Qantas set to axe more jobs

Qantas to axe even more workers as Sydney Airport bus services are outsourced.

Qantas will outsource the operation of its crew and customer bus services to Kinetic Group, resulting in about 50 job losses.

Qantas’s outsourcing blitz has been extended to the airline’s crew and customer bus service at Sydney Airport with another 50 jobs set to go as a result of the move.

The decision comes a week after Qantas announced it would outsource ground-handling operations at 10 airports, resulting in 2000 job losses.

Canadian-owned public transport company Kinetic Group will take over the bus operations for Qantas from early next year, reducing the annual cost of the service by almost 25 per cent.

An employee bid aimed at keeping the work in-house was unable to match Kinetic, only reducing costs by about 10 per cent.

By outsourcing the work, Qantas will avoid the $2.5m cost of replacing the 23 buses currently used for the services, which have an average age of about 20 years.

Kinetic has a fleet of more than 3000 buses that are used throughout Australia and New Zealand, including at Melbourne, Adelaide and Auckland airports.

A Qantas spokesman said they recognised the decision would be difficult for the Sydney transport team after “a very tough year”.

“We thank everyone for their dedication to supporting customers and colleagues over many years,” he said.

“It’s clear the in-house bid team put in a lot of effort. Unfortunately the bid wasn’t able to generate the same level of efficiency that dedicated bus companies can, with Kinetic’s offering more than double the savings of the in-house bid.”

Qantas will now consult with affected employees, all of whom would be entitled to a redundancy package and support to transition to jobs outside of the airline.

The job losses are among 8500 positions being shed by Qantas as the airline seeks to re-emerge from the COVID crisis as a leaner operation with a lower cost base.

More than 13,000 workers remain stood down, despite a sharp ramp-up of flights since key borders reopened in recent weeks.

A market update by chief executive Alan Joyce revealed the airline group was expecting another substantial loss in the 2021 financial year, with no significant international flying likely before July.

With $11bn of revenue going begging, Mr Joyce was exploring a wide range of cost-saving measures, including a potential relocation of the airline’s Sydney headquarters.

The airline will also reduce the number of cabin crew on its Sydney-Melbourne services from five to four people, as part of a $1bn cost-cutting drive.

Most other Qantas domestic services already operate with four cabin crew.

Companies being contracted by Qantas for other ground-handling operations include Swissport, which was recently sold by its Chinese owners HNA Group to a group of senior creditors, including SVP Global and Apollo Global Management.

Menzies Aviation, dnata, Northwest Aviation Services and Oceania will also pick up some of the work at various airports around the country.

The Qantas spokesman said the move to outsourcing was not a reflection on their people but the “sheer economies of scale” offered by specialist companies.

“Sydney is the only place where we operate our own ground transport services and the hard

reality is that it doesn’t make sense for an airline to buy and maintain a small fleet of buses,” he said.

“COVID has taken a devastating toll on our business that will take years to recover from. That’s why we are faced with difficult decisions like this one.”