31 October
Transport Minister Anthony Albanese has angrily contradicted claims by Qantas boss Alan Joyce that he told the Federal Government "on multiple occasions" that he might ground the airline's fleet.
Fronting a news conference in Sydney this morning, Mr Joyce said grounding the fleet "was not a surprise to anybody".
"We have been talking about it for weeks, months about the pain this was causing Qantas," Mr Joyce said.
But at a press conference this afternoon, a visibly annoyed Mr Albanese described three meetings he had convened with Mr Joyce, union boss Tony Sheldon and himself, where "at no stage" did Mr Joyce say Qantas would initiate a lockout and grounding.
Prime Minister Julia Gillard said she did not accept that Qantas's only choice on Saturday was "to take the extreme action" of grounding all planes and "leaving tens of thousands of passengers stranded".
She also denied newspaper reports that Mr Joyce had attempted to contact her before grounding aircraft.
"That is untrue and Mr Joyce has confirmed today that that is untrue," she told a press conference.
Mr Albanese went through a detailed timeline of telephone calls between himself and Qantas in which he rang Mr Joyce three times on Saturday after one of his staff had been alerted of the impending action.
He said it was only when Mr Joyce finally rang back that he got an indication the Qantas fleet would be grounded.
"That was the first occasion in which Mr Joyce or anyone else from Qantas had ever raised the issue of a lockout," Mr Albanese told reporters.
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