Famous last Qantas words in Bangkok: 'Nothing to worry about'

[Mid]

Famous last Qantas words in Bangkok: 'Nothing to worry about'
Lindsay Murdoch
October 30, 2011

Bangkok: Claudia Braun was so afraid of being stranded in flood ravaged Bangkok she telephoned Qantas hours before flight QF2 left London for the Thai capital, a scheduled stopover on the way to Sydney.

“I was told there was nothing to worry about,” says Ms Braun, a 28 year-old veterinary surgeon from Zurich.

But almost 18 hours into the flight, shortly before QF2 was to land in Bangkok on Saturday night, she and 300 other passengers were told the flight was being suspended in the city that is under threat from the worst floods in half a century.

“It’s just so unfair,” Ms Braun said in tears as she wandered chaotic Bangkok airport almost two hours after the plane had landed.

As first and business class passengers were ushered on to a British Airways flight to Sydney, economy passengers were told they would be taken by bus to the Four Wings Hotel in the Sukhumvit Road area of Bangkok, one of the areas under threat of flooding.

But Ms Braun said she did not want to stay in Bangkok and tried to book on another flight to Sydney, where she was to meet a friend and fly to Cairns for a four week holiday.

But she failed to secure a booking and by then the bus had left without her.

"I was willing to pay for a seat on another airline....I was quite hysterical," she said.

With the help of an ABC television crew, Ms Braun eventually was taken to the hotel where passengers were told that efforts would be made to book them on alternative flights.

Sydney rigger Gary Flanagan, 64, says Qantas staff either lied or were misinformed when they told passengers who arrived at Bangkok airport to check in for the flight to Sydney that the cause of suspension was either industrial action or a maintenance problem.

“I heard on the news before I left my hotel in Bangkok that Qantas had suspended all its flights,” he said.

Louis Moser, Qantas’s manager in Bangkok, was at the hotel handing out a Qantas statement blaming the cancellations on “damaging industrial action by unions.”

“We sincerely apologise for the impact this industrial action is having on your travel plans,” the statement said.

David Stuart, managing director of Sydney-based company Colormaker Industries, paid $1859 for a seat on an Emirates to Sydney rather than having to stay in Bangkok, unsure when he would be booked home by Qantas.

“Sure, I’m upset. Why wouldn’t you be?,” he said.

Mr Stuart said as QF2 came in to land he overheard flight staff telling passengers that Qantas boss Alan Joyce had been “quite stubborn” in negotiations with airline unions.

Only a few of the passengers taken to the hotel ventured out into Bangkok where large areas are inundated in filthy waist deep water.

Stephanie Monh, 32, from Germany, said passengers had been told they would receive some news at breakfast.

“They explained something about the reason for flight’s cancellation but I didn’t understand it,” she said.

Passengers arriving at Bangkok airport for the flight QF1 to London early today were told the plane was not going anywhere.

“There’s nothing we can do,” said London taxi driver Dave Bates, 62, who has been holidaying in Thailand.

“I hope they can quickly put me on another flight,” he said.

“I don’t want to be stranded in Bangkok’s floods….I have spent all week avoiding them."

smh.com.au

See Also : https://teakdoor.com/world-news/98022...l-flights.html (Qantas grounds all flights)

[Sezzo]

This is why I have avoided Quaintarse for years. They know nothing about service at all.

[Orroz]

....I was quite hysterical," she said.

One night in Bangkok. Is that anything to get hysterical about? Get a grip, woman

[DrAndy]

"I was willing to pay for a seat on another airline....I was quite hysterical," she said.

silly bitch

This is why I have avoided Quaintarse for years. They know nothing about service at all.

this has nothing to do with service, good or bad

merely taking the fight to the unions who would probably have grounded the flights anyway

[BobR]

....I was quite hysterical," she said.

One night in Bangkok. Is that anything to get hysterical about? Get a grip, woman

A dramatic drama queen enjoying her 15 minutes of fame.

