Just a quick correction to someone who said that the owner of Emirates airline is owned by the same people who are the regulators. Totally incorrect. The regulator for the UAE is the GCAA, and are based in Abu Dhabi. Now when Etihad starts flying to Australia, you can moan about the regulators and airline owners being one in the same, but not the case with Emirates.
As has been said here, Emirates airline does pay for fuel, it's just that when filling up here in the UAE it is cheaper than it would be elsewhere. But that is an advantage enjoyed by all the carriers operating in and out of here.
The inflight service on Emirates, while having slipped recently, is still head and shoulders above that of QANTAS or British Airways. Personally I still think the best service is on the South East Asian carriers, namely SQ and Malaysian.
Like everyone here, I don't want to see people lose their jobs, or for another Oz airline to go bust, but the consumer should have the final say. If given the choice the punters want to fly Emirates, or Singapore or whoever ahead of QANTAS, rather than blaming unfair competition, maybe the answer is to compete.
You look in the supermarkets here now in the UAE and since the non stop flights to Oz started the amount of Oz produce (including Tim Tams YAY!!!) on the shelves has skyrocketed. This means more jobs for Australians.