On Wednesday, Australia’s High Court ruled that Qantas, the nation’s flagship airline, was in violation of the law when it fired 1,700 ground staff early in the Covid-19 pandemic and replaced them with contractors.

Media reports noted that the court said that although the company had commercial motivations for the move, it had been in breach of industrial law because it “sought to thwart” the ability of the unionized employees to engage in collective bargaining and industrial actions.

Following the ruling, Michael Kaine, secretary of the Transport Workers Union (TWU), which was the plaintiff in the case, said to journalists, “These workers have been put through hell. Their families have been put through hell, their lives have been dislocated, some of them forever.”

In a statement, Qantas said that it would accept the decision of the High Court, noting that the Federal Court already ruled out forcing a reinstatement of the workers by the company.

The company said, “As we have said from the beginning, we deeply regret the personal impact the outsourcing decision had on all those affected, and we sincerely apologize for that.”

The carrier has also been dealing with accusations that in mid-2022 it had sold 8,000 tickets for flights which had already been cancelled.

Intense criticism of the company had prompted the previous chief executive of Qantas, Alan Joyce, to retire two months early, last week.