The story does not really say whether the grounding was completely optional or if the union actions had risen to a level to which the airline could legitimately no longer operate. It would also be interesting what the stockholders think about this, especially if the grounding was not immediately necessary.

[Wally Dorian Raffles]

^^^^There are many reasons why i avoid flying with Qantas - pronounced Cuntarse here in Japan.

The atrocious service being the main reason.

Last time I flew with them (over 5 years ago), i was constantly bumped by the overweight, bitter old pooves and hags each time they squeezed down the isles - i asked them to be careful, and not only did they pull attitude on me, they made sure they bumped me everytime they passed me!

I'm all for the policies of thai/singapore airways etc. Just employ pretty, young lasses who enjoy their jobs - and once they are old and fat, transfer them to jobs away from the public eye...

[Khun Custard]

Louis Moser, Qantas’s manager in Bangkok, was at the hotel handing out a Qantas statement blaming the cancellations on “damaging industrial action by unions.”

From what I saw on Australian network last night, the head of the unions stated that only 6 hours had been lost in the past 7 months due to stop work, industrial action.
The negotiations have been stalling for the same amount of time while a portion of profits from Qantas are laundered over to Jetstar to further enhance the asian low cost model appeal still continued
Any one remember the biz plan of Mr Twomey in the collapse of Ansett ANZ??

The unions are negotiating for wage and condition improvements and trying to stop the Asianification of cockpit crew to save a few bucks. Auzzies are just as Xeneophobic as Asians (but don't subscribe to all this face saving crap and wispers) when it comes to who is at the helm of thier national icon regardless of thier skill and track record.

All this in just over 24 hours after the AGM at which Alan Joyce, the CEO gets a Aud$2.5m PA salary increase.
So much for respect and transperency with their shareholders!!

"They are trashing our strategy and our brand. They are deliberately destabilising the company. Customers are now fleeing from us," Qantas Chief Executive Alan Joyce said. w

How much lower can employer / employee reationship go in a company that has traded for 91 years with out purging the current Board and the CEO - after all, in the scheme of things, they are the minority?
The shareholders should sack the Board of Qantas and send the Irish git back home.

i was constantly bumped by the overweight, bitter old pooves and hags each time they squeezed down the isles

A famous old joke Wally....

2 well travelled businesmen sitting in the lobby of a hotel (known to accommodate many flight crews) thought they'd do a bit of trolly dolly spotting.

First to walk across the foyer was two tall, arian beauties with marching step..
"I think they are Lufthanzer said one business man to the other.
The question was asked and a precise and polite answer was offered " Yah, ve are zee Lufhanzer crew"

2nd was a couple of asians, looking like they were on a cat walk, graciously smiling and showing courtesy to old and young alike
Must be Thai, the question asked ...Kar, kar we Thai!!

3rd group was a couple who walked fast, talked loud, ingnorant of their surrounds and plonked themselves down right next to the buisnessmen
One of the chaps inquired " may I ask what airline you work with?
One turned around and said 'What the fuck! that's none of your business.

The two business men turned to each other and simultaneously said QANTAS

[Bettyboo]

this has nothing to do with service, good or bad merely taking the fight to the unions who would probably have grounded the flights anyway

Being kicked off your plane and stranded in a flooded city thousands of miles from your destination, surely must have something to do with service...

I hope they all get full refunds (as the CEO said in his press release), but these folk will get zero compensation... the service they've received is abysmal and is directly due to senior management decisions that show exactly how much the CEO cares about service. He doesn't... He will lose his job over this general fiasco! Quite rightly so.

Now, I am neither siding with or against the unions, I am simply commenting upon this story.

[harrybarracuda]

[quote=Khun Custard;1920903]

The negotiations have been stalling for the same amount of time while a portion of profits from Qantas are laundered over to Jetstar to further enhance the asian low cost model appeal still continued

As discussed on the other thread in World News (and why open a second thread Mid?), Since Qantas OWN Jetstar, there is no "portion of profits" being "laundered".

And Qantas' international arm, which is normally the big earner, is taking a pasting ($200 million in the red). Do the employees want to chip in? Of course not, the shareholders are the ones that have to cover it.

