Jet* flying school???
 

Watching inside business on the ABC this morning.Was it my hearing or was that funny little irishman in charge of the deathstar advocating starting his own flying school?

Yep in one breath he says there's no problem getting pilots the next he says someone should start a flying school which provides pilots to Qantas Group and brings in a revenue stream to the group. I assume he's thinking a European styled school where you go and learn everything at the one school in a controlled environment, then get a job with the airline. Someone's going to have to rewrite the regs or bring in the MPL before that occurs.

Such an idea will be one way of bringing down pilot salaries too.

QF have been talking about flying schools (the traditional type, not a MPL one) for more than 12 months now. It's quite a hush-hush deal but they can see the $$$ in play- particularly for cadet pilots with the QF 'brand' on them.

It should work as long as the branding by QF isn't just a token sign on the door. If QF are fair dinkum about it then it needs to be fully embedded in the QF 'system'.

Hey yeah they could charge $20k or more above the average rates for CPL training but promise a job at the end of it. They could make sure that trainees meet certain educational and aptitude requirements before they begin the training. Maybe they could call it the Qantas Cadet Pilot Training Program :rolleyes:

The Jetstar stream could even get the successful graduates take out a further loan to do a type rating on an A320 :ugh:

Just a quick take on how this has worked out in Europe-

easyJet has a similar cadet scheme. They guarentee loans and guys go through a two year course, ending up with a frozen ATP and type rating, plus a debt of around 80 000STG!! They were to then be paid around 1000STG less than usual until the debt was paid off.

The theory (which EZ based its crewing projections on) was that they would get young, loyal, long term employees.

The realitiy was they produced qualified guys with big debts who needed to earn as much as possible to make a return on their investment.

Over half left for BA and Virgin within the first year (the pay differential more than made up for the change).

It neber ceases to amaze me that corporations will always pull out the "We need to keep the best people" card to justify enormous corporate salaries, but then try it's best to scew it's proffesstional staff.

If you want qualified people, PAY FOR THEM!!

Yeah thats what people thought about endorsements when Ansett and Qantas paid for them... you'll be surpised how low they will go!