Power of the Chairman’s Club
Turns out every MP in the Chairman’s Lounge gets a free pass to give to one other person of their choosing. Most MPs would choose their partner, Albo chose his son.
Whilst the closeness of politicians to the lounge in general is a topic for debate this particular story is a non issue.
Whilst the closeness of politicians to the lounge in general is a topic for debate this particular story is a non issue.
Alan Joyce doesn't use any influence gained by handing out memberships to the Chairman's Lounge! His 2017 Queen's birthday honours award of Companian in the Order of Australia (AC) was based on merit alone.
Another great Australian..
Another great Australian..
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Hrdickla said the most important thing for local tourism was to increase the number of inbound tourists to the country.
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The bit at the end sums it all up.
JOYCE SET FOR FAREWELL TO POLLIESAlan Joyce’s final tour of the country as Qantas chief executive wouldn’t be complete without a trip to the town where the carrier makes most of its money and, sure enough, Joyce’s victory lap of Canberra is nearly upon us.
Qantas is throwing a shindig in Parliament House’s private member’s dining room next Wednesday for its most important stakeholders – only MPs and senators allowed – to allow Joyce to gladhand the good and the great one last time, and to help incoming chief executive Vanessa Hudson get a feel for how it’s done.
Catering will be provided by the Ponytail Express himself, Neil Perry – who is, for those who have allowed themselves to forget, not only a chef, restaurateur, author and TV celebrity, but also Qantas’s director of “food, beverage and service”.
“We would be delighted if you could attend to meet our executive and incoming CEO, and talk about Australian aviation and the many sectors it touches,” the invitation says.
No doubt there will be plenty to talk about, given Transport Minister Catherine King is still under a fair bit of pressure to explain her decision to knock back Qatar Airways’ application to operate more flights into Australia – with Qantas being one of the few opponents of the idea.
Speaking at a tourism event in Brisbane on Thursday, Joyce denied Qantas has a lock on the direction of government policy, saying the airline has a “mature relationship” with government, but gets no political favours.
Margin Call will be interested to hear feedback on the length of the line of MPs wanting to petition Joyce – or Hudson, as his heir apparent – to allow their children to join Nathan Albanese in enjoying the Qantas chairman’s lounge largesse.
There was, sadly, no response to Margin Call’s query to Anthony Albanese’s office to see whether the Prime Minister would be attending the shindig hosted by “great mate” Joyce, nor from King’s office.
Qantas is also at some risk of a slightly more hostile reception at the dinner than it traditionally receives in the ministerial corridors, judging from an email response to the invitation from one grump MP that is currently doing the rounds of Canberra.
“Can’t afford to pay their workers properly, can’t afford to invest in capex to refresh Qantas’s tired and ageing fleet, can’t get flights to run on time, can’t get passengers’ baggage to land at the same place and time as they do, can afford to piss bucket loads of cash schmoozing politicians,” the missive says
JOYCE SET FOR FAREWELL TO POLLIESAlan Joyce’s final tour of the country as Qantas chief executive wouldn’t be complete without a trip to the town where the carrier makes most of its money and, sure enough, Joyce’s victory lap of Canberra is nearly upon us.
Qantas is throwing a shindig in Parliament House’s private member’s dining room next Wednesday for its most important stakeholders – only MPs and senators allowed – to allow Joyce to gladhand the good and the great one last time, and to help incoming chief executive Vanessa Hudson get a feel for how it’s done.
Catering will be provided by the Ponytail Express himself, Neil Perry – who is, for those who have allowed themselves to forget, not only a chef, restaurateur, author and TV celebrity, but also Qantas’s director of “food, beverage and service”.
“We would be delighted if you could attend to meet our executive and incoming CEO, and talk about Australian aviation and the many sectors it touches,” the invitation says.
No doubt there will be plenty to talk about, given Transport Minister Catherine King is still under a fair bit of pressure to explain her decision to knock back Qatar Airways’ application to operate more flights into Australia – with Qantas being one of the few opponents of the idea.
