The Qantas Airways Ltd (ASX: QAN) share price is shaking off the broader market malaise today and flying higher.
The S&P/ASX 200 Index (ASX: XJO) airline stock closed yesterday trading for $6.58 per share. Shares are currently changing hands for $6.67 apiece, up 1.4% in early morning trade.
This comes as the benchmark index reacts to overnight weakness in US markets to sink 0.73%.
Nor does the Qantas share price appear fazed by some unwanted, if largely expected, labour disruptions today.
What's happening with the labour dispute?
The Qantas share price won't be receiving any tailwinds from the company's refuelling crew subcontractors on Wednesday.
The workers at Melbourne Airport downed tools early this morning to kick off a 24-hour strike.
The employees have been trying, without apparent success, to renegotiate their pay and work conditions with Qantas and their direct employer, aviation labour contractor Rivet.
Transport Workers Union (TWU) national secretary Michael Kaine explained the motivation for the strike (as quoted by 9 News):
"They've had to deal with all the COVID crisis. Now we have a situation where they haven't had a pay increase for three years," Kaine said. "They've been negotiating with this company for a year, and they just need an opportunity to get some good pay increases but also an opportunity to rebuild these good aviation jobs."
Qantas is working around the issue and doesn't expect the targeted industrial action to impact flight schedules.
"Our operations team has done a great job of putting workarounds in place and at this stage we're not expecting any material impact to our flights on Wednesday," the airline stated.
Qantas does not directly employ the refuelling crews. ExxonMobil delivers the jet fuel for its Melbourne Airport flights and the oil giant subcontracts the refuelling segment to Rivet.
However, TWU acting branch secretary Mem Suleyman believes Qantas has plenty of sway over Rivet on any potential labour negotiations.
"As Rivet's major client, accounting for at least 60 per cent of the work, Qantas has the ability and responsibility to dictate through its contracts with labour providers that workers refuelling its planes are receiving fair pay and safe working conditions," Suleyman wrote in a letter to Qantas management.
Qantas share price snapshot
As you can see in the chart below, the Qantas share price has been a strong outperformer over the past 12 months, up 47%.
