Got sacked today

[old_mate]

/begin rant.

Basically, at the start of this year I left my trade with an airline to do a 'conversion' type apprenticeship and become a electrical fitter/mechanic (ordinary sparky). The company I worked for was high end electrical and data/comms, charged out at top dollar, expected top rate work and paid us all very well. Even took into consideration my previous trade when working out my wage under the AWA.

Since about April, the company hasn't done too well. Data side has been good, electrical side not so good. Our apprentice numbers are now 4, one who is a supervisor data guy and gets paid management salary of $80k (his wife is HR manager and associate director, but has no financial interest in the company), another guy who has lots of fibre experience and a mate i brought with me from the planes. Our electrical manager is found out to be under quoting jobs and pocketing some cash, he is soon fired and we keep soldering on.

By july, there is no sparky work, and we are sent out to emerald/alpha/aramac/barcaldine for a couple of months doing data cabling work for Qld health. Wasn't interested to go but they threatened me with my job if i didn't. Not good for my electrical apprenticeship but reasonable experience none the less.

Today, with the electrical side of the company now in tatters, data/comms not terribly busy and having the axe swung on several employees, the boss informs me I have a weeks notice of termination. Of course, there is the issue of terminating the apprenticeship contract but i think he has the idea he wont have to worry about that too much. Funny thing is, he only wants to sack two apprentices citing financial and lack of electrical work as reasons. The Department of Education and Training wants to investigate why they are only firing two and not the other two, why my training records are not existant and so on and so forth.

It annoys me that they cant fulfill the requirements of the training contract, (yet were more than happy to send me away for work when no-one else wanted to go) i have a mortgage and other responsibilites now and while the company have tried to get me other work, no-one wants to hire me because i simply cant earn less than $22/hr and most guys choose to pay the award minimum ($16/hr for adult apprentice) even though my TAFE is 90% done for the whole apprenticeship and with the right practical training and experience i could be licensed within a year to 18 months.

So now, i have a week or so to door knock, beg and try figure out how to survive on less money, or dump the whole idea and go back to fixing planes which even then is somewhat of a wage drop.

And under the AWA with less than 100 employees i have no further means to appeal, thanks workchoices.

If anyone knows of anyone looking for a sparky apprentice please let me know. Otherwise, thanks for reading my rant and any advice is muchly appreciated.