Speaking at a tourism event in Brisbane on Thursday, Joyce denied Qantas has a lock on the direction of government policy, saying the airline has a “mature relationship” with government, but gets no political favours.
Margin Call will be interested to hear feedback on the length of the line of MPs wanting to petition Joyce – or Hudson, as his heir apparent – to allow their children to join Nathan Albanese in enjoying the Qantas chairman’s lounge largesse.
There was, sadly, no response to Margin Call’s query to Anthony Albanese’s office to see whether the Prime Minister would be attending the shindig hosted by “great mate” Joyce, nor from King’s office.
Qantas is also at some risk of a slightly more hostile reception at the dinner than it traditionally receives in the ministerial corridors, judging from an email response to the invitation from one grump MP that is currently doing the rounds of Canberra.
“Can’t afford to pay their workers properly, can’t afford to invest in capex to refresh Qantas’s tired and ageing fleet, can’t get flights to run on time, can’t get passengers’ baggage to land at the same place and time as they do, can afford to piss bucket loads of cash schmoozing politicians,” the missive says
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Why do we need to wait until November? He whinges that the media keep talking about him, why the heck did he announce a 7 month farewell tour then?
No reason why he couldn’t leave today, yesterday or back in May. Just p!ss off.
No reason why he couldn’t leave today, yesterday or back in May. Just p!ss off.
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The next instalment from Joe Aston, unpaywalled for your convenience.
Anthony Albanese, Alan Joyce won’t let the truth set them free
Joe Aston
Columnist
Australian Financial Review
The first rule of Chairman’s Lounge is you don’t talk about Chairman’s Lounge. The Qantas chief certainly broke that one on Thursday.
Four days later, and the prime minister has still said nothing about the fact that his 23-year-old son is a card-carrying member of the exclusive Qantas Chairman’s Lounge, which entitles the young man to free flight upgrades and bottomless champagne.
Of course, Anthony Albanese doesn’t fly Qantas himself. The sitting PM and his entourage have their own private jet operated by the Royal Australian Air Force. Plainly, Albo has called in a secret favour to ensure that in his absence, the apple of his eye always travels in the cosseted style Qantas reserves for the executives and directors of large companies.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese with Qantas CEO Alan Joyce in March. Getty
One canard doing the rounds is that Nathan Albanese’s Chairman’s Lounge membership is justifiable on security grounds. Does anyone seriously believe the AFP’s personal protection branch says the regular Qantas Club is too dangerous? What a crock. By the extension of such logic, the kid could never even go to a pub. Even if the rationale was credible, it still wouldn’t explain why the PM has never disclosed it.
The PM hasn’t deigned to explain why such a valuable benefit was quietly conferred on his child alone, and nobody in question time on Thursday, or in any of his multiple media appearances over the weekend, has forced him to.
Ask yourself why the federal Liberals and Nationals haven’t said a single thing about this. Because they’re all in there alongside Albo, of course, sucking frantically on the Qantas teat. Like the American alliance and the offshore processing of asylum seekers, undeclared airline freebies are a bipartisan article of faith. Alan Joyce therefore maintains easy leverage over both sides.
And while Albo easily eluded scrutiny, it was Joyce who stepped up on Thursday to confront the revelation of Albanese jnr’s lofty Frequent Flyer status.
“I don’t deny it and at the same time don’t confirm it,” he said, as his PR flack huffed at reporters to stop asking questions on the issue. “I’ve been good mates with Albo for some time,” he added, defiantly.
Keep talking, Alan. Please, never stop.
Joyce’s comparison of federal politicians with mining executives is a typical misdirection. The quid pro quo with BHP and Rio Tinto bosses is that they direct lucrative corporate travel contracts to Qantas. Federal MPs fly Qantas but don’t themselves determine the Australian government’s travel deal with Qantas. That is (purportedly) a decision of the public service.
