TWU may challenge to #Qantas

via dailytelegraph.com.au

UNIONS are poised to challenge the tribunal decision that terminated their industrial action against Qantas following legal advice claiming the airline acted improperly and broke the law.

Transport Workers Union national secretary Tony Sheldon yesterday said advice showed the unions had grounds to lodge an appeal against the Fair Work Australia ruling.

But Qantas last night dismissed the claims, insisting it had fully complied with the law during the dispute and had taken the only option available to it in grounding the fleet last weekend.

The threat of a potential Federal Court challenge came as it emerged the TWU had also been lobbying the federal government to "beef up" the Qantas Sales Act to protect workers from the airline's plans to moves operations offshore and slash local jobs.

Mr Sheldon said the legal advice showed Qantas acted improperly by threatening to keep the airline grounded if the court only suspended instead of terminated the industrial action last weekend. It also showed that the position of the unions was not taken into proper consideration and that the lockout notice was illegal because workers were not given three days' notice.

Mr Sheldon stressed that he was still happy to continue negotiations with Qantas in good faith but planned to appeal the decision, possibly with other unions, to protect the broader interests of members.

"We have advice now that we can appeal this decision," Mr Sheldon told Australian Agenda on Sky News.

"They blackmailed the judiciary, they blackmailed the travelling public, they blackmailed the government and were on a hell-bent ideological rant that wasn't in the interest of anyone."

Qantas said there was no requirement to provide notice but the company gave employees two days anyway.

"As the government applied to Fair Work Australia and all industrial action was terminated, employees were not locked out," a spokesman said.

The debate came as opposition workplace relations spokesman Eric Abetz attacked the government for giving unions too much power.

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Some #QANTAS truths before the dispute

via twitdoc.com

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#Qantas shutdown: industrial relations and #Ausunions| Crikey

via crikey.com.au

Delegitimising unions in the great game of labour v capital

by Bernard Keane
http://www.crikey.com.au/2011/11/02/delegitimising-unions-in-the-great-game-o...

It may not look it, but there are strong links between the Occupy protests here and overseas, and more formal political debate and public discourse, which naturally has been dominated by the Qantas dispute. And not just in the vague sense that both deal with the economy, or capitalism, or markets.

Let’s be clear about the long-term business agenda in Australia regarding industrial relations. It’s an agenda aimed not at improving productivity — as I and others have incessantly showed, the last round of IR reform led to a drop in labour productivity — but a more self-interested one aimed at reducing labour costs and neutering unions.

Business is quite tolerant of trade unions, as long as they do nothing that inconveniences business or increases labour costs. They can even be a useful form of alternative pressure on governments when industries set about rent-seeking. Neutered unions are quite acceptable. Real ones, that aggressively represent the interests of their members, aren’t. And ones that actually take industrial action, in particular, are regarded as outright enemies of business.

This is the ultimate thrust of IR reform — to pathologise industrial action, however legal, however justified. The point is to frame the right to withhold labour as an illegitimate form of economic vandalism, no matter what the circumstances.

Thus the incessant business complaint that the Fair Work Australia framework is too “pro-union” because it allows unions to take industrial action once a number of legal hurdles have been cleared. And the logic of Qantas’s actions on the weekend was to break free of the normal industrial dispute provisions under which it was operating, in which unions could continue to take wholly legal industrial action which (as Fair Work Australia found on Sunday night) did not pose a significant threat to Qantas.

This is business’s particular self-interested contribution to the liberal economic reform project. The IR component of that project, starting in 1993 with the Keating government’s provisions for enterprise bargaining and accelerating in 1996-97 with Peter Reith’s reforms to deliver individual contracts, was to remove the impediments of a centralised bargaining system from a modern, open economy, allowing enterprises to respond to competition more flexibly.

Coupled with globalisation, deregulation and corporate tax cuts, the reform project has delivered a huge increase in the corporate sector’s share of national income — at the expense of labour, as this graph from the Australian Council of Trade Unions shows:

The wage share of national income in Australia has only recently come off historic lows. But on this we’re no different from the United States or the United Kingdom, where wage share has also dropped over the last three decades to historic lows of around 50%.

Australian business clearly doesn’t believe the wage share has fallen low enough. That’s what drives its agenda to go further and undermine collective bargaining, a key part of which is the right to withhold labour, something businesses have been trying to do since the time of the Combination Acts in the early nineteenth century. Australia remains, for its corporate leaders, a “high wage” economy that struggles to compete internationally. For globally-mobile capital, there’s always a lower-wage country somewhere else to move to.

That same global market, however, has been the justification for a massive increase in executive remuneration, which as Prof David Peetz has shown, accelerated in the 1980s but then really took in the late 1990s.

