Air New Zealand asking Immigration to import foreign pilots

[Gilles Hudicourt]

In New Zealand, Air New Zealand has applied to the local Immigration Department for permission to import foreign pilots because they claim there is a lack of local pilots.

Their requirements are for 500 total time and 25 hours night time. On that basis, they claim to exclude local pilots who do not meet those requirements in favor of higher experience foreigners.

Instead of investing in training locals, they want to leave the locals un-employed and employ foreigners instead.

http://tvnz.co.nz/national-news/there-n ... ys-5519443

http://tvnz.co.nz/national-news/air-nz- ... eo-5519191

Does this ring a bell ? Sounds familiar ?

It has a name. It's called corporate greed.

[tincanflyer]

Yawn. Yup, so everyone is doing, even other industries, countries, etc.

You should have your own index, to hide your crap. I'm sick of reading your posts and purposely ignore avcanada to avoiding reading your posts.

[Dh8Classic]

Well isn`t that lovely. A company does the responsible thing and says that they want experience as a primary hiring reason and Gilles is upset. Guaranteed, there will be no 500 hour foreigners hired, but you can rest assured that there will be no 250 hour locals hired either if possible.

I guess this safety oriented hiring idea is a foreign concept to some where qualifications based on cultural background trumps safety. Speak a certain language, or have a certain citizenship, we will hire you no matter how little experience you have. Criminal background, ah well, who cares, that personality trait will never come back to haunt us will it.

A safety culture is not corporate greed.

[ptc]

Having working for an Air NZ subsidiary I can pretty much guarantee that mainline will not accept candidates with those minimums. I would find it hard to believe that even the domestic turbo prop will take people with those times. When I got hired I have about 1200 hours TT.

I know my mates back down under are pretty upset about this as NZ is definitely a country with too few jobs for too many pilots

[JTF01]

New Zealand is a country with no pilot shortage. I've worked with experienced Kiwis across Africa and Asia who would love to be able to go home.

It would be wrong if the NZ government allowed this to happen.

Hence why the last 10 seconds of the newscast was encouraging.

jtf

[Gilles Hudicourt]

tincanflyer, there is a foe list on Avcanada that you can add me to, and when you do, every single one of my posts, past, present and future, will become invisible to you. I encourage you to use it. I use it regularly to block off people, when I've determined that they add nothing to the debate but venom or engage strictly in personal attacks while avoiding the issue at hand.

Cheers!

[chinglish]

I don't see what the problem is. The company is saying that there isn't enough qualified pilots (500TT 25 night) and government is saying that there isn't a pilot shortage. There's a difference between pilot shortage and qualified/ experienced pilot shortage.
A lot of overseas carriers conduct business this way (Cathay and Emirates come to mind) they import experience.

[Gilles Hudicourt]

To those that want to compare Canada, or New Zealand to Hong Kong and to the United Arab Emirates.

In Canada (population 33.5 million) there are 7,017 commercially registered aircraft, including 5,455 under 12,000 lbs and 1,562 over 12500 lbs. There are another 28,327 general aviation aircraft for a total of 35,354 registered aircraft (1 aircraft per 947 people).

Little New Zealand, with a population of 4.5 million has 4,572 aircraft on its Civil Aircraft Register (one aircraft per 984 people).

Hong Kong (population 7 million) and the United Arab Emirates (population 8.2 million) put together have less than 1000 aircraft on their civil aviation registers, and a majority of those are made up of the jet aircraft of the major airlines of those two places : Cathay, Dragongair, Air Hong Kong, Hong Kong Express, Ethiad and Emirates etc..... (one aircraft per 20,000 people).

Can they really be compared when talking about the need to import pilots ?

I don't see what the problem is. The company is saying that there isn't enough qualified pilots (500TT 25 night) and government is saying that there isn't a pilot shortage. There's a difference between pilot shortage and qualified/ experienced pilot shortage.

The is also a very small step between asking the government to allow one company to import foreign pilots on the basis that local pilots with less than 500 hours are excluded, and asking same government to allow same company to import foreign pilots on the basis that the local pilots who do not have a certain type rating and 500 hours on type are excluded.

[chinglish]

I didn't read anything in the ad about needing a type rating. If the foreign pilot has a type rating than good for them but I don't see what one has to do with the other. I'm not fully educated on the Air New Zealand situation but to the best of my knowledge, they aren't turing down pilots with the hours required because they don't have a type rating, they are turning down pilots because they don't have the required hours the company requires. That's what I picked up from the two links that were provided.

[Gilles Hudicourt]

You are correct.

What I said is that there is a very small step from turning down locals in favor of foreigners because the local does not have x number of hours, to doing the same, as airlines in Canada have been doing, because the local does not have a type rating.

A government must never take it lightly when a local airline turns down local pilots in favor of foreigners.

[slowstream]

You are correct.

A government must never take it lightly when a local airline turns down local pilots in favor of foreigners.

Agreed!

Government should NOT screw its own people based on what one company claims, but then government and corporations are always truthful............

If Air New Zealand is successful, it still does not mean that they will have throngs of foreign pilots coming over. I don't know what their wages are like, but New Zealand has a high cost of living and is highly taxed from what I know, making Canada look very inexpensive.
So unless Air New Zealand is offering huge incentives I doubt they will have a ton of people looking to go there.

That being said it still does not stop the mentality of Government and industry to ignore their own people

[Dh8Classic]

What I said is that there is a very small step from turning down locals in favor of foreigners because the local does not have x number of hours, to doing the same, as airlines in Canada have been doing, because the local does not have a type rating.

No you didn't....you said it was corporate greed. Read your initial post.

Let me guess...no response.

[slowstream]

What I said is that there is a very small step from turning down locals in favor of foreigners because the local does not have x number of hours, to doing the same, as airlines in Canada have been doing, because the local does not have a type rating.

No you didn't....you said it was corporate greed. Read your initial post.

Let me guess...no response.

Dh8Classic,

Are you saying there is no corporate greed here? That the airlines in Canada and other countries don't suffer from corporate greed?

[Joe Blow Schmo]

What I said is that there is a very small step from turning down locals in favor of foreigners because the local does not have x number of hours, to doing the same, as airlines in Canada have been doing, because the local does not have a type rating.

No you didn't....you said it was corporate greed. Read your initial post.

Let me guess...no response.

You really don't add much to any discussion do you? New Zealand has plenty of regional airlines and commuter operations. There are lots of pilots flying Dash 8s, B1900s, Navajos, etc...all of whom have, or will very shortly have Air NZ's stated minimums of 500 hours TT and 25 hours night, Many of whom would love to work for Air NZ. Air NZ suggesting there aren't enough appropriately experienced pilots in New Zealand is as ridiculous as Air Canada or Westjet suggesting the same thing about Canada.

Now I don't know what Air NZ pays, but a quick search on the internet suggests they pay quite a bit less than Qantas, Jestar and Virgin Australia. Perhaps the problem is not that there aren't enough experienced pilots but that there aren't enough experienced pilots willing to do the job for the package on offer. If (big IF, as I don't know) that is the case, then the solution (according to the laws of supply and demand) is to make the package more attractive, not get government help to bring in cheap labour. Remember that Australia and New Zealand already have an open labour market. Air NZ can already hire Aussies. So apparently they're trying to claim that there are not enough Kiwis or Aussies to do the job.