cannot afford to pay you is not exactly telling the truth.
Soon I shall be looking back. I hope I see not a few taking some heed. No doubt there will be some who disagree and will not.
However unless you rebuild the unity, you will have allowed the likes of the late Abeles and his successors to achieve what he set out to do, and that is to destroy the profession of air pilot, as it was built by those who had real bullets fired at them so long ago.
What is the future of the profession of airline pilots?
Is everyone currently in or coming into the industry at airline level, hell bent on flying regardless of the contempt managements hold for them.
Why has the profession been under constant remunerative attack for the last thirteen or more years?
Well, the primary reason is that pilots are such a fragmented group.
Threads in D & G often appear making comparisons between the pay and maybe conditions of QF and VB.
Would there be such a wide discrepancy if pilots were less fragmented and more unified.
In primitive, even recent times, families blended into tribes, which gave them the benefit of security and social order.
The problem was that across the valley there was another tribe with different priorities of security and social order, and conflict often resulted.
So it is with pilots today.
In Australia, the security of the AFAP tribe was fragmented with the departure of the Qantas sub-tribe in the early 1980’s. Genius was not a requirement to understand the long-term result of this dissection.
Then the 1989 dispute further fragmented the tribe into what we now know as the scabs and the 89er’s.
The demise of Ansett was not attributable to the pay levels of pilots.
The productivity of pilots has increased enormously over the years, yet the profession continues to be under attack, and the Cathay pilots are the most recent group to find the anti pilot management firing broadsides them.
So, the purpose of this post is this:
All you professional pilots sit down and have a think of your long-term futures, and not just the next hour you put into your logbooks.
Realise, that despite you being a professional, in a highly productive capacity, you cannot, in the airline industry, be self-employed. You therefore need to be associated with your fellow professionals through an organisation such as that which the ilk of the late Dick Holt established in the AFAP.
Unless, and until, you realise that this can be the only successful course for a long term highly regarded professional career, then your futures will steadily become untenable, and you will leave the industry, perhaps at the end, disillusioned.
And a word of advice for the new CPL’s whose desire to get those logbook hours knows no bounds. Remember, you have already invested a considerable amount of time and money into getting to the first base of this profession. Your services are worthy of payment. Any employer who exploits your keenness to fly for nothing makes extra bucks on your back. That money belongs to you as a payment for your services. That is the reality of the economy. Anyone who says they cannot afford to pay you is not exactly telling the truth.
Soon I shall be looking back. I hope I see not a few taking some heed. No doubt there will be some who disagree and will not.
However unless you rebuild the unity, you will have allowed the likes of the late Abeles and his successors to achieve what he set out to do, and that is to destroy the profession of air pilot, as it was built by those who had real bullets fired at them so long ago.
I must admit tool time I haven't agreed with a lot you have posted over time on Pprune but i'm right with you on this one. I'm a lowly low hour CPL holder and this industry continues to amaze me even though i've been involved in it most of my life thru my family. Pilots can be the most closely nit community around...when they want to be, and otherwise it's the most nasty backstabbing industry i've ever seen.
As even a low hour guy I refuse to work for nothing, and I refuse to fly VFR 182s in IFR conditions for free dropping parachutes, when guys out there put their foot down and quit these jobs, there is a chain of 20 more who knock down the door, get on their knees and get their highly 'prized' job as an unpaid IFR paradrop pilot. I love aviation, but not bad enough to do this, i've got more thoughts for my own life and the life of the others onboard to do it.......whats so true about what you said tool time is if EVERY pilot refused to fly paradrops in IMC, and if EVERY pilot refused to fly for free, what would happen.......if they wanted to fly they would have to accept that their pilots will fly by the rules, and PAY them. By saying this not ALL paradrop pilots fly thru cloud, but some make it so obvious it's not funny, I heard BN centre even question one aircraft today with 'confirm a request for 10,000?'....when all a/c in that general area were all IFR in IMC. CASA cracks down on certain operators on some things and let such blatent breaking of the Reg's go without comment.
It's strange to me that in comparison to aviation, the job that i've held to fund my flying provides a better wage, well maintained equipment, respects my jugdement, pays me to be trained, doesn't bond me, thanks me for a job well done and doesn't make me do anything illegal.....yet i've spent a small fortune to become a 'professional' pilot and your lucky to find a job out there that gives you half of those things listed above....
Glorified bus driver......I don't think bus drivers will drive for nothing....why do we?
As even a low hour guy I refuse to work for nothing, and I refuse to fly VFR 182s in IFR conditions for free dropping parachutes, when guys out there put their foot down and quit these jobs, there is a chain of 20 more who knock down the door, get on their knees and get their highly 'prized' job as an unpaid IFR paradrop pilot. I love aviation, but not bad enough to do this, i've got more thoughts for my own life and the life of the others onboard to do it.......whats so true about what you said tool time is if EVERY pilot refused to fly paradrops in IMC, and if EVERY pilot refused to fly for free, what would happen.......if they wanted to fly they would have to accept that their pilots will fly by the rules, and PAY them. By saying this not ALL paradrop pilots fly thru cloud, but some make it so obvious it's not funny, I heard BN centre even question one aircraft today with 'confirm a request for 10,000?'....when all a/c in that general area were all IFR in IMC. CASA cracks down on certain operators on some things and let such blatent breaking of the Reg's go without comment.