Now, you can look at this from a union perspective and rail about income inequality and overpowerful corporations, or from a corporate perspective and point out that it’s the logic of a global market. And that market is currently delivering strong employment growth and growing income to Australians. But either way, it is driving the growing anti-corporate sentiment in the community, the opposition to further economic reform and the desire to reverse some reforms like privatisation. The Occupy protests are only the most vocal point of this deep and wide community sentiment that corporations get all the benefits of the economic system while the community gets all of the costs.

Where unions have failed is to tap into this sentiment. Capitalism operates most effectively by atomising the individual, by ensuring that an individual’s primary relationships are one-to-one relationships with producers as a consumer, and with employers, as a worker. Traditional systems that establish links cutting across these one-to-one relationships — unions, churches, political parties — have all been in decline in recent decades. Now the internet threatens to establish a different set of relationships and communities at odds with capitalism. But unions still retain some of the power that they once had to disrupt capitalist relationships, which is why business wants to neuter them.

The challenge for unions is to find a way to effectively channel those community concerns. Some of the more politically effective unions, like the Australian Workers Union, would argue that that is exactly what they’ve done through outcomes like the recent steel industry package. They also face an often hostile media environment that reinforces the illegitimacy of industrial action.

Alternatively, the challenge for business is to find a way to address those concerns themselves, to stop the community seeing them as a problem, the beneficiaries of a rigged capitalist game. Continuing to reflexively wage industrial relations wars wouldn’t seem to be the best start in doing that.

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En Passant » Nationalise #QANTAS under workers’ control

via enpassant.com.au

The one percent cannot give what QANTAS workers want – a modest five percent pay increase and job security.

The one percent – QANTAS management, the rest of the ruling class cheering them on, the Labor government and Fair Work Australia – will reject these reasonable demands because it conflicts with the essence of capitalism, the right of capital to make ‘decent’ profits.

The chant of the Occupy movement – human need, not corporate greed – captures this class division perfectly.

QANTAS’s corporate greed – its need to increase its return on investment in competition with other airlines and capital more generally and hence cutting its costs through internationalising its services and reducing wages in Australia – clashes with the human need of QANTAS workers for secure jobs and increased wages that at least cover the real cost of living increases for households.

Under capitalism this class struggle over the distribution of the surplus can only be resolved in favour of workers through class struggle. That does not appear to be on the agenda at the moment from a union leadership compromised by years of complicity in neoliberal wealth shifting to the ruling class. That wealth shift to the rich has been so great that the share of national income going to capital is now at its highest since records were kept and that going to labour its lowest.

This wealth transfer to capital is driven by the need of capital to redress the tendency under its system for profit rates to fall. Lengthening the working day, new technology and returning only a pittance of the wealth workers create to workers are all part of the witches’ brew of capitalism and its systemic need for profit, profit profit to reinvest.

Fair Work Australia is one of the institutions of the one percent. It is captured and driven by the logic of the system of the one percent. For workers to actually win anything decent from it would require a massive strike campaign.

The decision to terminate all industrial action means the dispute has moved from terrain favourable to QANTAS workers to one favourable to Allan Joyce and his sister in arms, Julia Gillard.

Thee are no halfway houses. QANTAS workers could occupy QANTAS and begin running it. They have the skill and the expertise to do so; better indeed than the popinjays of profit like Alan Joyce who know only the strictures of capitalist ideology, practice and management, trapped as they are within the logic of capital accumulation.

The only way workers running the airline industry is going to occur is if QANTAS workers organise now and demand Labor nationalise QANTAS and tax the rich and capital to pay for adequate pay increases and job security. They would have to back these demands up with threats of strikes and when rejected, strikes that shut down not just QANTAS but the rest of the airline industry and draw in other workers to win the campaign.

The alternative is a real wage cut and insecure jobs.

Be realistic. Demand what is impossible for the one percent to deliver – real wage increases and secure jobs. Organise now to strike and shut down the airline industry to win these demands.

Nationalise QANTAS under workers’ control to win real wage increases and secure jobs. Tax the rich to pay for it.

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PALEA, PM picket Qantas office, Oz embassy in support of #Qantas workers

via allvoices.com

The Philippine Airlines Employees’ Association (PALEA) and Partido ng Manggagawa (PM) picketed the Qantas office and Australian embassy in a show of solidarity for the embattled workers of the Australian flag carrier. “We extend the hand of solidarity to our brothers and sisters who are for fighting for job security, decent pay and better working conditions. The struggles they are waging mirror the same demands that we are currently fighting for at PAL,” declared Gerry Rivera, PALEA president and PM vice chair.

