The Demise of Qantas

[Curly3]

Gough loves Julia, because he is no longer the worst Prime Minister in Australian history.

[Davey Crocket]

She makes everybody look good, even Rudd....if we didnt have a dodgy labor lover Govner General she would have been the 2nd Prime Minister to be kicked out of office....when she starts ranting "bring it on" in her screeching witch like voice It just makes my blood boil, she belongs on "house'os".....she acts like a gutter tramp and probably gave her fair share of "favors" to get where she got...shes an enbarassment to the country.

[Nathan S]

Montynut, the secret is in the double-spaced paragraph - two quite seperate points in my post.

[bazza]

what is with australasia we had aunty  Helen you have the ginga ninga?

[crash n bern]

It's a well laid out plan.  Qantas has to be Australian owned.  For some time they have been shuffling all the money into Jetstar.  The plan is to send Qantas down the gurgler and reopen a new airline in Asia using cheap labour etc. and leaving Qantas as a former shell of itself.

[shorelinemc]

the labour party isnt  union anymore,they just like to have unions think they are.i was  in a union once-had to be to get on to sites,when i needed them ,(i was a subbie foolishly owned a truck) the union,TWU, didnt do jack shit to help,had to resort to the physical to get paid,helps when you are my size sometimes.the same union then threatened me with court proceedings when i didnt renew my membership-they still invoice you because evidently they couldnt find my letter of resignation.in the end i was given the ph no of a union hating govt official who helped me out

[Montynut]

Montynut, the secret is in the double-spaced paragraph - two quite seperate points in my post.

No secret Nathan your paragraph spacing and layout is completely standard letter structure and contains nothing special to signify some special meaning or implication. Your post suggests that you are adding to my post not putting an opposite view.

Your hatred of John Howard is totally your opinion which is your right and that right is a corner stone of our democracy. Even the present Labor / Greens abomination has yet to remove that right although they appear to be trying to smother free speech. Their media investigation is just that, an attempt to control the media it is being driven by the Greens but the Labor party are completely complicit in that move.

The questioning during the Qantas inquiry by Senator Doug ‘Jock' Cameron, a complete ‘A’ hole that I worked with for 3 years a couple of decades ago, is a perfect example of the standard of person who rises through the Labor machine. They are given an unelected position because they are unelectable. This guy used his union and his positions within them as a personal vehicle to his own advancement.

During the Hawk and even Keating years the Labor Party dragged itself out of the type of thuggery that Unions had been famous for. It has taken only 15 years for it to slip even further into the current disgusting state of affairs.

What happened during the airline pilot's strike when Hawk was PM?

[Marc.com]

If we are to believe all the propaganda we read in the government controlled media,then the unions are the bad guys holding the country to ransom. When the real reason why they are fighting is for the survival of Australian jobs. And it,s not just a few Baggage handlers, it,s Everyone...Pilots, Engineers included,

Yeah and its not like the Australian's were doing those jobs badly...... they had to force land another A380 yesterday. It was the airline with absolutely the best safety record in the world and the
only reason they have never lost aircraft now in through the grace of god.

As an island nation Qantas is part of the national wealth and should stay that way. The Aussies that they are trying to get rid of at the moment are the same ones Joyce and his cronies will have his hand out to as tax payers when it goes ass up. I am all for organised labor in these cases, they are the voice of the people.

[Nathan S]

No secret Nathan your paragraph spacing and layout is completely standard letter structure and contains nothing special to signify some special meaning or implication. Your post suggests that you are adding to my post not putting an opposite view.

Look, its easy: You made a point which I agreed with, and then added my own seperate but related point.
Apart from my taking a shot at JWH, I'm surprised you found anything to object to in that post - I pointed out that the change from WC to FWA was actually pretty useless and superficial (and well short of what most voters believe it achieved).

The union movement* was on a rapid slide into obscurity until Howard remembered a decades-old grudge and gave them renewed purpose/focus. Apart from the union movement's own failings**, Hawke's/Keating's Accord was a big step toward reducing the need for unions in this country. Howard was a silly old prick because he obviously felt the need to stamp his authority over them - and it backfired. He could have gone a lot further toward his own goals if he'd had some humility and tact.

Let's not forget that there was some seriously nasty crap in WorkChoices, including the legalising the detention of Aussie citizens and holding them for a fortnight without charge. Regardless of what people think of the union movement, this sort of shit was rightly rejected by Australian voters.

