The mainstream media’s envious, small-town obsession with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and his family having received special airline upgrades and lounge access from Qantas has seen journalists largely miss the point. The airline’s expert lobbying — and the soft power of its exclusive lounges and upgrades — is all about one thing: protecting its financial and market position.
Canberra has decades-long form in the Qantas protection racket. There are few cleanskins in senior government ranks, of both stripes, when it comes to sucking on the airline’s teat and giving it special treatment.
The more than $2 billion handed to Qantas during the pandemic in taxpayer subsidies — not returned by the airline — and the blocking of Qatar Airways’ major flight expansion are two recent highlights of the national carrier’s success. But arguably the prime example was the failure to pull the trigger on the type of consumer protection (in a sector famous for its cavalier treatment of its customers) proposed in the the government’s aviation white paper released in August.
Instead we were given the cop-out of an ombudsman scheme — unsurprisingly this was the option that Qantas and its junior oligopolist Virgin had signed off on. The government rightly has the blowtorch on the supermarket duopoly of Coles and Woolworths, which between them controls 65% of their sector. Yet the Crafty Old Roo, with 63% of the Australian domestic aviation market courtesy of its two-airline strategy, gets a regulatory lettuce leaf.
This cave-in by Albanese and Transport Minister Catherine King was rammed home this week when the US federal government introduced automatic passenger refunds and payments within seven to 20 days for cancelled and significantly delayed flights (three hours for domestic, six for international), lost and delayed baggage, and a raft of inflight extras if they are unavailable, such as wi-fi and seat selection.
“Passengers deserve to get their money back when an airline owes them — without headaches or haggling. Today, our automatic refund rule goes into full effect. Airlines are required to provide prompt cash refunds without passengers having to ask,” US Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg posted on X this week.
Those words would ring like Christmas bells for Australian fliers if they came from Canberra. The new US rules largely match the European Union’s air passenger rights regulation. Even Qantas cannot dodge them on its handful of US and EU routes, as they apply to all airlines flying in and out of airports in both places. Still, Qantas has almost completely outsourced its European business to Emirates with its codeshare arrangement, only flying to Paris and, on a seasonal basis, Rome. EU rules do not apply to Qantas’ two daily flights to London.
Sure, Albanese has been particularly close to the master manipulator, former Qantas chief Alan Joyce but the big picture in focus is of an entire political and regulatory class (top brass from the ACCC, airline regulators and the law) that has succumbed to the cheap thrills of secret doors, free champagne and comfy seats instead of protecting Australian consumers from one of its most rapacious companies.
If Albanese wants to snuff the perception that he is Qantas’ man in Canberra, he must end the soft corruption of the Chairman’s Lounge and urgently revisit the weak white paper recommendations by replacing or supplementing an ombudsman with a US- or EU-type scheme. This is especially needed in the barely competitive Australian market, where the loss of Rex on major routes was highlighted by Qantas CEO Vanessa Hudson’s bullish financial update at its AGM last Friday.
Miss this opportunity and he will leave a free kick for a smart opposition to take such a voter-friendly scheme to the election. To be fair, opposition transport spokesperson Bridget McKenzie, who certainly knows a rort when she sees one, has been on the case for a while despite also having her snout in the Qantas trough. Indeed, some of the most egregious offenders have been on the opposition benches: wealthy Sydney MP Paul Fletcher with 69 upgrades, come on down.
But to really drive the political advantage home, Opposition Leader Peter Dutton should remove himself and LNP members from the Chairman’s Lounge — as well as the private jets of Gina Rinehart and her ilk. The icing on that cake would be to resuscitate the policy to give the competition regulator divestment powers over Qantas that McKenzie has already flagged. Does Dutton have the cojones?
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