Some 50 members of PALEA and PM held picketed the Qantas office at a building in Paseo de Roxas in Legaspi Village, Makati by 11:00 a.m. After holding a short program and chanting slogans in support of Qantas workers, the group then proceeded to the Australian embassy in the RCBC Plaza along Ayala Ave.
“Ang laban ng Qantas ay laban ng PALEA. We are all Qantas workers,” the protesters shouted. Rivera explained that “PALEA condemns the drive by Qantas to slash labor costs, undercut labor standards and weaken job security, all in the name of competitiveness. This is a mere myth as Qantas top management has taken salary hikes while forcing sacrifices on workers.”
Meanwhile PALEA dismissed a PAL announcement that it is readying charges against people who blocked a catering truck from leaving the In-Flight Center (IFC). “It is PAL’s habit to threaten its workers in a futile effort at intimidation.

They threatened administrative cases against employees for joining mass actions and they said they will file an illegal strike charge but none come of it. But this time, the threat is also a means for PAL to divert attention from its culpability in the violent daybreak attack on the PALEA protest camp which led to the death of one bystander and injuries to seven of our members. PAL’s best defense is offense,” Rivera insisted.

He added that “PAL could only invent the lamest excuse—that PALEA foisted the attack on its own campout. Unfortunately for PAL and its outsourced goons-provider, one of the attackers was caught and gave some damning admission. But the bigger question that people should ask is this: Why does PAL want the IFC to operate when it has declared that the airport services, call center reservations and catering departments have been closed? If Sky Kitchen and Sky Logistics need the IFC then these are illegal labor-only contractors not independent service providers.”

PALEA and PM also criticized the Australian labor court called Fair Work Australia (FWA) for “surrendering to the lockout blackmail of Qantas CEO Alan Joyce.” In a ruling, the FWA lifted the lockout but also stopped strikes by the three Qantas unions. “Workers now have 21 days within which to negotiate with the hardline Qantas management without the leverage of strike action. In the face of intransigence by Qantas, only industrial action can force employers to heed the demands of workers,” Rivera argued.

The Qantas union Australian Licenced Aircraft Engineers Association (ALAEA) had expressed solidarity for PALEA after some 2,400 its members were retrenched as part of a controversial outsourcing scheme that has been slammed as “a bid to demolish job security and also bust the union.”
JuanManggagawa is based in Manila, National Capital Region, Philippines, and is an Anchor for Allvoices.

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#AusUnions rally to support staff hurt by #qanats groundings

via smh.com.au

THE union movement will show its disgust at Qantas for locking out workers and grounding its fleet with a snap rally today at Sydney Airport.
The secretary of Unions NSW, Mark Lennon, said the protest would demonstrate the "groundswell of anger" over Qantas's hardline industrial tactics.

Leaders of the three unions at the centre of the disputes - representing engineers, ground staff and long-haul pilots - have lashed out at the airline's managers, accusing them of an unjustified and premeditated industrial attack.

Qantas planes sit grounded at Sydney International Airport on October 30, 2011 a day after the country's national carrier grounded its entire fleet due to a bitter industrial row. Photo by AFP

The secretary of the ACTU, Jeff Lawrence, joined the condemnation, describing Qantas's actions as "absolutely out of proportion to any action that has been engaged in by the union movement".
Concerns about job security and outsourcing - rather than pay - are the main issues in the disputes. The three unions are pushing Qantas for similar things, albeit in different ways.
The engineers, vulnerable to their work being sent overseas, want limits on outsourcing; the pilots union wants to ensure Qantas flights are operated by pilots paid at Qantas rates, not the lower Jetstar rates; the Transport Workers Union, which represents baggage handlers and catering staff, wants to restrict work being sent outside Qantas.

Qantas, which has been seeking to cut costs and shift its focus to Asia, argues its survival is at risk and it needs to be able to manage its business in response to competitive pressures.

Richard Woodward, the vice-president of the Australian International Pilots Association, said Qantas's decision to ground the fleet was an ''insane reaction'' that possibly broke the law.

''We think that Alan [Joyce, Qantas's chief executive] may have been in breach of the Fair Work Act by his actions,'' he said. ''He has locked out the short-haul pilots; they are not in this dispute - their award is not up for negotiation until next year.''
Captain Woodward said Qantas pilots were "very conservative people" and there were no plans for strike action. The only action Qantas pilots had been taking was inflight announcements about the industrial dispute, as well as the donning of red ties that carry the message ''Qantas flight, Qantas pilots'', he said.
The federal secretary of the Australian Licensed Aircraft Engineers Association, Steve Purvinas, said the Qantas reaction was disproportionate given his members had suspended industrial action for three weeks.

The TWU national secretary, Tony Sheldon, said his members had conducted only about six hours' worth of industrial action during seven or eight months of negotiations.
The national president of the Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union, Tony Maher, said Qantas was following a game plan honed by its law firm, Freehills. ''Freehills came to prominence in the Reith years and they spearheaded all the major disputes where employers were testing out Work Choices and its predecessor act. They were in the waterfront dispute, they were in the Rio Tinto dispute,'' he said.