Because they are in competition with carriers eating away at both the premium cabin and budget travel business, they simply have to cut costs to survive.

This is exactly what BA and Iberia have done, and unfortunately something has to give.

If the Qantas pilots et al think it's just Qantas, let's see them fuck off and get a more lucrative job somewhere else.

No, I don't think so somehow.

It's the world we live in mate. Why do you think travel is so cheap these days?

Ryan Air have created a Low Cost Carrier and shown just how to make money, so have Air Asia, and Jetstar are competing with the likes of them, Nok Air, 1-2-Crash, etc.

If any money is being "laundered" as you say, it's probably in the other direction to prop up the failing international part, which is already taking all sorts of measures like cancelling aircraft orders and squeezing more seats onto the A380 to try and cut costs and increase revenue.

[Bettyboo]

Do the employees want to chip in? Of course not, the shareholders are the ones that have to cover it.

Let's be clear, Harry, because I went through the same situations many times when I worked a corporate life: 'Do the employees want to chip in?' means job loses and pay/benefits cuts in real terms for a certain group of workers, while the SMT get massive pay increases. You say it is that way because they deserve it, earn it, etc. I can tell you from experience that that is simple untrue. It's dog eat dog, and the scum that are prepared to walk upon everybody else to get to the top are neither the most capable nor the ones with proven track records - this is an utter fallacy... Many many CEOs have taken company after company to the dogs, fuked up time after time and have zero respect from anybody who knows the business well. These folk just manipulate shareholder positions against employee positions for the sake of their bonuses - they are not in it for the longhaul, for the sake of the company or the employees (who ARE the company in this case), but solely for their own benefit - this is a massive global problem in business, as we have seen with the bankers so clearly; greed and incompetence of the CEOs/SMT who fuk up companies and economies then walk away with millions in bonuses leaving massive job cuts and company failures behind...

[harrybarracuda]

He will lose his job over this general fiasco! Quite rightly so.

Once again, there is absolutely no way this decision would have been made without the approval of his board.

This is exactly what the BA unions tried on, that it was a lunatic CEO acting in isolation.

*NER* Wrong.

[harrybarracuda]

Let's be clear, Harry, because I went through the same situations many times when I worked a corporate life: 'Do the employees want to chip in?' means job loses and pay/benefits cuts in real terms for a certain group of workers, while the SMT get massive pay increases. You say it is that way because they deserve it, earn it, etc. I can tell you from experience that that is simple untrue. It's dog eat dog, and the scum that are prepared to walk upon everybody else to get to the top are neither the most capable nor the ones with proven track records - this is an utter fallacy... Many many CEOs have taken company after company to the dogs, fuked up time after time and have zero respect from anybody who knows the business well. These folk just manipulate shareholder positions against employee positions for the sake of their bonuses - they are not in it for the longhaul, for the sake of the company or the employees (who ARE the company in this case), but solely for their own benefit - this is a massive global problem in business, as we have seen with the bankers so clearly; greed and incompetence of the CEOs/SMT who fuk up companies and economies then walk away with millions in bonuses leaving massive job cuts and company failures behind...

I don't know what to say about this, apart from the fact you sound incredibly bitter. You appear to have been left behind at the bottom of the corporate ladder by smarter people, and obviously you resent them for it.

And the way you finished your little outburst, best you get yourself a tent and get down to St. Pauls for some daily snivelling.

As I've already said, given that this thread really belongs in Airline news, the problem with many legacy carriers is they simply cannot compete in the modern world acting like they did in days of old.

Why do you think JAL went tits up? Sabena? Alitalia? Mexicana?

And that doesn't even touch the number of smaller airlines that have gone bust in the last three years. Air France KLM lost a billion quid last year, BA more than that over the previous two years before they met the conditions to merge with Iberia.

Would you rather the shareholders just said "fuck it" and pulled out their cash?

Because I'll guarantee you the bigmouths at the unions, many of whom are probably current or former company employees, couldn't run the fucking airline for love nor money - otherwise they would already be doing so.