We haven't "slipped further" into anything. The Qantas industrial action was not a patch on what happened during the Patrick dispute. Remember the yearly (threat of) strikes from Auspost just before Xmas? Etc etc.
Its often overlooked, but the height of the pilots' action was wearing the wrong coloured tie and making announcements over the plane's PA - hardly "bringing the company to its knees", and certainly not something that could be fairly justified as the actions of an unruly mob...

*There's no doubt that there are shitty jerk-off union officials, just as there's no doubt that there's shitty jerk-off bosses. But I do object when unions are generalised/demonised - its just as stupid as saying that all bosses are nasty pricks.
**"Trade" Unions in 2011? FFS, tradies haven't been the working poor for a long time now... *shakes head in bewilderment*

[Nathan S]

Yeah and its not like the Australian's were doing those jobs badly...... they had to force land another A380 yesterday. It was the airline with absolutely the best safety record in the world and the
only reason they have never lost aircraft now in through the grace of god.

As an island nation Qantas is part of the national wealth and should stay that way. The Aussies that they are trying to get rid of at the moment are the same ones Joyce and his cronies will have his hand out to as tax payers when it goes ass up. I am all for organised labor in these cases, they are the voice of the people.

Apparently, Qantas have a habit of repairing written off planes to keep their stats looking good. Sometimes those planes are never flown again, but the stats look good...

From another forum:

VH-OJH 747-400 went off hte end of the runway in Bangkok approx 300 mil damage and needed 3 engine changes and a whole new nose section from behind the front nose gear, also left hand wing gear needed replacing. This was to save the hull being clased as a write off (safety record).

VH-OQA A380 is still in singapore and is scheduled to be finished by December 2011. Airbus didn't have a repair scheme for the holes through the lower main wing plank and front spar. Best estimates so far are 180 mil

There are more.

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The thing that's struck me in the last day or two:
I'm an Aussie who doesn't own lots of shares in Qantas.
I can't think of how I'd benefit in the slightest if Qantas is moved partly/significantly/wholy overseas, or allowed to be wound down - but I can see how I'd suffer (indirectly) if that happened.
Therefore I support Qantas staying here - and ultimately I 'have to' support the job security claims from the Qantas employees, and reject the desires of the CEO & board.
Apart from political/financial ideologies, I wonder how any other Australian could come to a different conclusion?

[lyle2212]

Good on you NATHAN for painting a clearer picture on how the situation really is . I can recall a few years back when Qantas started to service it,s fleet overseas to save money that Dick Smith warned Australia that it was only a matter of time before Qantas would have their first airline tradgedy.

[Nathan S]

http://www.perthnow.com.au/business/opinion/unions-qantas-fight-not-about-money/story-fn8t4my5-1226186173946

FWIW.

[IT490K1983]

What Alan Joyce did to Qantas and its customers last week is inexusable and totally unnacceptable under any circumstances, ever. How can someone who earns $5 million a year think that this was not only the best course of action, but the only course of action available. Australians don't like being pushed into a corner and I think a few are already voting with their feet.

[AjayVMX]

Good to see all the red raggers coming out a usual. 

The bottom line is this:

If you owned or were the manager of a business which is losing money hand over fist due to protected union action and the only way to prevent this continuing was to get the dispute taken to Fair Work Australia, wouldn't that be the most responsible action?  Of course it is.

The judgement by Fair Work Australia in terminating the dispute made it clear that Qantas would not have been granted a termination and subsequent forthcoming arbitration on the weight of the union's actions alone.  THAT's why the grounding was necessary under the FW act.  Of course, the Minister DID have the power under the act to terminate the industrial action and prevent the grounding happening at all, but that would have not given the Government the ability to demonise Qantas and support the unions.

The inconvenient truth that Tony Sheldon is using the Qantas dispute and the baggage handlers as pawns in a game to bolster his chances of being elected president of the Labor party is not reported widely by the "love media" of course.

Lastly, the racist comments by many in the media about Allan Joyce's accent are a stark contrast to those NOT made about Doug Cameron's equally obvious (non-Australian) accent.  Wonder why? 

[Nathan S]

Why didn't Qantas management even try for arbitration? Protected industrial action is quite difficult when matters are being arbitrated...

The rules are the rules. Joyce's arrogance meant he couldn't handle playing by the rules (because he was losing) and he worked out a way to side step them.