The Federal Government has seized on comments by shadow treasurer Joe Hockey that he was told by Qantas well before Saturday that it was planning to ground its aircraft.

Transport Minister Anthony Albanese is suggesting Qantas and the Opposition colluded during the industrial dispute and the Opposition knew well in advance the aircraft would be grounded.

On ABC TV's 7.30 last night, Mr Hockey told Leigh Sales he heard the aircraft would be grounded "weeks ago".

"They've [Qantas] been saying it. Weeks ago. Publicly and privately, they have been saying for weeks," Mr Hockey said.

Asked if he had heard it "personally in a meeting with a Qantas representative at some time in the past few weeks?" Mr Hockey replied, "Yeah, sure".

Yesterday Opposition Leader Tony Abbott avoided questions about when he first knew about the Qantas grounding and today Mr Albanese ramped up the pressure in the wake of Mr Hockey's comments.

"It's pretty clear from the shadow treasurer's comments last night on the 7.30 Report that some people were aware that this was going to occur," Mr Albanese told reporters.

Mr Albanese cited a report given to Qantas on October 20, more than a week before the lockout, on the safety implications of a lockout of its workforce - suggesting Qantas was planning a grounding well in advance.

Qantas chief Alan Joyce has maintained the decision was only made on Saturday morning at a Qantas board meeting.

Mr Albanese said Mr Hockey's comments last night "showed what the real game was" and accused the Opposition about being "tricky" about the language they have used.

"I think it was an extraordinary, explosive interview by Mr Hockey on the 7.30 Report last night given the fact the Government had raised issues about when the leader of the Opposition was told about the proposed lockout and shutdown of Qantas," he said.

Mr Hockey moved to clarify what he had said, telling ABC News Breakfast this morning the Opposition had not heard about the lockout of workers until "4:45[pm] on Saturday".

"Qantas had not suggested there was going to be a lockout at any previous time to that," he said.

Mr Albanese questioned why the Opposition had not been critical of Qantas for leaving thousands of passengers stranded.

"They haven't uttered a single word of criticism against Qantas. This is a service industry. The public got locked out," Mr Albanese said.

"The travelling public were inconvenienced and that inconvenience was maximised by the fact that it was done on the Melbourne Cup festival weekend.

"Imagine how Tony Abbott would be reacting if this was a shutdown due to industrial action by unions rather than by an employer."