Pilots vs. Unions

[Guest basscheffers]

I decided to start a new thread, in response to http://www.recreationalflying.com/forum/general-discussion/120186-casa-discussion-paper-9.html going off-topic.

 

The Bloke is a hero. It is a BAD look for the airline and IF the management had any real appreciation of the likely reaction of the Union who HAVE to support the pilot, they wouldn't have done it. UNLESS...Perhaps ( MORE LIKELY) the management WANT to bring on a dispute so they can bring the SUPERCHEAP foreign pilots in to help the airline get their passengers around over Xmas.

Check out WHO owns most of Jetstar. Nev

It's probably a little more complicated than that. If the unions go on strike over this, an airline cant just hire a bunch of foreign pilots to fill the gaps. The problem is training; the pilots needn't just be type-rated ATPLs, they also need to be trained up to the airline's operating procedures. Training normally given by the same people that are on strike!

 

But yeah, in the long run, breaking the unions is a good strategy for Jetstar or any airline. They are already doing it with cut-rate NZ and Singapore based crews.

 

For an interesting view on Airline and union relationship, read this: Unions and Airlines

 

To summarise: pilots unions are so powerful they pretty much try to take all profit from an airline. When Fuel prices all of a sudden go up and passenger loads go down, where does that leave the airline?

 

So excuse me for not just rooting for the pilots; many of their problems are of their own making. You think it's airline management that like to the seniority system with a captain earning 5 times what a fresh FO does? That's the captain-run unions screwing the young ones, not the airline. Experience counts for something in all industries, but not quite as much as it seems to do in the airlines.

 

 

[Methusala]

Getting rid of unions is an aim of ALL management so they can continue their game of a race to the bottom in terms of wages. Please check out the "packages" that managers award themselves.

 

When they have their hands on the money they can see no reason to be stingey to themselves! I recall that Geoff Dixon was pushing a deal to sell Qantas to Allco finance

 

claiming it to be the deal of the century. Shortly afterwards, Allco disappeared up its fundamental orifice. Don't confuse management with the idea of "good". My spirited 2

 

bobs (not cents) worth, Don

 

 

[Guest basscheffers]

Getting rid of unions is an aim of ALL management so they can continue their game of a race to the bottom in terms of wages.

Having unions is not a black and white situation; I have no problem with having a pilots union. In fact, I am PRO union! But they should be there to keep the employers honest; not to themselves abuse their power, especially at the expense of their younger colleagues.

Look at the way the flight attendants union is holding BA to ransom. It's criminal, when the future of the airline is very much in the balance.

 

Please check out the "packages" that managers award themselves.

You have to put that into perspective. Yes, Allan Joyce may take home around $5M. But if he gave all that up and divided it amongst Qantas' 33,000 employees, each of them would take home a whopping extra $152 per annum!

People see these numbers and fail to put them into perspective. In reality they have very little effect on the bottom line of these billion-dollar companies. Much like complaining about the price of petrol and looking at the billions of profit is being made by the oilers. Think of how many cars in the world and how many cents you could realistically knock of a litre before the entire profit is gone?

 

PS: I do have a BIG issue with the oil companies not using their billions in profit to make their operations safer or to make good those who are affected by their spills.

 

 

[Methusala]

G'day Bass, It is not really valid to justify earnings packages that multiply executive salaries by factors of 1000 x workers' ($5,000,000 vs $50,000) so glibly. The way that executives work is on a typical 3 yr contract with heavy bonuses for increases in market capitalisation. This means that their interest is in the relatively short term view. When a company announces a round of redundancies it is usually rewarded with a hike in share price. The deal that Dixon set up would have rewarded him and fellow directors hugely but, as we have seen, would have lost the workers their jobs and Australia their flying kangaroo. Don't wish to overly politicise discussion but I see too much across the board

 

sledging of an imperfect TU movement without any sign that people inform themselves on other issues. See the great bankster fraud that cost many countries' middle classes their savings. Regards, Don

 

 

[poteroo]

The Men Who Killed Qantas by Matthew Benns.

 

"The flying kangaroo was once the natural first choice for travelling Australians. Now it attracts an endless stream of media headlines about mid-air dramas and maintenance breakdowns.This is the Qantas story that every airline passenger needs to read. It is the full and frank history of Australias' national carrier - a story that includes greed, lies, and crashes. It takes you into the boardroom, where giant golden parachutes are signed off, and onto the hangar floor, where engineers battle accounting cuts to keep planes flying. It takes you back to the foundation of the airline to disprove, once and for all, the official line that Qantas never crashes. This is the warts and all history that the powerful Qantas PR department does not want you to see....but you can bet they'll be reading it too ! "

 

from the back cover...........

