Home » News » Four Corners’ Qantas expose: What was revealed and how has the airline responded?

6 September, 2022

Four Corners’ Qantas expose: What was revealed and how has the airline responded?

Qantas was the focus of last night’s episode of ABC’s Four Corners where the airline’s reputation, work practices, controversies and cost-cutting were investigated.

The episode, which was titled ‘The inside story of the chaos at Qantas’, took a deep dive into the stories of current and former employees of the airline both before and during the pandemic.

Many types of Qantas employees were interviewed for the episode including baggage handlers, pilots, engineers and cabin crew who all discussed the high-pressure work environment and “divisive culture” that developed.

One of the main claims in the episode includes risks to the safety of staff. Several examples of this were given, including insufficient cleaning materials during the beginning of the pandemic, incorrect loading of baggage onto a plane and overworked engineers who struggled to get through planned maintenance, leading to higher risk of mistakes.

The episode particularly highlighted the illegal outsourcing of baggage handlers and its knock-on effect on the airline.

“Anybody who thinks the outsource of the in-house ground handling is not a problem is delusional,” an anonymous groundsman said.

“Bags aren’t making it to aircrafts on time, bags are being loaded onto aircraft incorrectly, flights are being cancelled because crew are running out of hours to operate these flights in the time it would take to fix the issues.”

Another claim in the episode was in regards to tactics used by Qantas against its pilots to get them to agree to new terms and conditions by threatening to give the work to another entity.

“The stress affiliated with this is underestimated,” an anonymous short-haul pilot said. “When you mix a safety critical role with the threat of losing your job then it really only ends one way.

“A mistake will be made, there will be an incident and there could be devastating consequences as a result.”

Former flight attendant, Matthew Allsop, said he wore the Qantas uniform for 15 years despite never being hired by the airline. Allsop explained that Qantas hires its staff through subsidiaries who are then contracted by the airline. This leads to massive pay and working rights disparities between staff.

“By creating these wholly-owned subsidiaries and small companies, they manage to water down the pay and conditions each time to slowly erode the high value of pay and conditions that once existed in the legacy part of the airline,” Allsop said.

Qantas posted a response to the episode on its newsroom, where the airline acknowledged the “tough decisions” it had to make during the pandemic in order to survive.

The airline claimed that it “would never (ever) compromise on safety” amid claims from unions like the Transport Workers Union (TWU) inferring Qantas would put safety at risk. Qantas also noted that Four Corners did not contact the Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) regarding any claims made in the program. The flying kangaroo said that CASA reiterated that it has confidence as to Qantas’ safety.

Four Corners was offered an interview with Alan Joyce on the condition that it aired unedited, but the program said this did not follow its format.

The airline went on to acknowledge that its service had been impacted by cancellations, delays and missed bags and apologised to its customers.

According to television audience measurement research firm OzTAM, the episode received 605,000 viewers.

In regards to the safety of workers in the Qantas supply chain, the TWU said it is in talks with SafeWork and has called on CASA and the Australian Transport Safety Bureau to investigate Qantas’ alleged safety breaches at Swissport, the ground handling labour provider carrying out the bulk of Qantas’ handling.

The TWU has obtained several memos sent from Swissport to workers reporting incidents, including: firearms unloaded onto arrivals carousels; dangerous goods loaded onto planes without being documented; cargo doors left open; stairs removed while passenger doors open; huge plane load imbalances; staff working while injured; and vehicles colliding with the refuelling hose.

The TWU is calling for a Safe and Secure Skies Commission to enforce standards that would rebalance the focus from executive bonuses and shareholder dividends to a safe, quality industry that serves the community and its workforce.

Featured Image: YouTube/ABC News In-Depth

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abc Four Corners qantas Transport Workers Union twu