Wild claims Qantas execs were ‘patting poodles and doing Zumba at a wellness camp’

Qantas execs were ‘patting poodles and doing Zumba at wellness camps’ while the airline battled some of the worst delays in its history, according to astonishing new claims. 

Transport Workers’ Union National Secretary Michael Kaine criticised Qantas’ management team and also blasted CEO Alan Joyce for the chaos at Australia’s airports. 

‘He had his corporate team enjoying a wellness camp with yoga, with Zumba and patting poodles to make themselves feel better,’ he said at a press conference on Tuesday, where he described Qantas management as ‘out of control’.

Qantas has struggled with cancellations, delays, staff shortages and lost baggage since the country’s borders reopened after the pandemic. 

He claimed Qantas execs (pictured is Alan Joyce) were ‘patting poodles and doing Zumba at wellness camps’ while the airline battled some of the worst delays in its history

The ongoing problems prompted commentator Phillip Adams, who coined the airline’s famous The Spirit of Australia slogan in the 1980s, to ask Alan Joyce to remove the tagline from branding.

Mr Kaine said Mr Joyce had ‘smashed workers’ and retrenched over 1,700 ground staff ‘illegally’.

‘Last year, the Federal Court found that 1,700 plus ground staff that Alan Joyce’s management sacked, were sacked illegally,’ Mr Kaine said. ‘The consequences of all of this, is that we have seen absolute chaos at our airports.

‘You can’t take 1,700 experienced workers out of ground operations in Australian aviation, and not pay a price.

‘This is a management team out of control.’

Qantas has been approached for comment by Daily Mail Australia. 

Mr Kaine said the aviation workforce in Australia has been ‘deliberately splintered’.

‘We have chronic understaffing, we have very low wages, and we have workers on minimum standards,’ he said.

‘It’s not just personal suffering, it’s not just poor service standards, we now have a safety crisis.

‘The current strains, pressures, fatigue and stresses that workers feel are very soon going to spill over into a very serious incident at our airports.’

Meanwhile, a dossier outlining ‘highly concerning safety breaches’ at Australia’s airports has also been released. 

Guns left unattended on airport baggage carousels, an undocumented box of petroleum products loaded onto an aircraft, passenger stairs wheeled away before the plane door was closed and collisions with refuelling hoses were some of the issues identified. 

Qantas has struggled with cancellations, delays, staff shortages and lost baggage since the country’s borders reopened after the pandemic

They were detailed in memos sent to Swissport cargo workers in the past six months, the Transport Workers Union said on Tuesday.

Swissport is one of the companies Qantas outsourced its ground-handling work to in 2020, when it sacked about 1,700 baggage handlers.

‘This is urgent. We want the air safety regulator to investigate. We want to make sure our skies are safe,’ Mr Kaine said on Tuesday.

‘We would rather sound the alarm than, in the event of a catastrophic event, be accused of remaining silent.’

Swissport said it was disappointed the TWU was undermining the company’s strong safety culture by distributing internal messages.

‘We encourage and support all reporting of possible safety issues, regardless of whether those concerns ultimately prove to have no foundation, so we can learn from any incident,’ a Swissport spokesman said.

‘That is indicative of a high-performing organisation, with a real commitment to safety.’

It rejected a claim airside drivers were getting behind the wheel with four hours’ training, saying recruits faced theory lessons, seven days of practical training and a final, formal assessment.

The regulator, Civil Aviation Safety Authority, said it had regular meetings with airlines’ safety managers and had an active surveillance section that hadn’t noticed an increasing trend in safety incidents at Qantas.