My take on the ordeal, for all the rounds of job cuts they have...

My take on the ordeal, for all the rounds of job cuts they have announced in the past five years, the actual number of jobs that have gone is much less (e.g. announce 2,000 cuts, actual jobs cut was 300 or something like that). Plus they have been hiring people the whole way along so the net change in employment is pretty minimal. So who knows whether these 5,000 will actually be cut (and not later replaced).

1,500 of that 5,000 are supposedly management / backroom jobs, which I wouldn't imagine would be as unionised as the pilots, ground staff etc. So god knows how they managed to get in a position where 1,500 backroom staff can be cut.

There will be changes to the service; international services out of Perth and Brisbane will be cut (so will be more codeshare instead of Qantas) and less flights to Singapore. They've delayed orders for or are disposing of 50 planes. $1bn of capex delayed - not really a sustainable ploy (will just mean customers flying on older planes with less comfort features, which is a less attractive prospect).

I did read that the average Qantas employee salary + benefits is upwards of $100k pa. So if you cut 5,000 of them, that's a saving of $500m a year...that is a massive number! Those savings would return them straight to profit...but only on the proviso that nothing else (e.g. market share, demand etc) changes.

ps - wasnt Jeff Kennett fantastic this morning?!