Australian carrier Qantas yesterday said it would cancel 28 flights and delay 27 because of a ground staff strike this week that would affect more than 6,000 passengers.
The move was announced as a security breach at Sydney airport saw the travel plans of thousands thrown into chaos, with the Qantas domestic terminal evacuated and about 2,000 passengers rescreened, delaying at least 14 flights.
“The Australian Federal Police has been notified and Qantas will be conducting a full investigation into how the incident was allowed to occur,” Qantas said.
Photo: AFP
Similar problems occurred at airports in Sydney and Melbourne earlier this year.
It was an unwelcome distraction as the embattled airline prepared for today’s nationwide walkout, which will see staggered four-hour strikes involving about 4,000 staff throughout the morning peak period.
Canberra will be hit between 3:30pm and 7:30pm, with cabin cleaners, baggage handlers and catering crew all taking part.
Qantas said the action had forced it to cancel 28 flights and defer another 27 by up to 35 minutes. Delays could linger for up to two days due to bans on paperwork and other jobs.
It hopes to meet the problems by deploying larger aircraft and using management staff in ground roles.
The Transport Workers Union (TWU) said the strike would involve both domestic and international staff, but Qantas said there would be no impact to international services “at this stage.”
“The TWU is intent on causing disruptions to Qantas passengers and we are doing everything we possibly can to reduce the delays and cancellations,” Qantas executive Olivia Wirth said. “We have been in negotiations with the TWU since May and are willing to offer reasonable pay increases. We encourage the TWU to remain at the negotiating table instead of going on strike.”
TWU lead negotiator Scott Connolly said the move followed a breakdown in contract talks and the airline’s recent announcement of a major Asia-focused restructure that will see 1,000 staff laid off.
Unions claim the move will “trash” the Qantas brand, cost jobs and erode local working conditions, also accusing Qantas chief executive Alan Joyce of hypocrisy of pocketing a 71 percent pay increase to A$5 million (US$5.19 million) as he axed jobs.
“Employees built the Qantas business and the Qantas brand, and they’re the company’s best asset,” Connolly said. “Qantas is selling out its staff, and trying to outsource all the labor it can in a zero-sum game of short-term hyper-profits.”
Qantas is locked in a bruising industrial dispute with the unions over pay and conditions, aggravated by last month’s Asia rebranding announcement.
Pilots and engineers are already undertaking low-level industrial action, but have threatened to escalate their campaign.
Pilots’ Union leader Barry Jackson said 22,000 people had so far signed a petition against outsourcing Qantas captains’ jobs, and they remained hopeful about talks with management “to avoid the escalation of this dispute.”
Qantas last month reported annual net profit of A$250 million — double that of last year.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day
Thousands of parents in Singapore are furious after a Cordlife Group Ltd (康盛人生集團), a major operator of cord blood banks in Asia, irreparably damaged their children’s samples through improper handling, with some now pursuing legal action. The ongoing case, one of the worst to hit the largely untested industry, has renewed concerns over companies marketing themselves to anxious parents with mostly unproven assurances. This has implications across the region, given Cordlife’s operations in Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The parents paid for years to have their infants’ cord blood stored, with the understanding that the stem cells they contained