Looming shortage of aircraft maintenance staff
Anna Patty
A looming 30 per cent global shortage of trained aircraft maintenance workers will hit Australia hard, a new University of NSW study has found.The university's business school has completed a five-year research project which reveals the global workforce shortage will emerge within 10 years. Matthew Dale and Alex Bathgate who have both just completed an apprenticeship with Qantas. Matthew has been given a job and Alex hasn't. Photo: Wolter Peeters
It warns that the Asia Pacific region will be particularly hard hit and stresses Australia has an urgent need to help meet the shortfall."This means moving quickly to rebuild both aircraft maintenance and maintenance training industries by 2020, to permit Australia to handle a high proportion of its own needs across the civilian airline, general aviation and defence sectors," the report says.Since 2007, the offshoring of aircraft heavy maintenance has raised concerns about safety and the loss of technical capability, export revenue and employment. The researchers said it was feared the heavy maintenance industry was going the way of other Australian industries, including car manufacturing. However, unlike car making, much of Australia's aircraft maintenance cannot be sent offshore."A crisis in the supply of aircraft maintenance skills at a global level is a major challenge, which will increasingly affect the viability of offshoring," the report says.
The researchers have called for an urgent review of the system of safety oversight of offshored maintenance, including international regulatory foundations."Australia has allowed its training system to run down, with enrolments in certain vital categories at their lowest since statistics have been collected, raising concerns that qualifications are not meeting international standards," the report says. Ian Hampson, Associate Professor from the School of Management at the UNSW Business School, speaking on behalf of the research team, said he was concerned Australia's training system was not producing enough licensed aircraft engineers."The Australian Manufacturing Workers' Union is currently in a dispute with Qantas over the employment of 20 newly graduated aircraft maintenance apprentices. Qantas says it has offered 18 jobs so far.The union says the future of the new graduates was uncertain in December last year, but 10 have since been offered 18-month contracts in Brisbane. Some say they will need to leave young families behind in Sydney to take up the positions.Three apprentices are being offered positions with Jetstar and four part-time jobs in West Australia are also being negotiated. Alex Bathgate is among the apprentices who do not yet have a position. He thought he was walking into a job for life when he started his aircraft maintenance apprenticeship with Qantas four years ago."There was no doubt in our minds that there would be a job at the end of it," he said.Mr Bathgate, 22, of Hurstville, said he was disappointed to he would not be following in his father's footsteps as a Qantas employee.His flatmate, Matthew Dale, 23, has accepted an 18-month contract to work in Brisbane after completing his apprenticeship. "I'm not a desk job sort of person," he said. "I love fixing things and it's a perfect job." "It's the only job I can see myself doing."A spokeswoman for Qantas said on Thursday 17 roles for the 20 apprentices had been found and on Friday said the number had increased to 18."We've been in regular contact with our graduating engineering apprentices about roles available to them, and we're pleased that the majority have been offered and have accepted jobs. We have been employing apprentices for 90 years and don't plan to change that, but like most businesses, we can't always guarantee that every single one will get a full time position at the end of it," she said.Australian Workers' Union Assistant National Secretary Daniel Walton said: "For people who have settled in Sydney and completed a four-year apprenticeship on the assumption of a full-time at the end, to be told that the best you can get is a part-time job in Perth is extremely disappointing".AMWU assistant national secretary Glenn Thompson said the union had lodged a dispute in the Fair Work Commission. He said the employment of the apprentices had been threatened last year, but extended until March 1. The University of NSW project was funded by the Australian Research Council in partnership with unions, industry groups and TAFE. 0 comments