Qantas engineers to walk off job in strike action but airline insists it won’t cause flight delays

Qantas insists passenger travel plans won’t be disrupted on Friday, despite union claims that a 24-hour strike by engineers will have an “immediate impact” on passengers.

The engineers revealed they will walk off the job for 24 hours, less than two weeks before Christmas, as their pay dispute with the Aussie airline reaches a stalemate.

The Qantas Engineers’ Alliance, made up of members from three major unions, issued a statement on Thursday accusing the airline of lying and misleading behaviour during wage negotiations.

The strike action will take place from 3.30am local time on Friday and last until 7.30am on Saturday.

Engineers will walk off the job in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide.

The statement said strike action was likely to have “an immediate impact as line maintenance workers are responsible for towing and marshalling aircraft”.

The strike comes after a six-week break in protected industrial action after the union agreed to pause its campaign during negotiations.

Wage negotiations began in April. The previous enterprise agreement expired in June.

A Qantas spokesperson said the airline had put “a number of contingencies in place” to ensure customers’ travel plans weren’t disrupted by the industrial action, but said customers should give themselves more time to get through security at this time of year.

“Our teams are working hard to ensure that this industrial action has minimal impact on customers’ holiday plans and we have put a number of contingencies in place and extra resourcing on the ground to ensure our customers get away as planned,” the spokesperson said.

“As always at this time of year our aircraft are full and airports are busy so we urge customers to give themselves more time to get through security and get to their aircraft.”

AMWU national secretary Steve Murphy claimed Qantas had “lied” because they had not lived up to their own values during negotiations.

“Workers have no other choice now, that during the holiday period, they will be taking industrial action to bring Qantas back to the bargaining table,” he said.

“Qantas is to blame if there’s any disruption to commuters over the holiday period. They have had six weeks to simply do what they said they would.”

AWU national secretary Paul Farrow said engineers felt they had been treated with “persistent disrespect” by the airline.

“Alan Joyce’s departure was meant to mean a new era for Qantas management, but this is just the same old playbook: treat skilled employees as if they’re dispensable and hope that customers don’t notice,” he said.

ETU national secretary Michael Wright said the industrial action would end “right now” if Qantas came to the table with a fair pay deal.

“It’s disgraceful that Qantas is not respecting these workers and the crucial work they do,” he said.

The Qantas spokesperson said those taking strike action were only a small part of tghe overall engineering workforce and claimed the airline had acted in good faith.

“We’re offering our engineers a competitive package including pay rises, upskilling and career progression that will enable them to earn significantly more over the next few years,” they said.