A take over by Chinese airlines would make sense for them, China Southern in particular which wants to operate a hub out of Guangzhou. They were the cheapest option from Sydney to London awhile ago. It would also give the Skyteam alliance a presence in Australia if CS or CE got in. China Eastern already partner with QF on Chinese domestic routes so that might be in doubt if they bought a competing airline in Australia. Whilst all three are government owned, Air China is the most government of the lot but would continue the Star alliance presence. Surprisingly the article talks about saving Virgin from going into administration, possibly they want to preserve as much of the operation as they can but I can still see a significant restructure and debtors taking a loss.
Allowing Chinese ownership might be the price for preventing an airline collapse and a significant loss of jobs and creditors money. The Chinese step in as saviours preserving Australian jobs and paying the creditors most of what they owe and it return get something they wouldn't be able to in normal times.
A Chinese owned domestic airline in Australia would come in handy for all the tourists they would bring in. Just like Thailand we could have the zero dollar Chinese tourist who arrives on a Chinese airline, stays in a Chinese owned hotel, gets transported around by a Chinese owned tour company, eats in Chinese restaurants and shops in Chinese owned downtown duty frees. Actually we probably have most of that already, still it creates a few jobs in the tourism sector and they pay some non refundable taxes.