''They stonewall in negotiations, they have an amiable looking spokesperson, that's Alan Joyce in this case, and they exaggerate the impact of industrial action.''

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/travel/travel-news/unions-rally-to-support-staff-hurt-b...

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Unions welcome Fair Work Australia decision | ACTU

via actu.org.au

31 October, 2011 | Media Release | ACTU
http://www.actu.org.au/Media/Mediareleases/UnionswelcomeFairWorkAustraliadeci...

Qantas must immediately resume flying its planes following Fair Work Australia’s decision early this morning to terminate the airline’s industrial action.

ACTU Secretary Jeff Lawrence said Qantas CEO Alan Joyce now had no excuse not to restart all services after his extraordinary and pre-meditated decision to ground the entire Australian fleet on Saturday afternoon.

Mr Lawrence said Qantas employees would turn up for work today ready to do whatever was necessary to get the planes back in the air. He welcomed the government intervention which had been the circuit breaker in the dispute, and said the next priority was to resume negotiations in a spirit of reconciliation.

“This decision by Fair Work Australia removes any reason for Qantas to ground its planes,” he said. “The tribunal has sheeted home to Alan Joyce full responsibility for the actions which caused massive disruption to the travel plans of thousands of Australians and the economy.

“The decision means Qantas must negotiate about the legitimate claims over job security and outsourcing unions have been pursuing for 15 months. This is a sensible decision by the bench.

“It is a pity it took government intervention to force management back to the bargaining table after such needless disruption. But it now means we can get back to negotiating in good faith, as unions have been seeking to do for weeks.

“But Australians have a right to ask: what did Alan Joyce achieve with this decision to ground the fleet? Qantas has made headlines around the world for all the wrong reasons due to this management action. The damage to the brand is immeasurable.

“Thousands of passengers around Australia have been stranded because of Mr Joyce’s action. And Qantas’ entire workforce are now fearful about their future. And Qantas has failed in its meanspirited attempt to lock out workers pursuing legitimate industrial claims. Did Mr Joyce ever consider the innocent bystanders who would be affected by his action?

“But despite their shock and dismay at what Mr Joyce has done, Qantas workers have performed magnificently in the face of enormous pressure, and we pay tribute to them.

“It needs to be repeated that workers at Qantas are simply seeking to negotiate new pay and conditions, and some guarantees from management about job security. But bargaining at Qantas had broken down because of management’s refusal to negotiate.

“Our immediate priority now is to work with management to get the planes back in the air, but then we will approach negotiations in a genuine spirit of conciliation and expect Qantas management to do the same.

“The key issue for negotiation is the future of Qantas jobs in Australia, and there must be a continuing role for the government during these talks to ensure job security.”

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Qantas Lockout: What the #Ausunions want & what #Qantas says| The Infrequent Rant

via infrequentrant.blogspot.com

via: Keep Calm Abbott is not PM

http://infrequentrant.blogspot.com/2011/10/qantas-lockout-what-unions-want-wh...

SUNDAY, OCTOBER 30, 2011

Qantas Lockout: What the unions want & what Qantas says

As we all know Qantas has ceased its operations in response to industrial reaction; this is a lockout of workers for fighting for their industrial rights.
Here is a summary of the union position and Qantas position according to the

Australian Financial Review:

Transport Workers Union

The TWU, which is negotiating a new agreement for 3800 baggage handlers, ground staff, and ramp services staff such as caterers, asked for a 5% rise, but has already indicated this figure is negotiable and it will settle at a lower rate.
But the TWU is concerned about Qantas’s use of cheaper contract Labour that threatens the livelihood of its members.

The union says most of its workers on the agreement are paid a base salary of $38,000 a year and rely on shift penalties and overtime to make a wage that covers the cost of living. It says this overt time work has been undermined by contracting out over the past 18 months.

The TWU says it understands the company needs “operational flexibility” but wants only 20% of work to be done by contracted, compared with Qantas’s preferred level of 55%.

The TWU is also seeking:

Protection for terms and conditions in terms of safety, training and standards – to apply to Qantas staff AND contractors.

Qantas to resolve what it says are long-standing aviation security issues and a lack of safety protocols for employees.

Rights of injured workers to be treated with dignity and respect
Commitments to a mutual relationship and good faith bargaining

Australian Licensed Aircraft Engineers Association

The ALAEA is negotiating on behalf of 1600 licensed Qantas engineers for an agreement that expired on January 1st.

It is seeking a 3% per annum pay rise and faster progression by engineers through the payscale.

The engineers’ most contentious clause is that the Qantas commit to local engineers doing heavy maintenance on the company’s growing fleet of new A380s in the coming years. Local engineers already do line-maintenance, or the day-to-day upkeep of planes, but heavy maintenance engineering starts on an aircraft only after several years of operation. A380s were introduced in late 2008.

