Qantas has landed back in court this week to find out how much it’s going to pay in penalties for outsourcing staff during COVID. 

The national carrier is currently before the Federal Court following one of the most high-profile breaches of the Fair Work Act in recent corporate memory. It has been found repeatedly responsible for breaching the Act after outsourcing ground-handling jobs in 2020, dismissing around 1700 workers.

The Federal Court is now deciding just how much Qantas will have to pay above its $120 million assistance package it has already offered to put the case behind it. This package was offered after Qantas told the court in one of its hearings it didn’t believe the TWU members deserved compensation at all.

But $120 million is not enough for the Transport Workers Union. It’s pushing the court to impose additional fines for the airline’s conduct. 

In fact, TWU boss Michael Kaine has said that he wants the penalty to be so large that other companies won’t even think to try it in future.

“Not only was it an appalling act to get rid of a loyal workforce, it was the biggest case of illegal sackings in Australian corporate history. The penalty to Qantas must reflect this and send a message to every other company in Australia that you cannot sack your workers to prevent them from using their industrial rights,” Kaine said via a TWU statement.

The union wants the court to level the highest penalty it possibly can for breaching the Fair Work Act: $121 million. 

“We need to see Qantas held accountable to the fullest extent here,” he added.

Court call Qantas out for 'lack of remorse'

During the most recent penalty hearing this week, Justice Michael Lee presiding over the hearing made pointed remarks about the airline’s tone and approach to the breach of the FWA. The Justice Lee expressed concern about what he described as a lack of meaningful accountability from Qantas, particularly regarding who appeared in court to speak on behalf of the company.

Rather than calling any executives who made or influenced the outsourcing decision, Qantas put forward Catherine Walsh, a senior HR executive who joined the company in 2024, years after the events in question. CEO Vanessa Hudson was nowhere to be found for the penalty hearing.

“You have to confront what happened and why,” Justice Lee said, as reported in The Australian.

“To put on someone who wasn’t even there and say this is our response now, well, that doesn’t go very far.”

He questioned whether Qantas had genuinely reflected on the conduct that led to the breach.

How did we get here?

The case centres on the airline’s 2020 decision to outsource roughly 1,700 ground handling jobs during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Transport Workers Union (TWU) argued that the move wasn’t just a cost-saving measure—it was a strategy to prevent unionised employees from exercising protected workplace rights, including industrial action.

In 2021, the Federal Court sided with the TWU, ruling that Qantas had acted unlawfully. That finding was upheld on appeal by the Full Federal Court in 2022 and again by the High Court in 2023.

With the legality now settled, the focus has shifted to penalty. The TWU is pushing for the maximum penalty—$121 million—describing the conduct as deliberate and damaging. Qantas has already agreed to $120 million in compensation, but that amount sits apart from what the Court may still impose as a punitive fine.

The current hearings will decide how the Court views the airline’s conduct—and its response to the rulings.

The TWU says that “companies like Swissport” still handle the ground operations for Qantas, and called out “significant and alarming safety concerns, severe under-staffing and a revolving door of fed-up workers” as an ongoing issue.