Qantas chief Vanessa Hudson has a major flight deck problem: pilots are leaving the company’s low-paid regional subsidiaries in a steady stream and many experienced long-haul pilots are possibly retiring in coming years.
She also has a major problem with the company’s mainline short-haul pilots. Bitter accusations between Qantas management, pilots and unions have broken out in strongly worded emails and letters, as the airline fights to salvage its latest enterprise bargaining agreement with its short-haul pilots, its biggest pilot cohort.
The problems come as Hudson faces industrial action from some of the company’s maintenance engineers, who will begin striking on Thursday.
‘Treated pilots with contempt’
A breakdown of trust between pilots and management has been at the core of the pilot exodus. Qantas pilots loathe management, according to multiple pilots who spoke to Crikey. This began under former CEO Alan Joyce, who “treated pilots with contempt”, according to one pilot. This was dramatically exacerbated by the carrier sacking hundreds of pilots during COVID while management kept their jobs.
“All the pilots hate management. While some things have changed under Hudson, the new mantra from management is to point to the ‘Alan Joyce’ era. Most of them were part of that. And the company’s attitude to industrial relations has not changed one bit,” a Qantas pilot told Crikey.
Tony Lucas, president of the Australian and International Pilots Association (AIPA), the main pilot union, admitted discontent has been the worst he has seen in 30 years: “Recently the BS has ramped up to levels that I’ve not previously experienced and only rarely seen against AIPA in my nearly 30 years as a Qantas pilot.”
Acrimony between staff and management is taking place despite platitudes from Hudson in the company’s latest annual report about improved relations with airline staff. “Our people are our greatest asset and we will continue to invest in them, including through recruitment and training,” she wrote.
As an experienced Qantas international pilot told Crikey, “There are hundreds of long-haul pilots who will retire in the next few years. While there are many first officers who have been waiting a long time to step up, there is a vacuum behind them. Emirates are cleaning up, other Middle Eastern airlines are also hiring, Cathay Pacific and the Japanese and Chinese airlines are also back in the market.”
Qantas pilots at the carrier’s worst-paid regional divisions are lining up to leave, lured by better salaries and working conditions at overseas airlines, as well as at local competitor Virgin.
As one regional pilot told Crikey, “There are about 20 to 25 pilots who are waiting on hold at Virgin, but their start dates have been deferred or delayed due to Rex pilots being snapped up by Virgin. Hudson has been lucky with the Rex collapse, it at least delayed this disaster for her.”
Pay deal ‘not good enough
Qantas’ enterprise bargaining agreement offer for its short-haul pilots has been met with scorn, especially in the wake of a recently improved deal between Virgin and its pilots after pilots voted down the first draft. The Qantas EBA also falls well short of salary increases gained by pilots in offshore airlines this year.
“There are some good things in it, but it’s not good enough, especially when we see the $2 billion in profits the company makes, the huge management bonuses and the increases and bonuses that pilots in other international airlines are getting,” one pilot said.
In a bid to strong-arm pilots, the national carrier’s tactics have involved withholding the $5,000 recovery boost — announced two years ago and already paid to thousands of other staff — until pilots sign the EBA.
Concerned with management monitoring of the online pilot chat site PPrUNe, pilots took their grievances onto private Whatsapp groups. However, AIPA has admitted it is also monitoring these groups and appeared to threaten its own members that Qantas would act against them.
“It is important to remind all pilots that what you consider to be ‘private’ slack forums and WhatsApp groups are not ‘private’ when it comes to what you say about your colleagues. Pilots have previously faced consequences under Qantas Code of Conduct policies for what has been said across a variety of so-called ‘private’ forums.”
FWC decision imminent
The aggressive attempts by both management and AIPA to get short-haul pilots to agree to the new terms have raised further suspicion as to their motives for the “urgency to complete the deal”, as one pilot put it.
The Australian Federation of Airline Pilots, a rival union, has publically flagged a range of problems it has with the Qantas EBA and has recommended its members vote no. The union told Crikey it had been steadily gaining members from AIPA.
The decision of the Fair Work Commission (FWC) on Qantas’ pay dispute with pilots at its Perth-based subsidiary Network Aviation is due in coming weeks. The FWC mediated the recent Virgin pilots deal, which has seen their salaries draw close to those at Qantas short haul, people familiar with the deal said.
All pilots who spoke to Crikey believe the FWC vote will go against Qantas.
“It would be good if it was voted down, because it would be good slap in the face for Qantas as a company, and the Qantas pilot union, which has not been negotiating properly,” one pilot said
We should know by next Wednesday.
Do you back Qantas pilots in their fight against management? Let us know your thoughts by writing to letters@crikey.com.au. Please include your full name to be considered for publication. We reserve the right to edit for length and clarity.