Chairman’s Lounge membership is absolutely different for BHP and Rio because those companies don’t regulate Qantas. BHP doesn’t hobble Qantas’ competitors or defang its supervising statutory authorities. Rio Tinto doesn’t shower Qantas with taxpayer subsidies.
The big reveal here is that Joyce sees it as a commercial arrangement. There is only one credible quid pro quo between the two counterparties: politicians get Chairman’s Lounge with all its associated trappings and, in return, Qantas gets a legal protection racket.
Am I saying that Albanese is unreasonably accommodative of Qantas because Joyce put his great mate’s son in the Chairman’s Lounge? That causation is impossible to demonstrate, and by itself, a stretch.
What I am saying is that it smells, and what any mug punter understands is that you cannot accept extravagant favours from someone you regulate because that is plain as dog’s balls a conflict of interest. Indeed, the only reason Albanese kept it secret is because he knew it looked bad.
Joyce is neither confirming nor denying, like he’s the Israeli defence minister. He doesn’t seem to comprehend that nobody else denies it, everyone knows it’s true and he might just have an obligation to clear this up.
Each day, Qantas sells thousands of tickets on flights it never intends to operate (as does Virgin Australia). Each day when they are cancelled en masse, passengers and airports have zero redress (unlike in the European Union).
The Albanese government defunded the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission’s airline monitoring program in June with airfares at record highs and Qantas still the most complained about company in Australia. What possible justification could there be for such a decision?
When COVID-19 hit, Joyce convinced the Morrison government not to provide a $1.3 billion loan to Virgin, so his archrival collapsed into administration. Joyce then set about extracting $2.7 billion of COVID-19 subsidies, none of which were repayable.
And now the Albanese government has knocked back Qatar Airways’ application to launch 28 new weekly flights between Doha and Australia. We knew how dodgy that decision was when the government tried to blame cavity searches in Qatar three years ago, but then Transport Minister Catherine King put it down to decarbonisation. Now it’s the Australian government conducting indefensible searches – they’re searching for a plausible explanation, but there isn’t one. It’s not me saying this, it’s the entire travel industry.
Albo was terribly cross when Joyce brought the nation to a standstill 12 years ago. Is he serious? There is actually scarce evidence Albanese did anything in 2011 beyond offering a handful of barely stern words. Albanese was transport minister for six years and incredibly, this is all Joyce can come up with.
Joyce reached into his grab bag of tough love examples and from the past decade, economy-wide industrial relations laws are literally all he’s got. They also came after Qantas illegally sacked 1700 unionised employees during COVID-19.
“This is just a nonsense that Qantas has this unbelievable influence that can dictate anything with the government,” Joyce protested. “And I don’t know how that mindset has got there because it’s just not right.”
This is almost a facsimile of his outlandish claim in May that leasing Finnair aircraft, pilots and cabin crew to operate Qantas flights was “positive for the creation of [Australian] jobs and anyone who says anything else is just completely wrong”.
Here he goes again, betraying his extraordinary perceptual deficits, dialling in from Alan’s magical world, where anyone who doesn’t agree with him simply has the incorrect mindset. I can’t cope with the idea you have a valid criticism of me, therefore I will invalidate you.
Wouldn’t it be fun, occupying an unreality where everyone else is wrong and you’re always right? It can only be the rarefied air that does it, the warping quality of power.
Joyce acts as if no one is noticing. I’ll just sprinkle a dodgy favour over here, and I can neither confirm nor deny. I really had to sell $17 million of Qantas shares in June to buy an apartment even though I sold a $20 million house in July. The world is wrong.
But in fact, a multitude of Australians has noticed. When Qantas reports its record profit on August 24, every jaded road warrior at the airport waiting for their flight to be cancelled will think of Joyce and his $24 million bonanza – his free upgrade to First Class for a Premium Economy performance.
