Forty Qantas aircraft engineers in Canberra have learned that their work, heavy maintenance on the Qantaslink Boeing 717 aircraft, will be moved to Singapore from April, leaving them out of work, according to their union.
A media release from the Australian Licensed Aircraft Engineers’ Association (ALAEA), quotes its federal secretary, Steve Purvinas, saying: “The facility in Canberra was only opened in 2015, Qantas accepting all the accolades for supporting local employment.”
He said Qantas had been very quiet about the closure and shifting of work to a facility in Singapore called ST Aero.
“Because the workers are contractors, there has been no consultation, there will be no redundancy payouts and the engineers will be left high and dry,” Purvinas said.
“Qantas are taking advantage of a broken workplace relations system that bypasses fairness in favour of corporate greed. These aircraft never fly out of Australia, yet Qantas will intentionally send them empty to Asia to save a few bucks…”
The release contrasted the earnings of Qantas chief executive Alan Joyce with that of the 40 contractors, who it said earned an average Australian wage and “will now be regretting their move to Canberra in 2015 on a false promise of 10 years’ work”.
Qantaslink operate 20 Boeing 717 aircraft, which serve many secondary destinations in Australia including Canberra, Darwin, Cairns, Gold Coast and Hobart.
According to the ALAEA release, Qantaslink engineers were informed by email of the move with the following message from Qantas management: “I would like to take this opportunity to thank them for the outstanding work they have done over the past three years.”
Written by Peter Needham
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