Premier Colin Barnett has spoken to the heads of Qantas and Perth Airport in a bid to end an impasse over plans to run direct flights to London and Europe from Perth. The revelation came as a union with hundreds of members at Perth Airport accused the private operators of putting “profit before jobs” and urged the Federal Government to intervene. As Perth Airport defended its role in the negotiations, it emerged the Premier had held separate talks with the feuding parties on Monday. At the centre of the matter is a dispute over who should pay for upgrades to the airport’s domestic terminals needed to accommodate the Boeing 787 planes. Qantas claims the upgrade will cost A$25m but the airport says the figure will be closer to A$40m once work outside the terminal is taken into account. It also claims Qantas has refused to guarantee it would continue to provide the service, leaving the airport to carry most of the risk. While Barnett met Perth Airport CE Kevin Brown in person, it is understood he spoke to Qantas boss Alan Joyce on the same day. It is understood Mr Barnett was satisfied with the outcome. Barnett’s involvement comes amid growing calls for the State and Federal governments to help solve the deadlock.<br/>
oneworld
Two beers, two shots of vodka and a shot of gin might sound like the start of a big Friday night. But that round of drinks has instead ended a Qantas flight attendant's 28-year career. Qantas will now pay the veteran steward more than $33,000 after the workplace tribunal ruled it was harsh and unfair to fire him for taking the collection of booze with him at the end of a flight. The Fair Work Commission has heard Qantas randomly searched the crew of a Friday night flight from Perth to Sydney in February 2016, and found the attendant with one bottle of beer, one can of beer, two single serve bottles of vodka and one of gin. The 50-year-old steward, who had worked for Qantas since 1988, initially told the airline the 50-millilitre bottle of gin found in his bag could have been from a hotel mini bar. He later changed his story, admitting to taking the beer, but maintaining he inadvertently left the vodka in his pocket while serving passengers. He gave no explanation for the gin. Qantas sacked the attendant in March over the theft and for his misleading explanation for the gin, the commission heard. Another attendant on the same flight was also caught with alcohol and sacked, while a third was caught but not fired because there was not enough evidence. Fair Work Commission Deputy President Jeff Lawrence ruled last week that Qantas had valid reason to dismiss the attendant. However, Deputy President Lawrence found the dismissal was nonetheless harsh and unfair. Story lists why. <br/>
American Airlines Group said Tuesday that International Business Machines will supply cloud computing services for “select” enterprise applications, in a bid to improve technology efficiency and flexibility. The deal allows American to use the IBM Cloud and partner with IBM to build new cloud-based applications. American may also use IBM’s analytics services. The cloud deal is not exclusive and American may work with other cloud providers. This is the airline’s first large-scale use of public cloud technology. The airline spent much of 2016 evaluating a cloud move,and assessing the capabilities of competitors IBM, Amazon.com Inc. and Microsoft Corp. In a proof-of-concept period, American asked IBM to build a few mock applications to see how quickly they could be deployed in the cloud, said Patrick Grubbs, VP of IBM’s travel and transportation group. “Days versus months is what you’re attempting to demonstrate,” he said. Now the companies will dissect American’s key business processes, such as buying a plane ticket, to identify which IT systems support it and whether whole or parts of these systems can be moved to the cloud, Grubbs said. American does not plan to move all technology and applications to the cloud, a spokeswoman said. The airline and IBM declined to specify which applications may be targeted first. <br/>