A mate of mine forwarded an email that he sent to Steve Price in response to his editorial piece in the Herald Sun today,
" Hi Steve, normally I am a massive fan. I say normally because I can't believe the stuff that I am hearing and reading from you regarding Qantas.
In your article this morning you state, "The problem for the airline is that Australians treat Qantas as their own. We don't expect to have to fly Jetstar when we want to fly Qantas. Our national carrier is the safest airline in the world and frequent flyers will tell you how comfortable they feel arriving at a foreign airport and seeing the kangaroo on that tail."
I believe that this hits on the head one of the main reasons for the demise of Qantas, the fact that we are seeing less red tails at airports that we want and need to visit, coupled with the fact that Qantas is gifting routes and modern equipment to Jetstar means that Qantas is making itself unprofitable.
I can't believe that if I want to fly Qantas internationally from Melbourne, I have no choice but to first go to Sydney and then be restricted to a very small number of international destinations.If I want to go to Paris, I am forced to endure going through Heathrow, sheer lunacy!
If Qantas were serious about reviving the international arm, surely they would expand the network, revitalise the fleet and actually spend some money advertising it.
It is not all about price, it is about convenience of destinations, convenience of departure point (ie Melbourne), comfort of the aircraft and spending as little time as possible in transit. Unfortunately Qantas has none of these key selling points. Mr Joyces announcements do nothing to address these failings, instead all he talks about is reducing costs. Any moron can reduce costs, it takes some spine and initiative to increase revenue.
My ultimate frustration though, is that it seems particularly hard to get a view from anyone with a position of power and respect (ie: you or Andrew Bolt) who does not seem to be toeing the Qantas
PR department line. How can there be an objective view from Herald Sun journo's when the Qantas group spends an untold amount of money with full wrap around ad's?How do we, the general public, know that what we are hearing from media commentators such as yourself, is not tainted by the lure of membership to the Chairmans Lounge?
For years I have felt that as a middle aged Australian male, I have had no voice in mainstream media until you came back to Melbourne and MTR started up. I thought finally we had a voice that would pick through the inherent corruption and cronyism of not only our politicians, but big business as well.
Steve, please don't let us down. Next time that you have Mr Joyce on your program ask him some of the hard questions about his company.Ask him how a low cost carrier operating on low yield routes manages to be the "shining light" of the organisation. Ask him how much of the costs of the Qantas group are apportioned to Qantas International, even though the costs are incurred by other entities.
Ask him about his involvement as a director of a company that is making a fortune by leasing aircraft to the Qantas group. Ask him if they are deliberately running down our national icon to circumvent the Qantas Sale Act. Ask him if they are denigrating the company so that he and his cronies can buy it out and asset strip the carcass.
I have no vested interest here, I am a car salesman in the western suburbs of Melbourne who is simply disgusted by the web of lies and deceit being spun by those in charge of our national carrier.
I sincerely hope that you have not been lured into parroting the half truths of the Qantas
PR machine by the lure of fancy memberships and cheap travel in the pointy end of the plane Steve.Please do some research on the questions that I have put to you and take up the battle on our behalf because I think that you will find a sordid tale of greed and corruption that if it is not stopped, will lead to the demise of a company that probably most represents everything that is good about our country,
Regards
Name Witheld"
Maybe more of those affected should bombard people like Price and Bolt et al and force them to ask some questions!