[Bettyboo]

^ not bitter, Harry. Wasn't left behind either... Just had enough of morons doing a bad job. I was offered 2 big money CEO positions (headhunted internationally and nationally, so I couldn't have been that bad) - just decided upon a more fulfilling way to live life rather than chasing the $...

As I said, I don't support the unions, I support sustainable intelligent business practise; I support a free market economy and shareholders too. I don't support greed at all costs.

Your post doesn't offer much analysis, Harry, just emotional cliches really. There is a middle ground between greed at all costs and communism, you know...

[IceSpike]

QANTAS, aka Queensland and Northern Territory Aerial Services Limited is considered a LEGACY Airline and started operations in the 1930's.
Legacy airlines are getting their asses kicked by low cost, budget, non-union air carriers Worldwide.

Being kicked off your plane and stranded in a flooded city thousands of miles from your destination, surely must have something to do with service...

QANTAS will not recover from this.
Who would want to Fly on an Airline that the CEO, Management, Pilots, Flight Attendants, Chefs, and Mechanics are un-happy?

[Neo]

As first and business class passengers were ushered on to a British Airways flight to Sydney, economy passengers were told they would be taken by bus to the Four Wings Hotel in the Sukhumvit Road area of Bangkok, one of the areas under threat of flooding.

Cuntish.

[Bettyboo]

^ indeed. Quantas has never been seen in this awful light before (to such a bad and wide reaching degree); shocking brand depreciation by the CEO.

^^ that's why the CEO will go, he has caused serious and possibly irreparable damage to the company. Losing loyal customers costs airlines a massive amount (800% over getting new customers the maths goes...)

Harry, boards, CEOs and chairmen have strained relationships at best, usually happy to get their daggers out for each other - in this case, the board and chairman will scapegoat (and rightly so) the CEO; indeed, he was probably brought in for just such a ploy... His job is to work with the employees and customers not fight against them; these preprepared announcements that staff are broadcasting, blaming the unions (regardless of how much truth are in them), will massively backfire on the CEO too - badly and naively worded... You just throw somebody off a plane in a foreign city after promising you wouldn't do so, then the CEO/management turn round to you at that time and say "this is not our fault, it's the unions, sorry, now fuk off...", everyone will: 1) get angry at the lack of responsibility shown by the management; 2) question what kind of a management is unable to control their staff/unions; 3) decide never to fly that airline again...

Quantas had one of the finest reputations in their industry; this is the most damaging event in their history, and the CEO is the focal point, he is the observable centre. I doubt he will last the month...

[LooseBowels]

A typically stupid overreaction from a typically stupid CEO.

He has quite openly and brazenly put profit before peoples wellbeing and safety.

The fat cats just dont give a shit for anything except what they can milk out of everything.

If he was going to act like a child, dont you think he would have made sure people got home before embarking on this lunacy. He typifies his strata so well but the majority have had it with these guys now.

[harrybarracuda]

^ that's why the CEO will go, he has caused serious and possibly irreparable damage to the company. Losing loyal customers costs airlines a massive cost (800% over getting new customers the maths goes...)

Harry, boards, CEOs and chairmen have strained relationships at best, usually happy to get their daggers out for each other - in this case, the board and chairman will scapegoat (and rightly so) the CEO; indeed, he was probably brought in for just such a ploy... His job is to work with the employees and customers not fight against them; these preprepared announcements that staff are broadcasting, blaming the unions (regardless of how much truth are in them), will massively backfire on the CEO too - badly and naively worded... You just throw somebody off a plane in a foreign city after promising you wouldn't do so, then the CEO/management turn round to you at that time and say "this is not our fault, it's the unions, sorry, now fuk off...", everyone will: 1) get angry at the lack of responsibility shown by the management; 2) question what kind of a management is unable to control their staff/unions; 3) decide never to fly that airline again...

Quantas had one of the finest reputations in their industry; this is the most damaging event in their history, and the CEO is the focal point, he is the observable centre. I doubt he will last the month...

