Qantas flight attendants fiasco a test for industrial relations legislation

Qantas flight attendants have had enough. They are the latest group of employees to test the national carrier’s divide-and-conquer industrial relations strategy, with two landmark claims by the Flight Attendants’ Association of Australia​ (FAAA) in the Fair Work Commission.

The flight attendants seek regulated labour-hire arrangements from the airline and one of its external labour-hire suppliers, Maurice Alexander Management (MAM), under the Albanese government’s “same job, same pay” legislation. The FAAA wants to align the pay and conditions of flight attendants across the group who all do the same job, thereby stopping Qantas from using companies like MAM to hire flight attendants on lower pay and conditions.