 

happy days,

 

 

[Guest basscheffers]

G'day Bass, It is not really valid to justify earnings packages that multiply executive salaries by factors of 1000 x workers'

I agree you can't justify it; executives are overpaid and too often think short term due to their personal gain from a "pump and dump" of their own share options.

All I am doing is putting it into perspective; people see the exec's $5M and wrongly assume that means the company could also afford to pay everyone else lots more.

 

 

[Gnarly Gnu]

Unions are just another big business out to look after nobody but themselves. Long gone are the days they were interested in helping and protecting the workers.... in fact a pool of unemployed workers is a necessary by-product of their actions.

 

 

[winsor68]

Unions are just another big business out to look after nobody but themselves. Long gone are the days they were interested in helping and protecting the workers.... in fact a pool of unemployed workers is a necessary by-product of their actions.

As an Airline employee in a department which has the unions stripped out of it 10 or so years ago I find this sort of ignorant BS offensive... The Unions are not perfect... but they are all you have.

 

I hear it all the time when new people start working in my field.... "They can't expect us to work 15 hour days"... "We are entitled to a 10 hour break"... etc etc etc

 

What people fail to realize is that all those "Rules" were fought for and won for workers by Unions... and that they are not part of industrial relations laws in Australia... Remove the Union and your employer can work you whatever hours they wish because only Union Industries are automatically entitled to anything.

 

Ironically it is usually people who are in a Union who complain... all the while accepting the conditions the Union gives them... something the rest of us can only dream of.

 

 

[Methusala]

It is an undeniable fact that employers and industries spend enormous sums on public relations (a more acceptable term for propaganda) - lobby groups that use secret forums to pressure politicians, and industrial legal representation both across the board in national wage cases and individually in industry awards. Mention of these organisations, eg. Chamber of Commerce and Industry, even the taxpayer funded Australian Building and Construction Commission that have a central purpose - that is to oppose organised labour - does not prompt the negative reaction that CFMEU, AWU, ANF etc seems to.

 

Unions are necessary to attempt to balance the equation and ensure that living conditions do not fall in the way that those in the US have. Lets have a balanced view of society and realise that Australian egalitarianism is based on "the fair go for all". Don

 

 

[facthunter]

opinions.

 

There are plenty of sources of anti-union rhetoric and they are well funded. Unions are demonised often. The Murdoch press is flagrantly anti-union.

 

The employer -employee relationship is one sided except when there is a shortage of labour and the competition for good workers drives up pay and conditions.

 

A BAD employer can act as the main recruitment driver for union membership. IF all employers were good employers, there would be no need for unions at all.

 

Do you want to travel in an airliner where the boss has just sacked a pilot for refusing to take an aircraft which has safety related faults and a new( scared) pilot has just hopped in the seat ready to take the flight. Think it doesn't happen?... Dream on.

 

Happens in the trucking industry too. Could be eliminated overnight if people were fair dinkum. Trouble is, if your competitor is not unionised and therefore forced to do it right , you are at a competitive disadvantage and may go out of business.

 

Most intending passengers will just go on-line and go for the CHEAPEST fare regardless of the reputation of the airline.

 

Would the same people just go on-line and look up the cheapest car, and buy it without going well into it. Funny Huh? Nev

 

 

[Guest ozzie]

A repeat of 1989? Jet* would love it. Give them a chance to offshore all their pilots and cabin crew. playing into their hands, just like they did for Ables.

 

This is a thread for PPRune.

 

 

[Methusala]

Sorry but.... I do notice the occasional shot fired this way or that in these posts regarding "sacred" political beliefs. This thread was not started by myself but it being here I have added my voice as have others. If one does not wish to partake in any discussion held in these pages then just don't. It is for the moderator to decide what shall be legitimate for discussion and not for individuals to take up the censor's red pen.

 

Thanks,Don

 

 

[Methusala]

The truth in industrial relations is that the working class (very unfashionable term since the press have renamed them"Howard's battlers") are only a vote away from the recurring nightmare of "Workchoices". The architects and virulent proponents of this scheme remain while the hapless John W Howard has fallen by the wayside. The "truth" about the IR wars in this country lives in our memories of Reith and Corrigan directing balaclava draped dog handlers against Australian workers. Any workers who think that these people are to be trusted should research the shoddy way in which the Bahrein trained strikebreakers where discarded after their part ended. "Boots and all" is the way this debate has always been conducted! My conclusive remarks to this thread, kind wishes, Don

 

 

[winsor68]

Workchoices is well and truly alive... I am too disgusted to even talk about it any more.

 

And sorry but BS and Ignorant are just the least of the words I would use for people who have blinkers on because it doesn't affect them... there is a real problem and the Baby Boomers have sold the rest of us up the garden path to self fund their own retirements.... and then they have the gall to complain!!! Talk about taking the cake and eating it too. Any generation after after will be lucky to get crumbs.