I doubt he was brought in for "such a ploy". He was tasked with reducing operating costs, reducing capital requirements, and returning a profit to the airline's owners. The unions in this case, as in many other airlines, do not see the writing on the wall, and have been trying to blackmail the company to protect their own interests.

I applaud him for taking a tough stance.

The ironic thing this is only a day or two after Gillard was talking about how the unions have worked with employers to survive the financial crisis.

The company and its shareholders know only too well that there are plenty of people to replace anyone from pilots down (and I mean that in terms of cost, not disparagingly). Which is why as long as the government doesn't intervene, the senior management team and the board will achieve its objectives.

As for the customer loyalty comments, I think BA are a great example of how loyal customers can be if they see who is really fucking them around.

Public support will be a key factor in this dispute.

Plus, I would suggest that a large number, if not the majority of customers these days are looking for competitive prices first and that's where their loyalty lies.

[Bettyboo]

I am not supporting the unions, I don't have the full information; we don't have the full information, we just see the propaganda put out by both sides. I support sustainable business practice.

I applaud him for taking a tough stance.

A tough stance can still be a smart stance and a staff inclusive/moral building stance - he has abjectly failed on these last two accounts. Being seen as 'tough' is not a sole quality required by today's business environment; tough, purposeful and smart would be closer to the equation.

As for the customer loyalty comments, I think BA are a great example of how loyal customers can be if they see who is really fucking them around. Public support will be a key factor in this dispute.

The Australian public are the customers that are most vocal and powerful in this situation - they have and will turn against the CEO for damaging their national carrier, especially being a foreigner...

BA are a very different beast to Quantas.

We'll see how it unfolds, Harry. I suspect that the CEO will be kicked out soon, and much more inclusive approach will be taken by the management; even if the government intervenes to facilitate this...

[LooseBowels]

Passenger reports hitting the world news. extremely critical of Quantas

Virgin and other airlines putting on 30,000 extra seats to save the situation.

"Never fly Quantas again", " Totally irresponsible management"

Labour court sitting in Perth, only interviewing quantas witnesses.

Quantas outsourcing more jobs to asia

Quantas staff looking after affected first calss travelllers, at expense of cattle class

Go now joicey

[IceSpike]

"I was willing to pay for a seat on another airline....I was quite hysterical," she said.

silly bitch

Why is She a Silly Bitch?
Man o' Man Dr Andy, how many times have you done a transit through an Airport?
You expect to make your connections and satisfy your commitment's. She stated that She was willing to pay for a flight out of BKK on Her own.
It is a suck bad situatioin. This Woman is not a Bitch!
A story shared that most People can appreciate.

this has nothing to do with service, good or bad merely taking the fight to the unions who would probably have grounded the flights anyway

It has everything to do with service!
Do you pay for Shite and expect nothing in return?
If your stuck in an unfamiliar Airport will you go to the next Union Meeting and demand satisfaction?

[hazz]

From what I can tell this action has been taken to force the government to get involved with this dispute. This has succeeded in as much as a government tribunal has been recovered, which will decide whether to order an end to industrial action by both unions and management. I guess its an attempt to get union strike action at quantus declared illegal.

I am left wondering if we are watching a CEO making a last ditch attempt to break belligerent unions and works who are bent preserving their t&c's at any cost, driving the company into the ground or we are looking at a CEO obsessed with maximising his bonus at what ever cost to the shareholders, customers and employees.

I've been round long enough to see and experience both.

If its true that the CEO happily held an AGM days before this lockout, one can only assume that he wants to actively avoid working with and explaining himself to the owners of the company he is running, interests he should be safeguarding. Given this how can you expect him to act in good faith with the employees and their unions.

A union policy of belligerence in negotiations to the point of bankruptcy, is a strategy which would only work if you could rely on the government bailing out quantus without letting an receiver gut the company and work force first. what are the chances of that?

Personally I have concerns about a CEO who seems to hide from the shareholders, precipitates a crisis to get the government to carry out his staff negotiations for him and doesn't apparently have an issue about dumping his customers thousands of miles from home.

