Qantas Maintenance Must Be Kept in Australia: Union
Radio Australia | Sep. 02, 2008
The Australian Manufacturing Workers Union will continue its push for Australia's biggest airline, Qantas, to guarantee maintenance work will not be done off-shore.
The Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) has released details of an audit that found maintenance of the airline's fleet has fallen below the company's own benchmarks.
The authority started its review after a mid-air explosion caused a 747 to make an emergency landing in Manila in July, but found recent incidents can't be directly linked to declining levels of maintenance.
Dave Oliver from the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union says maintenance work needs to be brought back to Australia.
"This should be a wake-up call to Qantas, to have a long hard look at their maintenance operations, and to start giving the guarantees that are needed in respect of maintaining a strong viable high-quality engineering and maintenance facility that has given them the reputation of being the safest airline in the world," he said.