Qantas management says it does not have the scale of operation to establish a A380 maintenance hangar in Australia that would be viable. But the union says the likely alternative of “offshoring” the maintenance to the Philippines raises safety concerns.

Australian International Pilot Association

The AIPA is negotiating the current agreement on behalf of the 1700 long-haul Qantas pilots who fly larger aircraft like Boing 747s, 767s, and Airbus A380s and A330s, and has not staged industrial action in 44 years
The union wants a 2.5% a year wage rise which it says is negotiable
The key issue is a Qantas flight/Qantas pilot clauses which would see all Qantas flights operated by Qantas pilots.

Without this clause, the pilots group say the airline’s management will look to employ foreign pilots or use the lower-paid Jetstar pilots on Qantas-coded flights. The pilots are worried Qantas’s plans to move to Asia will mean that lower-skilled foreign pilots will be flying Qantas-branded flights, raising safety concerns and reducing the amount of work available for them.

Qantas argues it cannot continue to operate if it is forced to pay all the pilots the same pay and conditions.

AIPA says it industrial action has not cost the company a cent in revenue, delayed passengers or grounded any flights and that its entire public industrial action over the past four months has been to make a positive in-flight announcements and to wear red ties with a campaign message on them.

What Qantas says

There are 15 unions involved with Qantas and in the past 15 months it reached agreements with 10,000 workers represented by 4 unions over 5 enterprise agreements or 1/3 of the Qantas workforce.

Qantas says the TWU staff are the best paid in the country – 12% high than their equivalents in Virgin Australia – and its pilots and licensed engineers are among the best compensated in the world with its long-haul pilots for example earning 50% more than their peers at Virgin.

It claims the 3 unions are seeking pay and conditions that would put Qantas staff further beyond its competitors and that they want the right to control key elements of how the company is run.

My take on Qantas’s argument that they pay more than their competitor Virgin is that a fair day’s work ought to entitle someone to a fair day’s pay. If Virgin is paying its staff an unsatisfactory wages then it ought to have industrial action taken upon it. But that does not stop Qantas from the criticism that it should receive for paying its average worker $38,000 – which is certainly not a living wage.

The unions are well within their right to protest Qantas the national carrier from outsourcing its services to other countries; and ensuring that if Qantas does that they pay equivalent and equal wages. Moreover $38,000 is a disgusting wage for a full time job in any environment which requires security checks like and international airport. Having poor pissed off workers is never a good thing in that sort of environment.

via: http://infrequentrant.blogspot.com/2011/10/qantas-lockout-what-unions-want-wh...

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URGENT BULLETIN: To all AWU members at #Qantas #AusUnions | The Australian Workers Union

URGENT BULLETIN: To all AWU members at Qantas

29 October 2011

The Australian Workers' Union is as shocked as the travelling public by this extraordinary and unprecendented act by Qantas.

Words can't express our anger at the unilateral decision Qantas management has taken – as well as the impact it will have on all Qantas workers and the thousands of travellers now left stranded in Australia and around the world.

Unions rightly give 72 hours notice before industrial action, but Qantas management has given no notice before this wildcat grounding of their fleet.

Make no mistake: this is an ambush on the Australian people.

We deal with large corporations day in and day out, and one thing we know is that they don't make decisions like this on the spot.

I've already told Qantas that we believe their action is irresponsible, unnecessary and endangering future viability of airline.

At no stage did Qantas request for the Government to intervene – nor use many of the other provisions under the Fair Work Act which could have resolved this dispute earlier.

Let me be clear: the AWU will not stand by and allow our members at Qantas to be unfairly impacted by this decision.

We understand that at this stage, the lockout does not begin until 8pm, Monday 31 October 2011.

Members should also be aware that the Federal Government has now applied to Fair Work Australia to suspend the lockout – we should know the outcome of this application within the next few hours.

The AWU leadership will meet tomorrow morning, the ACTU leadership is meeting this evening and we will notify members of next steps by 11am tomorrow, Sunday 30 October 2011.

We have attached correspondence received by the union from Qantas at 5:15pm today for your reference.

Further information will be provided to members and delegates from their Branch Organiser over the next day.

via awu.net.au

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Union warns Qantas strikes could last a year #qantas #Ausunions #twu

via theaustralian.com.au

THE Transport Workers Union has warned unionists are prepared to wage a year-long campaign of strikes against Qantas as thousands of airline passengers face disruption today from the latest round of stoppages by employees.

As the Gillard government stepped up its criticism of the engineers union for advising the public not to fly Qantas before Christmas, TWU national secretary Tony Sheldon said industrial action would persist until the airline backed down on its strategy to slash labour costs and move jobs offshore.

