Qantas classic award bookings: restricted to a few bad seats right at the back?

I've taken 2 domestic classic award flights recently, just to use up some points and because I needed to get to the destination anyway. When I booked online there were only about 4 available seats I could select from, right at the pack of the plane, and when checking in at the kiosk I only got those same seats to choose from again, all others were marked as unavailable. It was the same for both flights, but the actual flight was less than half full, I don't think I saw one person having to sit next to somebody else. So I was wondering if classic award bookings are always restricted to a few bad seats right at the back? Because if not I should have been able to pick from nearly any other seat on the plane based on how empty the flight was.

I don't usually fly Qantas so have no status.

It's not the Classic award booking that puts you in the back on QF, it's status. Platinum and Gold get a lot closer to the front. Bronze, and sometimes Silver, get treated like you've paid budget fare. I know, I've been on all four kinds of status at one time or another. 

Thanks, so if I was Gold and had booked the same flight as a classic award I would have had the choice of any seat not already taken by another passenger? When you book a budget fare you still get to pick any seat not already taken don't you? I wonder if booking an anyseat award as a non status passenger will give me a better selection next time?

Not sure about the Anyseat award and your chances of a good seat, I've never used one. If you were Gold and booked even a revenue budget fare there are seats available to select that don't come up if you are Bronze. Same for Gold flyers on Classic awards. Qantas seems to have adopted the BA model; cheap fares (including award flyers with no status) down the back, higher payers and status flyers get better choices; they probably won't concede this though.

You're just getting the seat... Seat selection is then the same as any other booking.

Oh sorry just properly read the other responses -- QF does the whole status members get access to the best seats, and free pre-checkin selection. For non status fliers, and for those who are bronze and I think silver you can pay to select your seat prior to online checkin or else just wait. Where QF seat you as part of their random allocation isn't impacted by your fare/award tickets -- once they've done status FF by order and all the other special seat people it's just randomly placed depending on the size of groups etc.