Workers here for the long haul

We are at a crucial stage of the unions’ campaign for justice and fairness at Qantas. The Engineers dispute has no doubt paved the way to ensure that we must all stand up and be counted as Qantas has given no one any confidence that they can stick to a deal even if one is struck in this or any other agreement.

Whether it’s a free-falling share price, a failed sale, the largest corporate price fixing cartel that the Sydney Morning Hearld described as a “global debacle that has snowballed into the world’s largest and most far reaching anti-cartel investigation.”

Yet here we still have the Qantas CEO defending his position and Qantas’s record to all who are prepared to listen but makes no mention of the current investigations and the fines dished out by the illegal price fixing that Qantas has engaged in. He might not but we should be making sure Journalists start asking the pertinent questions regarding Qantas’s and Dixon’s performance.

Let’s also clear up a few myths that are being continually perpetuated by Qantas management. If you have listened to news and interviews over the past month, it would be fair to say that Qantas management are trying pretty hard to believe, and get others to believe, their own rhetoric. Let’s just zero in on the facts. Geoff Dixon can say what he likes but many of his own Staff have given up on him as we speak. How long can the Shareholders he often refers to, continue supporting him? We can only wonder when we have a closer look at the following series of events of this once great Australian Airline.  The real spirit of Qantas is at an all-time low and free falling quicker than Qantas’s current share price.

Firstly, how does a CEO survive an illegal price fixing cartel that has been in operation during all the time that he has been at the helm? If he was not aware of it, why wasn’t he aware of it? That would usually be enough for any CEO in charge of 35,000 employees to be shown the door but not this CEO.  So far we have $A70 million in fines, an undisclosed fine by the ACCC, an impending class action estimated to be in the vicinity of $200-$300 million, a former Qantas executive in jail and more Qantas Executives under investigation.

We have had a failed sale, a share price that has dropped 52% and still in free-fall, a serious industrial dispute that threatens the very nature of the business – aviation and no doubt many more disputes are quickly about to enter the identical ‘flight path’ as they taxi onto the negotiation and dispute runway.

One could draw the conclusion given the obvious failure to easily negotiate a fair outcome for these group of workers that maybe DIxon’s final legacy is about deliberately manufacturing and prolonging this dispute as an excuse to move more jobs offshore. If you talk to some people in the industry, they will tell you that this is exactly the reason Qantas Wage position continues to remain at 3% irrespective of the financial position of Qantas. Qantas constantly take advantage of any impending or actual airline crisis. Let’s analyse some of the more common statements Qantas rely upon in its public defense of their position.

Qantas has Increased thousands of Jobs

This one is a beauty as many or most of the new jobs created are temporary in description through outsourcing with workers now doing Qantas mainstream work even though they are not and have never been employed directly by Qantas and are also on inferior conditions of employment. What areas of Qantas has not been touched by outsourced labour which has directly undermined the job security for every Qantas worker and their families? As is the case just last week, Dixon quoted Avalon as not being part of this current dispute and again these workers are employed doing the same work as the current engineers on Qantas Aircraft but are employed by “Forstaff” and not by Qantas. They may have increased jobs but not ones that afford the same set of working conditions to workers doing identical work. How can you boast about increasing jobs when the airline doesn’t or is unwilling to directly employ these working Australians?

Job Security

How can there be any level of job security when Qantas is hellbent on outsourcing and selling off the airline? One only has to look at the ‘job security’ clause in any union agreement to determine where Qantas are heading or in many cases, have already landed as far as job security goes. There is no job security at Qantas and many would argue that there hasn’t been any for at least the last six years.

Wage Policy

Qantas wage policy did not just come around this time due to increased fuel costs. They have been trotting out this “wage policy” of 3% whether it be in good times, bad times or at any other time. The facts are that Qantas have no interest in genuinely negotiating and bargaining a fair deal in any set of negotiations with their workforce. That is why Dixon calls it “wage policy”. How can you have ‘predetermined’ wage policy when you are negotiating a new set of terms and conditions of employment. When DIxon negotiates his own deal, apparently Qantas’s wage policy is no longer “wage policy”. If it were, he would be getting 3% instead of 48% on total remuneration over the past two years. Let’s put it into some perspective, Dixon earns an average of $130,000 per week which equates to 185 Qantas workers who are on about $700 per week.

Have a look at all the enterprise agreements registered during Dixon’s reign and see what the wage clauses hold. Qantas has been bludgeoning workers into a position of fear over their job security due to events such as SARS and 911 with flexibility, wage freezes, wage restraints and yet we are no closer to any fair wage increases and job security today. They use the ‘volotile’ airline industry as ransom over their workers even when Qantas’s financials has never been stronger. This is evident in the CEO’s own pay packet that gives him a nice little earner of nearly $7 million per annum and a 48% increase over the past two years and now through the ‘goodness of his heart’ has established a “wage freeze” for executives apparently due to the increased “fuel costs.” If workers were earning 48% wage increases we are sure they also would have no problems offering up a wage freeze. They have however already accepted wage freezes during a previous airline crisis. It is just sheer and blatant hypocrisy however for Qantas Executives that have arguably not even performed to warrant these obscene increases to their own remuneration. How can the average Mum’s and Dad’s who fly Qantas accept these unreal world standards when they are struggling to keep a roof over their heads, feed and clothe their children?

The Battle Lines

This will most likely be the most important industrial dispute workers will be involved in (irrespective of what areas of Qantas and what union you are in) since the waterfront battle in the late 90’s. There is only one option in this round for all unions…we must fight and be united in achieving a fair outcome for all Qantas workers and our families. We are not just fighting for wage increases, we are fighting for our very survival and there is no better time than now to do it. The alternative is to simply sit and wait in the ‘departure lounge’ to the unemployment scrapheap. We will not remain at Qantas by accepting wage restraints and more ‘flexibility’ by allowing Qantas to threaten us again. We will remain at Qantas by forcing management to adopt changed standards of integrity, fairness, transparency and to finally recognise it has been the very workers they continue to attack, who have put them in the place where they are today…one of the most most profitable and the safest airline in the world.

This point should not be lost on the Rudd Government should they get pressured to intervene. If they do, it will surely be a test of his leadership in supporting Australian workers and their families who put him where he and his Labor Colleagues are today – in Government for the people of Australia.

Qantas has laid this dispute firmly at our collective feet and we must end up standing firm on both of them.