Insisting the company had "declared war" on its Australian workforce, he told The Australian: "I see our members will be taking strong action from week to week until the matter is resolved, and whether that is Christmas this year, or next year if the company is prepared to break the workforce, the workers are determined to stand up on behalf of their families and the Australian icon."

Qantas will use hundreds of managers to try to soften the impact of the strike today, but still expects to cancel 14 flights and delay 38 others for up to an hour.

The TWU will take strike action in two two-hour blocks during morning and evening peak travel times, except in Canberra.

Politicians seeking to leave the nation's capital at the conclusion of the parliamentary sitting week face a single four-hour strike.

The airline says 6800 passengers will be affected, with further disruption tomorrow as the licensed engineers union holds four-hour stoppages.

Qantas said TWU members in Sydney and Melbourne would be told they were not required to perform their duties - but would still be paid - between the start of their shift and when strike action commenced.

Qantas said the move would allow management staff to work from the start of the shift, "ensure the smooth running of the airport and minimise any further cancellations or delays".

Federal Transport Minister Anthony Albanese yesterday joined criticism of Australian Licensed Aircraft Engineers Association secretary Steve Purvinas for warning passengers not to book with Qantas before Christmas.

"One of the things I don't quite understand, frankly, is the idea that it is in anyone's interests to talk down this great Australian company," he said.

Mr Albanese said he was "very concerned" about the dispute and he found the comments by Mr Purvinas "extraordinary" as "you need a strong company in order to employ people in order to have union members".

Tourism Accommodation Australia managing director Rodger Powell said the threat by unions that disruptions could continue through Christmas would have a significant impact on his sector.

Christmas was the peak holiday travel period of the year, and hotels factored increased demand for accommodation into their planning, Mr Powell said.

Capital city hotels rely on business travellers for their bread and butter and these strikes are already having an impact.

Also of concern is the impact on major events, particularly the Melbourne Cup. The huge investment by many companies in corporate hospitality could be thrown into chaos if flights were disrupted.

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Jetstar crew members claim exploitation | Lateline | #Ausunions

Jetstar crew members claim exploitation

Print Email

Australian Broadcasting Corporation

Broadcast: 27/07/2011

Reporter: Steve Cannane

Jetstar Airlines has been accused tonight of compromising safety by exploiting cabin crew, demanding they work 20-hour or longer shifts.

Transcript

ALI MOORE, PRESENTER: Jetstar Airlines has been accused of exploiting cabin crew tonight, demanding they work 20-hour shifts, sometimes longer.

Current and former crew members of the Qantas-owned budget airline say the practice leaves them extremely fatigued, compromising cabin safety.

And a clause in the contracts of the foreign-based workers says if they're sacked or break their contracts they can be forced to pay back more than four months of their base wages.

This special report by Steve Cannane. Alison McClymont was the producer.

STEVE CANNANE, REPORTER: At Sydney Airport, holidaymakers check in for Jetstar's afternoon flight to Bali. It's a popular service for those escaping the southern Australian winter.

But for Jetstar crew, the flight to Denpasar is no trip to paradise.

'JAMES', FORMER JETSTAR FLIGHT ATTENDANT: You start at four in the afternoon and finish, back in Sydney, seven the next morning. So it was horrible - I felt like a slave. I've had a couple of times where I had delays on the Bali flight and that 14, 15-hour shift would turn into a 19-hour, 20-hour shift.

RICHARD WOODWARD, AUSTRALIAN & INTERNATIONAL PILOTS ASSOCIATION: Well the cabin crew are suffering very badly because they don't have a regulated limit on how many hours they can do, particularly the foreign crews, and so they're working the maximum hours.

For instance, they're doing Sydney-Bali and back - that's about a 17-hour night. That's very, very fatiguing. The pilots fortunately have an industrial agreement and the upper limit of the Civil Aviation Order agreement.

STEVE CANNANE: This practice of making Jetstar crews fly return shifts, rather than staying overnight like pilots, was raised by Nick Xenophon in the Senate inquiry into airline safety earlier this year.

NICK XENOPHON, INDEPENDENT SENATOR: When cabin crew tell me that if there's an emergency, they don't think they'd be able to cope at the end of a 17 or 18 or 20-hour shift, then it really gives you cause for concern.

STEVE CANNANE: And concerns about fatigue are not confined to Jetstar's international flights.

Lateline has obtained over 60 incident reports that show that at least 37 crew members have filed complaints this year to Jetstar management about fatigue and exhaustion after flying the Sydney-to-Perth and Sydney-to-Darwin routes.

They've also raised serious concerns about the cabin crews' ability to deal with emergencies.

JETSTAR FLIGHT ATTENDANT ONE (male voiceover): I believe that if there was an emergency situation, crew would not be alert enough to respond accordingly.