 

 

[winsor68]

Listen... I am sorry if it sounds like I am having a go at all of you guys... This is why I say it.

 

We all remember The Who singing "A Young man ain't got nothing in the world these days"... Was true then... is ten times more relevant today.

 

What I am seeing is the Baby Boomers owning everything... they own the business that has reduced wages to pitiful levels and is happy to go along with a government (also populated by BBers) that mandates that it happens....

 

Meanwhile in smoko rooms, living rooms, and just about anywhere Baby Boomers are commenting that the young people today are "out of control"...are the cause of these problems because they "want everything now" and are causing the world to go down hill.

 

Last time I checked... it was still a case of the old man "having all the money, cause a young man still ain't got nothing in the world these days"

 

Unless you count the Plasma TV's, computers and cars. Try getting by without all these unnecessary consumables... Again... who profits here?

 

It is ironic... So what I am saying is I don't hold any of you personally responsible... But this is what has happened from where I have been observing for the last 20 years since I entered the workplace.

 

Please don't take offence... But take a look around and think what all this means for our kids and grandkids... they are the ones who will pay the price. They are the ones who will really do it tough.

 

 

[winsor68]

This thread back up what I am implying here... Somewhere someone pointed out that the senior pilots are quite happy to get their perks at the expense of the younger guys coming into the game... Its the old Gordon Gecko "Greed is good" mentality... its everywhere.

 

 

[winsor68]

Thanks for understanding the point I was ineffectually trying to make Blackrod...

 

The fact that it has been the same through the ages is ironic is it not? Sadly I feel that it is going to be much more deeply felt for the future generations. In many respects we have been lucky.

 

I mean how fair is it that this generation votes to raise the retirement age for all the future generations but that is effectively what we have done. In France they tried it and the people tore the place appart!!!

 

 

[Methusala]

Obviously the "ends justifies the means". applies to thuggish tactics re dogs and balaclavas on the australian wharfs? And I know of the case of an industrial manager at a mine site in the 80's who was always accompannied by his "friend", a boxer! Why was HE so popular? Nothing wrong with my memory by the way - I remember Howard saying that no Australian worker would be worse off under Workchoices. I do resent an implication of unfairness when I have only recounted factual acts. So it goes...Don.

 

PS I did not introduce the statement "boots 'n' all" to the discussion.

 

 

[winsor68]

What I want to know is... If as they say we are all going to live to 80 who is going to pay for it???

 

Most of us will be lucky to live past 70 with modern work practices evolving the way they are... Unless we have an absolute bucket load of super and an chunky inheritance, or you were lucky to get onto the bubble wagon before it burst this may be a blessing...

 

 

[Methusala]

Dear Winsor Mate, I am nearly 60 yrs and I have been asking myself the same sorta questions as your last one. In the 60's and 70's there were self-sustainability models called communes populated by hippies or alternate life style people. This was a movement that was not able generally to withstand the pressures of personalities and generally poor economic distribution.

 

The answer is only to live in harmony with the land and nature - not taking more than needed and accepting that natures cycles can deal very harshly with all living things.

 

The history of pre-industrial society shows that people and the Earth can exist with little detriment on this basis.

 

We now know that , for example, CO2 levels in the atmosphere have increased since this time. we also know through the work of an early economist named Malthus that we

 

cannot demand more and more stuff from a finite planet. And so it goes...regards, Don

 

 

[Methusala]

Dear Black Rod et al, Please don't take this as arrogance but, at last some light shining out of this debate. The question as always is not unions vs employers and not labour vs conservative but how do we as a group survive a looming catastrophe. I don't think that the problems will be solved in this forum but I am pleased to see we've escaped from a

 

loop! Back to aviation. Regards, Don

 

 

[winsor68]

Mankind needs to populate other planets or we need perfect, free and total birth control.

 

 

[winsor68]

Warren Buffett: Read My Lips, Raise My Taxes - ABC News

[Methusala]

Are unionists imagining victimisation?

 

The World Today - Unionists claim membership means no work 14/12/2010

 

 

[winsor68]

The World Today - Unionists claim membership means no work 14/12/2010

This has happened in my industry (Airline Ground Handling)... All employees at my work have been told and I quote "If you join a Union you don't want to work here"...

 

This stuff really is a joke... Just recently I questioned my employer about our wages and conditions... result??? I was labelled a "whinger" and had my hours cut... cost approx. $400 per f/night. Contacted Fairwork Australia... they can't do anything to protect people from this sort of thing.

 

All the big airlines know about this... by employing contractors they get away with it and no comeback... Just give it 20 years and it will happen to your industry if it hasn't already.

 

Unless of course people wake up and stop bashing the Unions... Because if you have ever looked into this... that was all the worker had... there is no other safety net...