ABC 4 Corners on Qantas - Monday 5 September

[kangarooflyer88]

One final thought: whatever happened to whistle-blower protection?

That went away when Uncle Alan took away the whistle and became the ref!

So long as shareholders are happy with Uncle Alan's performance and passengers aren't overly inconvenienced he will remain, as simple as that. People love to complain about QF's on time performance, lost bags, etc., but I would encourage you to look outside Australia for a sec and you'll see this is happening everywhere from Canada to Croatia. Fact of the matter is there's this new disease that's circulating around and the airlines still haven't figured out how to protect their employees from it despite having now two years of scientific data showing what needs to be done.

-RooFlyer88

 

[bladeau1981]

If you want to run with the AFL analogy then I think once flying restarted AJ thought Qantas were Geelong but it turns out that they were North Melbourne. AJ tried to blame the fans for not being match fit but it turns out it was the Qantas team. North Melbourne worked out that they needed a new coach and have recruited Clarko for next season. It is time for Qantas to do the same.

To keep with the AFL analogy, Qantas is basically PAFC. Thinks they are great, thinks the coach is great and not willing to make a change just blame the players for not being motivated, match fit or whatever excuse kinkley comes up with on the day.

 

[jpp42]

If they didn't get rid of AJ when he used heavy handed tactics like shutting down the airline when pilots went on strike,

Actually, they *hired* him specifically to do things like this. The 2011 lockout/shutdown was done at the behest of the board... it may have been AJ's idea, and it was his to execute on, but the board explicitly signed off on it. So by no means are they going to fire him for doing exactly what they approved.

 

[LondonAussie]

What's clear is Australia needs to have more consumer rights when it comes to delays and cancellations. For instance, I reckon if Qantas had to fork out $600 in cash compensation for arriving at your destination 4 hours late, Qantas will be more punctual. And the best part about these consumer rights is it doesn't cost the airline a penny. Don't believe me? Look at EasyJet and RyanAir which operate in the context of EU 261 and yet provide dirt cheap fares across the continent.

I agree, but those once cheap RyanAir & EasyJet fares have mostly disappeared since the pandemic, and airlines (BA in particular) were denying EU261 compensation claims, telling customers the COVID-19 pandemic was an "extraordinary circumstance" which meant they were not entitled to EU compensation. After the media started hounding them, airlines changed their tune and started paying up.

BBC Panorama (the UK equivalent of 4corners) did a story on this in July - not sure if it can be watched outside the UK. BBC One - Panorama, Airport Chaos: What’s Gone Wrong?

 

[OZDUCK]

Agree with the sentiment here, if there's any time to make the lobbying push now is the time. When we hear stories of folks being stranded for a week in Bali (not the worse place to be stranded BTW), lost bags, 14 hours hold times, etc. In terms of lobbying effort how would this work? I'm not familiar with Australian politics, although I hear it's very similar to Canadian politics (i.e. there are elected MPs and appointed Senators). I think the key here is framing, consumer's rights is corporate rights, is shareholders rights. Anyone who thinks that a company offering a substandard product is working in the best interest of shareholders will be disappointed!

-RooFlyer88

Just a quick correction. In Australia Senators are elected and there have been a number of Independent Senators from no major party. These days any appointed Senator is replacing a Senator from the same party who has died/retired etc. They are only appointed for the remainder of the original Senators 6 year term and must then stand for re-election.

The rules about who can appoint the replacement Senator were changed a number of years ago after an incident which it is prudent not to discuss here

 

[Melburnian1]

If you want to run with the AFL analogy then I think once flying restarted AJ thought Qantas were Geelong but it turns out that they were North Melbourne. AJ tried to blame the fans for not being match fit but it turns out it was the Qantas team. North Melbourne worked out that they needed a new coach and have recruited Clarko for next season. It is time for Qantas to do the same.

There was a very recent 'Australian Financial Review' survey that had 501 respondents, although the journalist did not explain how the 501 were contacted, or by what means (telephone?) they contributed.

IIRC 47 per cent wanted Joyce to resign. This is extraordinarily high. Normally re listed companies, many people (including businessmen who read/view 'AFR') would be neutral. Not here.

The Board and Chairman have backed Joyce as far as outsiders like me can observe.

 

[Quickstatus]

If ABC wanted to prosecute a case that Qantas is becoming more unsafe (and these employment conditions are a factor - but they're not the only factor) - I don't think it did a very good job

They should have talked to safety experts with no bone to pick with the airline and really explored what safety in a supposed high reliability organisation really means. But that would not really fit into their format. it is really damming on the ABC that it is more important to fir into a format with programming and time limitations than exploring the real issues

ss. Yet, the ABC didn’t suffer scheduling outages nor snap lockdowns forcing 79% rates of cancellations like July 2021

Yes, organisations like that have been the real winners of the pandemic. Programs like FC just promotes the ABC as a moral arbiter of the truth rather than a program that explores the nuances of the issues at hand.