[harrybarracuda]

From what I can tell this action has been taken to force the government to get involved with this dispute. This has succeeded in as much as a government tribunal has been recovered, which will decide whether to order an end to industrial action by both unions and management. I guess its an attempt to get union strike action at quantus declared illegal.

I am left wondering if we are watching a CEO making a last ditch attempt to break belligerent unions and works who are bent preserving their t&c's at any cost, driving the company into the ground or we are looking at a CEO obsessed with maximising his bonus at what ever cost to the shareholders, customers and employees.

I've been round long enough to see and experience both.

If its true that the CEO happily held an AGM days before this lockout, one can only assume that he wants to actively avoid working with and explaining himself to the owners of the company he is running, interests he should be safeguarding. Given this how can you expect him to act in good faith with the employees and their unions.

A union policy of belligerence in negotiations to the point of bankruptcy, is a strategy which would only work if you could rely on the government bailing out quantus without letting an receiver gut the company and work force first. what are the chances of that?

Personally I have concerns about a CEO who seems to hide from the shareholders, precipitates a crisis to get the government to carry out his staff negotiations for him and doesn't apparently have an issue about dumping his customers thousands of miles from home.

According to him, the Shareholders approved all of the measures he was taking, including the loss of 1,000 jobs.

Naturally the union objected to all of this, and put their foot down and walked out of negotiations.

Whether the shareholders were aware of the lengths he'd go to to force the unions to continue negotiations is another story, according to the unions they were not.

But it does seem that he was not exactly hiding his plans from the shareholders as you state, and I'm sure they have been aware of the costs to the airlines of the strikes and other industrial (in)action that's been going on so long.

This is why I liken it to the BA cabin crew strike. They absolutely refused to negotiate on fairly simple points of negotiation (they wanted the cabin supervisors, who spent most of their time in an office) pushing trolleys and helping with the service, with one crew member removed from the aircraft by natural attrition and voluntary redundancy. Two factors to remember in that instance: (1) BA crew numbers were already in excess of other airlines (certainly the Middle East carries cut cabin crew to the bone during the financial crisis, and I flew enough times to notice it) so it wasn't much of a loss; and (2) the Union leadership consisted of the very people asked to do a little more work.

Once they refused to negotiate, BA essentially said "OK, well we're going to go ahead and do it anyway", at which point the strikes started - over the "imposition". What else were they supposed to do when they were bleeding cash and the union refused to negotiate?

But as you say, the CEO has a lot of work to do explaining that this action is not completely out of the blue, and that many people had already been inconvenienced by strikes and the rest.

I concur that it will not last long, especially if it is a vocal minority of union hardliners who have contributed to the current situation with their intransigence in previous negotiations.

One thing you can say - he's got some balls to take such a decision, and even if the Board are backing him, he is the easy target if it doesn't work.

Here's what he said at the AGM:

He said the agenda of the three unions with which Qantas was at loggerheads was to "stop management from making neccessary changes".

• "They want to be paid to do work that no longer exists due to new generation aircraft. Effectively they want a veto on management decision making."

He has highlighted to shareholders that the dispute has cost Qantas $68 million to date.
Outside, the "Occupy Sydney" protesters - who number about a dozen - have finished their chants.
Jordan Humphreys, 21, says he and the other campaigners are here to support the Qantas workers.
"Qantas needs to run things for their staff, rather than their CEOs," he says. On whether the workers will get their way against Qantas, Mr Humphreys says he is hopeful. "It's entirely possible for them to succeed."

Read more: Live: Qantas AGM | Qantas Boss Alan Joyce and Unions Face Off

There's detailed coverage of the AGM at that link. Note that the VAST (not VOCAL) majority of shareholders voted to (a) accept his remuneration package, and by implication (b) accept his proposals for the future of the airline.

It also states that his "new" package is still less than the one he earned while running JetStar.

It's longish, but I'd recommend reading it.

