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| Issue No 10 |  |
23 April 1999 |
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NewsUnions to take on Qantas Over Foreign Jobs
NSW unions plan a co-ordinated strategy against Qantas, as the national airline announced plans to extend its offshore recruitment program.
The Labor Council will co-ordinate a campaign across the airline amidst rising concerns the company is becoming a hostile and anti-union employer. Flight Attendants Association international president Peter Smith told this week's Labor Council that Qantas had increased the number of foreign jobs it would seek to more than 500. While Qantas originally claimed the decision was about employing the foreigners for the language skills and cultural diversity, they had betrayed this as a lie by nominating Auckland as a recruiting base, Smith said. As reported in Workers Online last week, Qantas is looking to cuts by recruiting Thai nationals, who are paid 40 to 50 per cent less than Australian workers. "This is a clear attack on Australian wages and conditions," Smith said. "We can't believe the double-standards of Qantas," he said. "One month ago, they told the Productivity Commission in Canberra that foreign airlines shouldn't be allowed to fly in Australia because of the impact on Australian jobs. One month later they are recruiting offshore." The FAAA warns this could be the first step in Qantas moving more of their operations offshore, including engineering and maintenance work. "Qantas has a moral responsibility to invest in Australian jobs and if they don't want do that then the union movement should force them to," Smith said. Labor Council secretary Michael Costa described the decision as "appalling" saying that Qantas was jeopardising its status as Australia's ambassador airline. "It's time we put a bit of heat on Qantas and exposed it for the sort of bastardry that it's undertaking in a range of areas," Costa said. The Qantas decision follows a string of actions by the company which have angered unions, including hiring private detectives to secretly film ground staff while drinking off-duty and organising foreign customs officials to strip-search flight crew for alcohol.
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   Interview: Latham: Leading With The ChinLabor's heretical voice talks about trade unions and how they'll survive in the land of the Third Way. Unions: Nursing the NumbersActive members are the key to recruitment for one of the state's strongest unions, the NSW Nurses Association. We talk to some of the star recruiters. History: A Sense of CommunityHistorian Greg Patmore looks at labour-community coalitions in the Lithgow Valley between 1900 and 1932. International: Labor Council Official to Dili Front LineLabor Council’s Chris Christodoulou will be one of the first foreign unionists to head to East Timor in the leadup to independence. Review: When Billy Met LindsayWhat happens when a British political popster meets with an Australian political thinker? Legal: CyberPorn in the WorkplaceA new protocol in the NSW public service is setting the benchmark for acceptable use of the internet.
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