JETSTAR FLIGHT ATTENDANT TWO (female voiceover): It is unsafe and I am concerned that it will only be when something unfortunate happens that something will be done about this.

STEVE CANNANE: Flight attendants are also worried about their own safety after doing shifts that cross from day into night into morning.

JETSTAR FLIGHT ATTENDANT THREE (male voiceover): I was afraid I might have a car accident on the way home from duty.

JETSTAR FLIGHT ATTENDANT FOUR (female voiceover): Driving home after this duty is extremely dangerous and I have found myself almost falling asleep at the wheel.

STEVE CANNANE: And while Jetstar is pushing its Australian-based crews hard, it's the foreign-based crews who are under the most strain.

A third of Jetstar's staff are employed overseas.

Their Bangkok cabin crew are employed by a company called Tour East Thailand.

Lateline has obtained a copy of the employment contract for the Thai-based cabin crews.

It states that crew can work shifts up to 20 long. But as this contract shows, in effect there are no limits to the hours they can be forced to work.

CABIN CREW EMPLOYMENT CONTRACT, TOUR EAST LTD (male voiceover): "The planned limit and operational extensions may be extended by the employer."

STEVE CANNANE: This clause is not in any contracts for Jetstar's Australian-based crews.

NICK XENOPHON: Not only is a clause like that unconscionable, it just seems incredibly unsafe. How will a crew be able to cope with an emergency if they've been required to work in excess of 20 hours in just one shift? It's something that doesn't apply to Australian cabin crew for good reason and it shouldn't apply to foreign-based cabin crew who are doing work here in Australia.

STEVE CANNANE: Jetstar declined to be interviewed for this story, but in a statement tonight said there are clear limitations on hours.

STATEMENT FROM JETSTAR (male voiceover): "Jetstar has clearly established duty limitations that are consistently applied regardless of where our cabin crew are based."

STEVE CANNANE: Jetstar's Thai-based flight attendants get paid a base wage of AU$258 a month. Each hour they fly, they get another $7 an hour, plus allowances. They don't get paid for sick leave and have half the annual leave of their Australian colleagues.

While on annual leave, they get paid less than normal. That AU$7 an hour on top of their base wage, becomes just $9 a day.

Annika, as she's asked to be called, says foreign-based cabin crew are under immense pressure.

'ANNIKA', JETSTAR FLIGHT ATTENDANT (female voiceover): Asian-based crew aren't unionised and they're constantly threatened with the non-renewal of their contracts should they speak out about anything to do with their jobs.

STEVE CANNANE: And there's an extraordinary financial disincentive not to speak out. If Thai-based crew quit their jobs early or are sacked, they can be forced to pay back up to four and half months of their base wage.

In its statement to Lateline, Jetstar also said:

STATEMENT FROM JETSTAR (male voiceover): "Some of our international cabin crew are required to pay a bond as a compensation for investment in training, if a cabin crew member leaves within two years of employment. This is a locally based arrangement that reflects the local market conditions ...".

STEVE CANNANE: On April 22nd, five Thai-based crew, exhausted from a series of domestic and international flights, pulled out of a flight from Sydney and Melbourne, citing fatigue. They were concerned they wouldn't be able to respond to an emergency situation, should one arise. In response, they got this letter from their employer, Tour East Thailand, threatening them with the sack.

TOUR EAST THAILAND (female voiceover): "Whilst illness, etc., is accepted by your employer, poor time management is not ... TET requires from you an undertaking that you will not repeat these behaviours in the workplace."

STEVE CANNANE: This letter castigated the crew members for causing damage to the reputation of their employer, Tour East Thailand, who hire cabin crew for Jetstar. But Tour East Thailand is unlikely to lose its contract with Jetstar. Qantas owns 37 per cent of Tour East Thailand.

NICK XENOPHON: On the face of it, it seems as though the Bangkok-based crew are being looked after by an independent contractor at arm's length from Qantas, when in fact Qantas has an iron grip on this company. It's a pretty mean and tricky set of operations and Qantas really needs to come clean on this.

STEVE CANNANE: Jetstar cabin crew fear more and more flight attendants will be hired under this model: foreign-based, subcontracted, with lower wages and poorer conditions.

ANNIKA (female voiceover): It's all about the money. It's about making as much money as they can. We're constantly cutting corners and pushing the crew, as that's the only the area where we can save.

STEVE CANNANE: Steve Cannane, Lateline.

ALI MOORE: In its statement to Lateline tonight, Jetstar said it has made considerable investment in its fatigue management systems, and it says Jetstar is continuing to invest and build in this important area, in line with a global best practice risk management approach, adding that Jetstar continues to assess their operations in light of their fatigue management system that shows safety is always the first priority.

The full statement and responses to specific questions will be posted on the Lateline website.

Read the full statement and response from Jetstar.