It's strange to me that in comparison to aviation, the job that i've held to fund my flying provides a better wage, well maintained equipment, respects my jugdement, pays me to be trained, doesn't bond me, thanks me for a job well done and doesn't make me do anything illegal.....yet i've spent a small fortune to become a 'professional' pilot and your lucky to find a job out there that gives you half of those things listed above....
Glorified bus driver......I don't think bus drivers will drive for nothing....why do we?
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Tool Time,
AFAP a phoenix from the ashes?Not such a bad thing,hard lessons learnt.
VB a major catalyst for the above?Some exKD drivers told me a lot of their union people having tremendous luck because of their AFAP affiliation.
Would be ironic to see the AFAP bring VB wages to the norm.
AFAP a phoenix from the ashes?Not such a bad thing,hard lessons learnt.
VB a major catalyst for the above?Some exKD drivers told me a lot of their union people having tremendous luck because of their AFAP affiliation.
Would be ironic to see the AFAP bring VB wages to the norm.
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Have to agree with the post for sure.
When you have Pilots that will suck Co#k to get the job then I think it will never go away.
Scenario-- no names no Court Cases.
Pa 28 job in East Coast GA company first up.
Bank Running next ,straight in .
PA28 to PA31 in no time .
Amazing what high heel boots do to get you on a Bank Run.
Other Pilots from other Companies mentioning the Inadequacies of this driver .
Still it seems to be the way.
If you can't beat em , then start your own Company.
Its worked for me.
When you have Pilots that will suck Co#k to get the job then I think it will never go away.
Scenario-- no names no Court Cases.
Pa 28 job in East Coast GA company first up.
Bank Running next ,straight in .
PA28 to PA31 in no time .
Amazing what high heel boots do to get you on a Bank Run.
Other Pilots from other Companies mentioning the Inadequacies of this driver .
Still it seems to be the way.
If you can't beat em , then start your own Company.
Its worked for me.
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TTT and co.
I don't think you should be placing such a strong emphsis on union involvement as a way to generate unity amongst pilots.
I too was once a union member, however I lost all faith in their ability to represent when they failed on all accounts to successfully regain mine and others employment and the 10s of thousands of dollars owed to each of us in redundancy and unpaid leave.
They also failed to draw attention to what this company was doing to it's "employees" conditions of work. They, under no uncertain terms and with no consultation with the pilots or union, sacked everyone (the great ethnic cleansing of '93) and offered their positions back as share holders of the 2 bit employment companies set up to blatently avoid payrole taxation obligations, (amongst other trivials) and at the same time, stripping them of any rights they may have had under a federal award.
Oh yes. This company managed to survive (all be it with a red and white tail now) and many of the union members standing by, letting all this happen to their "brothers", remain with them to this day, even after the shafting all have received from this unscrupulous operator.
So, in summary:
Don't be so naive to think that the AFAP will be our great savior IF it hits the fan. Their (unions) purpose is only to justify their existence. Anything too hard gets shelved, as did the above very straight forward case.
Put it this way. If the AFAP, due to their actions in my case, caused this company to return to their previous incarnation, abiding by a federal award and meeting their obligations to the ATO, they would not have survived (they barely survived as it was) and their members would have been out on the street unable to pay their dues. That wouldn't serve the unions purpose now would it?
I don't think you should be placing such a strong emphsis on union involvement as a way to generate unity amongst pilots.
I too was once a union member, however I lost all faith in their ability to represent when they failed on all accounts to successfully regain mine and others employment and the 10s of thousands of dollars owed to each of us in redundancy and unpaid leave.
They also failed to draw attention to what this company was doing to it's "employees" conditions of work. They, under no uncertain terms and with no consultation with the pilots or union, sacked everyone (the great ethnic cleansing of '93) and offered their positions back as share holders of the 2 bit employment companies set up to blatently avoid payrole taxation obligations, (amongst other trivials) and at the same time, stripping them of any rights they may have had under a federal award.
Oh yes. This company managed to survive (all be it with a red and white tail now) and many of the union members standing by, letting all this happen to their "brothers", remain with them to this day, even after the shafting all have received from this unscrupulous operator.
So, in summary:
Don't be so naive to think that the AFAP will be our great savior IF it hits the fan. Their (unions) purpose is only to justify their existence. Anything too hard gets shelved, as did the above very straight forward case.
Put it this way. If the AFAP, due to their actions in my case, caused this company to return to their previous incarnation, abiding by a federal award and meeting their obligations to the ATO, they would not have survived (they barely survived as it was) and their members would have been out on the street unable to pay their dues. That wouldn't serve the unions purpose now would it?
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I.T.
Your post mentions events which ocurred to you and colleagues, and we all can understand you being disgruntled.
However, that does not address the issue of my thread.
If you are suggesting unity can be achieved without being associated/affiliated/unionised, then I can only disagree.
As much as we all think we are not workers - we are PROFESSIONALS - truth is we are workers, and even in the new world of economic realism, we can only assure proper professional standards in ALL facets by being unified.
I can only reiterate - unify or be damned.
Your post mentions events which ocurred to you and colleagues, and we all can understand you being disgruntled.
However, that does not address the issue of my thread.
If you are suggesting unity can be achieved without being associated/affiliated/unionised, then I can only disagree.
As much as we all think we are not workers - we are PROFESSIONALS - truth is we are workers, and even in the new world of economic realism, we can only assure proper professional standards in ALL facets by being unified.
I can only reiterate - unify or be damned.
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Tango Tango Tango - Request Clearance To Utopia
Analyze This.....
Try it, lie down and take a bex TTT
Try it, lie down and take a bex TTT