 

[TheRealTMA]

Just a quick correction. In Australia Senators are elected and there have been a number of Independent Senators from no major party. These days any appointed Senator is replacing a Senator from the same party who has died/retired etc. They are only appointed for the remainder of the original Senators 6 year term and must then stand for re-election.

The rules about who can appoint the replacement Senator were changed a number of years ago after an incident which it is prudent not to discuss here

Unrepresentative Swill — Unrepresentative swill

www.malcolmmackerras.com

 

[Quickstatus]

My impression of the airline is this:

It may believe in its own infallibility because of past safety outcomes - we are safe because we are the 'safest airline in the world'. The airline had an excellent safety record so there is no reason to not continue operating in the same way even though the past is never a good predictor of future safety. They don't see the "boiling frog" or that time and time again accidents and failures in high reliability organisations (airlines) are incubating waiting to emerge when the organisation continues to belief that it is safe. Its overconfidence in its recovery post Covid was amplified by the huge demand for their product that they sold as much aircraft seats as there were available aircraft and crew. At the same time not considering that their operation and the environment is now very different to pre Covid. It thought it could just flip a switch, except that it is now an airline trying to return to full production ASAP with a workforce who have lost corporate memory due to redundancies, lower experience due to new hiring, overall lacking recent practice and a poor workforce-executive relationship. Insert into that continued absentees which all adds up to multiple system stressors and the need to be financially efficient due to huge financial losses. It took a while for the airline to acknowledge that with a moderation on seat availability - a sign of reactivity rather than proactivity. The airline was happy to stress the system to chase the dollar.

One of the indicators of an erosion in safety culture in high reliability organisations like this airline is a supression of certain voices, preferring certain ones (executive and managers) while not listening to others (workers at the coal face). Another indication is that the CEO does not appear to be open minded preferring to blame the passengers and the effects of Covid for the performance issues at the airline. A CEO that is not open minded tends to only listen to certain channels that reinforces his views. Perhaps he attributes the airline's success and safety to his and the board's abilities and decision making, rather than luck. Safety focused executives are generally ambivalent about their roles in past success.

High reliability organisations incubate failures all the time and often audits, quality assurance, risk management might not suggest anything to suggest untoward - until it happens. This has been a feature of most of the failures of high reliability organisations through history. But when failures are analysed, the indicators of potential and impending failures were always there a long time before the failure occured.

"Success narrows perceptions, changes attitudes, reinforces a single way of doing business, breeds overconfidence in the adequacy of current practices and reduces the acceptance of opposing points of view." (Weick and Sutcliffe 2007)

 

[coriander]

I was a Qantas captain for 37 years. This chaos did not need to happen

It didn’t take Einstein to work out that when the world came out of lockdowns and border restrictions eased that people would be desperately hungry to travel.

www.theage.com.au

An un-related anecdote: In March 2013, Mrs C and I flew to the US for our 25th wedding anniversary. We'd received a J to F upgrade, so had time in QF F SYD lounge before boarding our A380 to LAX.

After lunch on board where the staff were absolutely brilliant knowing it was our anniversary celebration flight, I settled down to finish a book I was reading........ "QF32".

The CSM wandered past, topping up the Moet, saw the book and stopped.
"You do know who is your Captain today?"
"Um no, I think it was the FO who made the last announcement".
"The Captain today is David Evans, one of the TEAM that saved QF32." (his emphasis on the word). David was a senior check captain on that flight, route checking pilot-in-charge Richard de Crespigny and training another check captain, one of five pilots on the flight deck that day.

"Wow, he's our captain?"

"Would you like to meet him?"

"YES PLEASE, it'd be an honour."

About half an hour later David himself came down, introduced himself to Mrs C and I and chatted with both of us for a few minutes, with some polite and reserved conversation about all the heroes in the book . As he rose to return to the coughpit, he said "if you wait after landing, I'll give you a tour of the coughpit."

We did and he did.

The photo of Mrs C and I in the pilot and co-pilot's seats taken by David is on the wall in our lounge room and is one of my all-time favourite and most treasured photos.

He's one of nature's true gentleman and his demeanour, grace and carriage made us feel secure that if this was the calibre of the cohort of QF's pilots, we'd always feel confident and happily fly QF.

