More job losses at Qantas

QANTAS has called for voluntary redundancies among check-in and other ground staff at Sydney Airport's international terminal after the loss of a multimillion-dollar contract with Air New Zealand.

The airline's management will meet the Australian Services Union, which represents customer-service staff at Qantas, on Friday to discuss the number of jobs likely to be lost.

Both sides said there would not be compulsory redundancies.

Qantas' long-standing contract to provide ground-handling services for Air New Zealand at airports including Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth will end in March. The multimillion-dollar contract is one of Qantas' largest and includes checking in of passengers and baggage handling.

The ASU's assistant national secretary, Linda White, said Qantas staff at Sydney Airport's international terminal were most likely to be affected by the loss of the contract with Air New Zealand. At other Australian airports, Qantas was likely to be able to redeploy staff to other roles, she said.

"They did call for expressions of interest among the check-in and customer-service staff, but the exact number is still very fluid. We should know at the end of the week," she said. "The place that was affected the most was Sydney because it has the most flights [by Air New Zealand]."

Air New Zealand made a decision in November to contract Toll Dnata to do the work. Airlines are increasingly turning to third-party operators for ground-handling services.

The threat of further job cuts comes after Qantas announced last year it would axe about 1260 roles from its engineering and maintenance operations in Australia.