They will do nothing that is not to the direct and immediate benefit of EK (which is why I am very happy to be with them). There is only one rather large body of water which we don't yet span. EK has a commercial department second to none, and a management team that makes QF look like kindergarten rejects. The future is clear if you don't have rose coloured glasses on.
Few Australians seem to fully realise this, but every Kiwi does; NZ and Australia have a 'common market' treaty called CER [Closer Economic Relations]. The CER works in exactly the same way as the agreement between the USA, Canada and Mexico [on which it is based]. So Emirates flying SYD-AKL and SYD-CHC with traffic rights is exactly the same as if they suddenly popped up with traffic rights between New York and Toronto and Los Angeles and Vancouver. How likely would that be to happen? Not very. Yet they busted into the trans-Tasman market.
At the time this happened they also achieved vastly expanded traffic rights west out of Australia to Dubai. The 'cover story' was that it would be good for
inbound tourism to Australia to have some competition to those unpopular price gouging folks at Qantas. They'd inundate Australia with tourists from all points [Yeah, right!]
To back up their 'tourism friendly' credentials, Emirates built and still operate an 'eco friendly' resort out in a remote place called the Wolgan Valley, NSW. How charging at least $1250 per night to stay there benefits the Australian tourism industry is still not clear, at least to me. About the only person it ever benefited was the farmer who sold his marginal, unproductive property, overrun with kangaroos, to Emirates. And I bet he sold out cheaply, not realising who was buying.
As I said that was the cover story. But in a logical world, you'd have to think there was something else going on here. Now either Australian politicians and public servants are incredibly naive and stupid [entirely possible] to give away traffic rights even within their own CER to foreign interests who provide nothing of substance back in return, or you'd have to at least entertain the possibility that Emirate's "second to none commercial department" includes a man with a suitcase padlocked to his wrist who travels to Australia. A lot.
A diligent Police Force, who are independent from the political structure just so they can investigate such things without compromise, would no doubt carry out enquiries, should they ever have suspicions, in exactly the same way they'd use to apprehend bank robbers. They'd look around to see who was a likely suspect and who has been living beyond their means since the act was perpetrated. Follow The Money is nearly always a useful line of investigation. The independent police and the judiciary are there to protect us from such events, should they ever occur. At least in a logical world. Unfortunately we don't seem to live in a logical world any more. [Although the AWB was recently investigated regarding their activities while selling wheat into the Middle East, so perhaps the system might still work, after all].
A half empty Emirates A380 flew out of Sydney on the short sector to Auckland this morning, as it does every morning. How much money does that service lose every day? Does an under-utilised, gob-smackingly expensive 'eco-friendly' resort in the Wolgan Valley offset, in any way, the damage done to Australian and NZ jobs, the environment and economic prosperity wrought by the stupidity of allowing Emirates world domination, however achieved?