Sorry if I drifted off-topic

 

[RooFlyer]

I was a Qantas captain for 37 years. This chaos did not need to happen

It didn’t take Einstein to work out that when the world came out of lockdowns and border restrictions eased that people would be desperately hungry to travel.

www.theage.com.au

An un-related anecdote: In March 2013, Mrs C and I flew to the US for our 25th wedding anniversary. We'd gotten a J to F upgrade, so had time in QF F SYD lounge before boarding our A380 to LAX.

Wow. Thanks for posting both the Age story and the anecdote. The Age piece about as powerful as the entire 4 Corners story.

 

[UP4014]

Don’t forget AJ is retiring next year, he will push costs down now to make the golden parachute a big one.

 

[jase05]

Don’t forget AJ is retiring next year, he will push costs down now to make the golden parachute a big one.

The belief from many is that the retirement will be delayed. He isn’t going anywhere just yet

 

[CaptainCurtis]

Bad timing for Qantas

Qantas launches investigation into overloaded Sydney flight

The shock discovery of a larger-than-expected amount of freight put the plane over the maximum allowable weight when it took off from Sydney.

www.smh.com.au

 

[Rangalad]

The belief from many is that the retirement will be delayed. He isn’t going anywhere just yet

Don’t want to “like” this post, but I’m hearing the same thing.

 

[coriander]

Bad timing for Qantas

Qantas launches investigation into overloaded Sydney flight

The shock discovery of a larger-than-expected amount of freight put the plane over the maximum allowable weight when it took off from Sydney.

www.smh.com.au

Interesting that 100kg overweight in the wrong place didn't affect flight.

Obviously still enough Swiss cheese slices in the pack.

Post automatically merged: Sep 8, 2022

Don’t want to “like” this post, but I’m hearing the same thing.

I thought he said he wasn't planning on retiring till after delivery of the Sunrise project A350s.

 

[SYD]

Further SMH / The Age article providing some context that the ABC skipped…

Defending Qantas: Criticism of the flying kangaroo needs some context

Qantas has earned a lot of the recent scrutiny but it isn’t alone. A report from the ACCC has revealed it wasn’t even the worst performer in the domestic aviation market.

www.smh.com.au

 

[RooFlyer]

Bad timing for Qantas

Qantas launches investigation into overloaded Sydney flight

The shock discovery of a larger-than-expected amount of freight put the plane over the maximum allowable weight when it took off from Sydney.

www.smh.com.au

Very!

Further SMH / The Age article providing some context that the ABC skipped…

Defending Qantas: Criticism of the flying kangaroo needs some context

Qantas has earned a lot of the recent scrutiny but it isn’t alone. A report from the ACCC has revealed it wasn’t even the worst performer in the domestic aviation market.

www.smh.com.au

Sure - that's what others have put up here. "No worries - Qantas is only just as bad as all the others". Unfortunately, they charge a huge premium for an equally bad experience.

 

[RichardMEL]

I think we all agree that with very few exceptions(as in any industry) the tech and cabin crews are all fantastic. In fact most of the customer facing roles do the best they can with ever shrinking resources. I certainly do not worry to get on an QF aircraft in terms of the professionalism of the entire crew (tech and cabin) on board. As jb747 noted earlier he could work with new and never met tech crew and have the training work so well to mean they are in sync from the get go.

As we all know the problems have been caused at the back end, cost cutting, outsourcing yadda yadda yadda.

I also feel the problems with the Call Cnetres, bad ticketing issues etc didn't really fit the narrative - focused on safety, outsourcing etc. Was it mostly prompted by the unions? I wouldn't go that far - after all the mess that is QF has been in the public eye for a long time now so it's not really your unions arcing up about an issue that has no obvious bearing on the general public.. Most people know in some way of the problems even if they haven't flown on a plane, let alone QF, for years. I'm sure obviously they get a good reception from the ABC for obvious reasons, and this was a good platform. Heck I don't really disagree with any of their points raised. Some may have been a bit overblown, some not. The story was definitely framed in a certain way and thatr's why the entire call centre thing didn't get an airing (and perhaps it's too big to include as it might have distracted a bit? I'm unsure).

I'm flying in a few days. My biggest concern is before I get on board - 1) I do not get delayed to my connection in SYD too much, 2) My bag makes it through that connection (forced to check) and that flight takes off in a reasonable time. Once I'm on board I am happy to be in care of very good crews.

 

[SYD]

Bad timing for Qantas

Qantas launches investigation into overloaded Sydney flight

The shock discovery of a larger-than-expected amount of freight put the plane over the maximum allowable weight when it took off from Sydney.

www.smh.com.au

Gees, I just read that article. Lucky there wasn’t a Hemsworth or two onboard, let alone an American tour group.