Please Note: This news story has expired and is held in our business travel news archive. The story is shown here for information purposes only. Please click here to view our current news releases.

Qantas Staff Take Strike Action 24 March

24th March 2006 QANTAS staff are taking industrial action today (March 24) in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane over airline plans to send its maintenance work overseas.

About 450 workers will march to airport terminals in each of the major cities where they will hold rallies and inform passengers of the airline's plans to slash jobs and send work to Asia.

Australian Manufacturing Workers Union (AMWU) national secretary Doug Cameron said Qantas had broken its commitment to keep heavy maintenance in Australia.

"On top of slashing hundreds of jobs and services, they are now secretly sending planes to Asia for vital maintenance," Mr Cameron said in a statement. Ha also conceded that he can not quarantine flights from the effects of the industrial action.

Qantas has said it is committed to keeping its heavy aircraft maintenance in Australia, despite arranging to send a Boeing 747-400 to Singapore for work next month.

Further Information:
www.qantas.com.au/regions/dyn/au/publicaffairs/introduction?ArticleID=paf_curr_intro
www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200603/s1599599.htm

Follow our travel updates on Twitter: @_BusinessTravel