In their minds, Joyce isn’t the great man who saved the national airline, he’s the unrivalled influence peddler screwing the travelling public to the wall, entrenching his virtual monopoly position by moving politicians on a string. Everyone can see it but him.
Columnist
Australian Financial Review
The first rule of Chairman’s Lounge is you don’t talk about Chairman’s Lounge. The Qantas chief certainly broke that one on Thursday.
Four days later, and the prime minister has still said nothing about the fact that his 23-year-old son is a card-carrying member of the exclusive Qantas Chairman’s Lounge, which entitles the young man to free flight upgrades and bottomless champagne.
Of course, Anthony Albanese doesn’t fly Qantas himself. The sitting PM and his entourage have their own private jet operated by the Royal Australian Air Force. Plainly, Albo has called in a secret favour to ensure that in his absence, the apple of his eye always travels in the cosseted style Qantas reserves for the executives and directors of large companies.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese with Qantas CEO Alan Joyce in March. GettyOne canard doing the rounds is that Nathan Albanese’s Chairman’s Lounge membership is justifiable on security grounds. Does anyone seriously believe the AFP’s personal protection branch says the regular Qantas Club is too dangerous? What a crock. By the extension of such logic, the kid could never even go to a pub. Even if the rationale was credible, it still wouldn’t explain why the PM has never disclosed it.
The PM hasn’t deigned to explain why such a valuable benefit was quietly conferred on his child alone, and nobody in question time on Thursday, or in any of his multiple media appearances over the weekend, has forced him to.
Ask yourself why the federal Liberals and Nationals haven’t said a single thing about this. Because they’re all in there alongside Albo, of course, sucking frantically on the Qantas teat. Like the American alliance and the offshore processing of asylum seekers, undeclared airline freebies are a bipartisan article of faith. Alan Joyce therefore maintains easy leverage over both sides.
And while Albo easily eluded scrutiny, it was Joyce who stepped up on Thursday to confront the revelation of Albanese jnr’s lofty Frequent Flyer status.
“I don’t deny it and at the same time don’t confirm it,” he said, as his PR flack huffed at reporters to stop asking questions on the issue. “I’ve been good mates with Albo for some time,” he added, defiantly.
Typical misdirection
Joyce even insisted that Chairman’s Lounge status is “not a gift, it’s a commercial arrangement that we do. Some of the politicians are … our largest flyers and we facilitate access to our lounges if you’re in BHP, if you’re in Rio. The government has a big contract with us – it’s absolutely no different.”Keep talking, Alan. Please, never stop.
Joyce’s comparison of federal politicians with mining executives is a typical misdirection. The quid pro quo with BHP and Rio Tinto bosses is that they direct lucrative corporate travel contracts to Qantas. Federal MPs fly Qantas but don’t themselves determine the Australian government’s travel deal with Qantas. That is (purportedly) a decision of the public service.
Chairman’s Lounge membership is absolutely different for BHP and Rio because those companies don’t regulate Qantas. BHP doesn’t hobble Qantas’ competitors or defang its supervising statutory authorities. Rio Tinto doesn’t shower Qantas with taxpayer subsidies.
The big reveal here is that Joyce sees it as a commercial arrangement. There is only one credible quid pro quo between the two counterparties: politicians get Chairman’s Lounge with all its associated trappings and, in return, Qantas gets a legal protection racket.
It smells
Joyce says it’s not a gift, so what is commercial about the (secret) arrangement between the PM and Qantas?Am I saying that Albanese is unreasonably accommodative of Qantas because Joyce put his great mate’s son in the Chairman’s Lounge? That causation is impossible to demonstrate, and by itself, a stretch.
What I am saying is that it smells, and what any mug punter understands is that you cannot accept extravagant favours from someone you regulate because that is plain as dog’s balls a conflict of interest. Indeed, the only reason Albanese kept it secret is because he knew it looked bad.