Even the hissing and booing smacks of a minority of belligerent, back-slapping shareholders who also happen to be Union members - EXACTLY what happened at BA's AGM.

[Bettyboo]

^ there's clearly massive problems there... problems with SMT...

The shareholders greed for future payouts has stopped them from understanding the needs of the company; but when it's the SMT putting the 'evidence' before them, of course they only see the part of the story that the SMT want them to see... so much wrong here, and you don't really need business experience to see it...

Once again we see failing businesses making losses, shedding staff (and this is very serious within service industries because these staff ARE the business - much more so than a passing management team..., these staff are very expensive to train, move to the competition and unskilled outsourced labour is brought in, which damages and diminshes the Quantas brand, their position in the marketplace and their ability to be effective in their sector against the newly superior competitors; superior, in part, due to the Quantas staff who now work for them - effectively, Quantas is training a highly skilled workforce then outing them to the opposition and replacing them with lower skilled outsourced workers. I would love to be one of their competitors who will massively benefit in people resources over the next year or so!), but paying masses payments to a SMT who are taking a scalpel to the business, destroying the business, and taking out massive amounts of money from the business - all, of course, accomplished by fooling (only presenting certain evidence, as is the norm in AGMs... lots of studies on the deceipt of AGM, you may want to look at Bhatia: www.icmpw11.cbs.polyu.edu.hk/source/Bhatia.pdf) the shareholders by manipulating their greed. Of course, it is the shareholders who will need to put more money in when this twat of a CEO is long gone, or maybe, the government will put taxpayers money in. Everyone loses, except the SMT who will be long-gone with their millions...

[Khun Custard]

Since Qantas OWN Jetstar, there is no "portion of profits" being "laundered".

I had the benefit of watching the ABC Four Corners program a few weeks ago that made and substantiated this "laundering" claim.
Sure, at the end of an accounting period QANTAS HAS ALWAYS MADE A PROFIT. but, if you allocate expenses to Qantas (regional and international) that should be paid (either whole or in proportion) by Jetstar (i.e. attribution of the real gross costs of running a maintenace facility) then my and Four Corners assertion that this style of accounting appears deliberate to support the image and bottom line of the Asian business model.

I don't know what to say about this, apart from the fact you sound incredibly bitter

Well Betty, I think you hit the nail on the head - I'm also proud to be one of the 1%

According to him, the Shareholders approved all of the measures he was taking, including the loss of 1,000 jobs.

On the current shut down issue...........No Sir, the shareholders and the Australian Goverment (who set the terms of conditions for the privatisation of Qantas 20 years earlier -which has clauses that excluded this type of Not in the National Interest /Rambo action ) had no knowledge of this - you only had to see the TV interview with Tony Albanese (Minister for transport) and the PM to gauge how utterly SHOCKED and pissed off they were.
When the bell rings at the stock exchange on Monday (we should also note the elegant timing of the Qantas announcement) then you will see the shareholders reaction -now that will be interesting!!!!

This is exactly what BA and Iberia have done,

Correct me if I'm wrong but was this not during the time of Sir Rod Eddington,
the Auzzie lad who was attributed with the begining of the end of Ansett and then moved to Cathay before going to BA was incharge??
Guess if you practice long and hard enough you'll eventaully get the model right - but what a cost!

Really, in the end, this is what you have...
1) 68,000 paid passengers around the world who would have no reason to support Qantas in the future
2) airline employees (NOT Pilots) dads and mums with kids who want to keep their middle class income up with spiralling inflation.
3) a Nation whos national aviation flag carrier is now a disgrace
4) Sir Richard rubbing his greying goatee with glee while his newest, bestest mates on the Auzzie / Orient route, Singapore Airlines (the government) think, Oh well, couldn't buy the ASX (stock exchange) but this one will do and its free!
5) a Board and CEO who will be financially well postioned to be sacked and still have the means to live a reasonable lifestyle.

The Fair Work Place tribunal is set to conclude recieving evidence from all parties in the next few hours, no doubt the Commissioners will have a very long and sleepless night in delivering their verdict.