Since the last bulletin your ASU National Negotiating Team have met with Qantas management on 16 June and 1 July.

We now have had responses to many of our claims and unfortunately there is nothing positive to report, save to say there was a positive indication about our payroll claim from the managers who are prepared to develop a protocol for underpayments and overpayments.

On our other claims, Qantas refuses to acknowledge there are issues with notice periods for rostering or with the lack of EBA duty travel provisions and with the way in which higher duties is managed.

The ASU national negotiations team met again with Qantas management in Sydney on 4 June 2010 for Day 3 of our EBA 9 negotiations.

At this meeting we tabled almost all of our remaining detailed claims. Qantas Holidays EBA representatives also met the Qantas Holidays / Jetset Travelworld Group management on 2 June 2010 in Sydney.

On 25 May 2010 ASU officials and delegates from Qantas Holidays and Jetset Travelworld met with various management representatives from Qantas Airways and Jetset Travel Group including Sue Bussell from Qantas Industrial Relations and Andrea Slarke, Chief Development Officer of Jetset Travelworld to discuss the recent announcement about the merger with the Stella Group.

The ASU National Negotiating Team met with Qantas management in Sydney on 26 May 2010 for Day 2 of our negotiations for Qantas EBA 9.

Late on 12th May the Board of Jetset Travelworld Group announced a merger with Stella Travel Services after weeks of speculation that the deal was in the wind.

For Qantas Holidays employees this is the 2nd corporate upheaval in 18 months after their very successful and important Qantas business was sold to Jetset Travelworld in a share transaction which saw Qantas Holidays transferred to the Jetset Travelworld group (JTG) and Qantas business travel remain a division of Qantas Airways Limited but become a “contractor” to JTG.

For more information see the latest ASU bulletin.

After many weeks of meetings across the country, ASU members at Qantas have overwhelmingly endorsed our EBA 9 Claim.

Starting today our claim will be presented to Qantas management by ASU delegates and members at various locations at organised gatherings of members celebrating the start of our “Worth respect” EBA 9 campaign.

Qantas ASU members are invited to attend meetings about the upcoming EBA negotiations. Some of you may have already received an invitation about the meetings in your workplace. These meetings will involve a discussion about the Draft Claim (attached) with members asked to vote for or against the proposal.

The Draft Claim was developed in response to the results of the recent ASU members survey. It has been endorsed by ASU delegates from across the country. Now it is up to members to decide if this is the claim we will pursue in negotiations. It is extremely important that members attend so that you have your say and be part of our campaign for winning respect at Qantas. So that members can be part of this process- below are the list of all meetings scheduled thus far. If you are unable to attend the meeting in your particular workplace you are invited to attend meetings at Airport Central (22nd April) or the Holiday Inn (28th April).

Meetings have been scheduled at the following work locations:

In March 2010 almost 70 ASU Qantas Group Delegates from across Australia met to discuss our Union’s strategy for the forthcoming Qantas EBA 9 campaign. Over two days your delegates considered survey results, talked tactics, put together a draft claim for members’ consideration and also elected your ASU Qantas EBA 9 National Negotiating Team.

In the attached document we take the opportunity to introduce the National Negotiating Team (NNT).

Around 70 ASU Qantas Group delegates from all around Australia met in Melbourne on 17 & 18 March 2010 to discuss the year ahead and in particular the preparations for this year’s bargaining agenda in the Qantas Group.

Delegates from Qantas Airways, QFCL, QFIT, Jetstar and QantasLink attended to plan our strategy.