Do you have a comment or a story idea? Get in touch with the Lateline team by clicking here.

via abc.net.au

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#Qantas strike could drag on to Christmas #Ausunions

Slow motion ... Qantas and its key unions are still in the midst of a tug-of-war. Photo: AFR

A DAMAGING game of cat and mouse between Qantas and its key unions will continue to disrupt the travel plans of thousands of passengers late this week, and threatens to escalate in the lead-up to Christmas.

After cancelling industrial action yesterday, the airline's 1600 licensed aircraft engineers now plan to stop work for four hours on Friday. It has the potential to disrupt the plans of Wallabies fans travelling to the Rugby World Cup semi-final between Australia and New Zealand this weekend.

The Transport Workers Union has notified Qantas its members, including baggage handlers and caterers, will take a two-hour stoppage on Thursday if management does not put a ''concrete offer'' on the table. Negotiations between Qantas and the union are scheduled to resume tomorrow.

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Jetstar's check-in staff will also refuse to charge passengers for excess baggage for 24 hours from 3am on Friday, after negotiations over a new enterprise agreement broke down.

Despite the engineers calling off a four-hour stoppage yesterday, Qantas said it was too late to reinstate 40 flights that had been cancelled. ''You just can't turn an airline on and off,'' Olivia Wirth, a Qantas spokeswoman, said.

The engineers' union said it had cancelled the strike yesterday after the company sent notices threatening to withhold up to seven hours pay from its members. Qantas rejected the claim.

Meanwhile, Fijian police have charged the Fiji Airline Pilots' Association secretary, Australian Shalend Scott, over the leaking of documents that embarrassed the national carrier, Air Pacific, part-owned by Qantas.

A hearing is scheduled for October 21.

with AAP

via smh.com.au

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Engineers next to hit Qantas with industrial action | The Australian

via theaustralian.com.au

QANTAS will be forced to shut its heavy maintenance facilities in Brisbane and Victoria tomorrow because of industrial action by licensed engineers.

Members of the Australian Licensed Aircraft Engineers Association will strike for a full shift at the facilities, forcing the airline to stand down other workers on full pay.

The action comes as the Transport Workers Union warned yesterday that it could hold a second round of stoppages involving ground staff as early as next week. However, the union said any action would have to be ratified by members.

The licensed engineers have been ramping up their campaign, extending overtime bans to weekdays and threatening next month to expand one-hour rolling stoppages to four hours.

Unions are bracing for months of strife and ALAEA federal secretary Steve Purvinas has described the situation as a war with the company.

While tomorrow's strike will not have a direct effect on passengers, it will delay entry into service of aircraft undergoing maintenance and add to the cumulative impact of the ALAEA's action.

A rolling campaign by engineers in 2008 saw the airline's on-time performance drop below 70 per cent and cancellations top 6 per cent, while it cost the airline more than $130 million.

Qantas group executive Olivia Wirth said four-hour rolling stoppages by engineers would have a significant impact.

"We don't have a contingency workforce and we don't have contingency capabilities like we do with the TWU workforce," Ms Wirth said.

The TWU strike forced Qantas to cancel 28 flights and delay others but its contingency plans coped with the renewed schedule.

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Union say Qantas sent thugs | Sky News #Ausunions

via skynews.com.au

The Transport Workers Union (TWU) has accused Qantas of 'sending out thugs' in the middle of the night to intimidate staff involved in nationwide strike action.

The national secretary of the TWU, Tony Sheldon, said Qantas representatives visited employees' homes at midnight on Monday to deliver letters condemning the action.

'We want to reach an agreement but sending thugs around to employees' ... homes at midnight is not required by law, it's only required if you want to intimidate and stand over your own workforce and their families,' Mr Sheldon told reporters in Sydney on Tuesday.

He called for the Fair Work Ombudsman to look into the matter.

'The Fair Work Ombudsman needs to investigate families having their doors bashed on at 12 o'clock at night,' he said.

Mr Sheldon said he was aware of 12 cases where this had occurred.

He said the letter informed employees preparing for partial work bans that they would not be entitled to any payment during that period and that the airline refused to accept any work done by them until they were prepared to perform all normal duties.

Mr Sheldon also accused Qantas of escalating disruption to flights by locking out staff prior to the four-hour work stoppage period.

'One thing is quite clear and that's that the company is determined to have a fight with its workforce - it's determined ... to extend the strike,' he said.

About 3700 baggage handlers, caterers and other ground staff stopped work for four hours across Australia's airports on Tuesday.

Another 200 staff responsible for signing off on fuel, supplying aircraft with food and other higher duties, took part in a partial work ban on Tuesday.

Mr Sheldon said the union would continue negotiations with Qantas over the coming days and weeks.

However, if a settlement wasn't reached he would be recommend further industrial action which could include longer strikes.

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