Joyce is neither confirming nor denying, like he’s the Israeli defence minister. He doesn’t seem to comprehend that nobody else denies it, everyone knows it’s true and he might just have an obligation to clear this up.
Each day, Qantas sells thousands of tickets on flights it never intends to operate (as does Virgin Australia). Each day when they are cancelled en masse, passengers and airports have zero redress (unlike in the European Union).
The Albanese government defunded the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission’s airline monitoring program in June with airfares at record highs and Qantas still the most complained about company in Australia. What possible justification could there be for such a decision?
When COVID-19 hit, Joyce convinced the Morrison government not to provide a $1.3 billion loan to Virgin, so his archrival collapsed into administration. Joyce then set about extracting $2.7 billion of COVID-19 subsidies, none of which were repayable.
And now the Albanese government has knocked back Qatar Airways’ application to launch 28 new weekly flights between Doha and Australia. We knew how dodgy that decision was when the government tried to blame cavity searches in Qatar three years ago, but then Transport Minister Catherine King put it down to decarbonisation. Now it’s the Australian government conducting indefensible searches – they’re searching for a plausible explanation, but there isn’t one. It’s not me saying this, it’s the entire travel industry.
Tough love
Joyce produced two alternative data points. Albanese “had a go at me when we grounded the airline in 2011”. And, “if the government was doing the bidding of Qantas, then it would have not [introduced] multi-employer bargaining, which is a bigger issue [than air rights]“.Albo was terribly cross when Joyce brought the nation to a standstill 12 years ago. Is he serious? There is actually scarce evidence Albanese did anything in 2011 beyond offering a handful of barely stern words. Albanese was transport minister for six years and incredibly, this is all Joyce can come up with.
Joyce reached into his grab bag of tough love examples and from the past decade, economy-wide industrial relations laws are literally all he’s got. They also came after Qantas illegally sacked 1700 unionised employees during COVID-19.
“This is just a nonsense that Qantas has this unbelievable influence that can dictate anything with the government,” Joyce protested. “And I don’t know how that mindset has got there because it’s just not right.”
This is almost a facsimile of his outlandish claim in May that leasing Finnair aircraft, pilots and cabin crew to operate Qantas flights was “positive for the creation of [Australian] jobs and anyone who says anything else is just completely wrong”.
Here he goes again, betraying his extraordinary perceptual deficits, dialling in from Alan’s magical world, where anyone who doesn’t agree with him simply has the incorrect mindset. I can’t cope with the idea you have a valid criticism of me, therefore I will invalidate you.
Wouldn’t it be fun, occupying an unreality where everyone else is wrong and you’re always right? It can only be the rarefied air that does it, the warping quality of power.
Joyce acts as if no one is noticing. I’ll just sprinkle a dodgy favour over here, and I can neither confirm nor deny. I really had to sell $17 million of Qantas shares in June to buy an apartment even though I sold a $20 million house in July. The world is wrong.
But in fact, a multitude of Australians has noticed. When Qantas reports its record profit on August 24, every jaded road warrior at the airport waiting for their flight to be cancelled will think of Joyce and his $24 million bonanza – his free upgrade to First Class for a Premium Economy performance.
In their minds, Joyce isn’t the great man who saved the national airline, he’s the unrivalled influence peddler screwing the travelling public to the wall, entrenching his virtual monopoly position by moving politicians on a string. Everyone can see it but him.
Last edited by PoppaJo; 6th Aug 2023 at 10:35.
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Joe Aston should be Australian of the year IMO
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Qantas shares could slide 30pc after boom, Angus Aitken warns clients
Ayesha de KretserSeniorKEY POINTS
- Why it matters: Qantas shares have soared as it benefits from booming demand
- The airline must spend billions on new planes, which could cut into returns
- The company is due to report its full-year financial accounts on August 24
Urging them to sell, Mr Aitken wrote in a note to clients that investment analysts were too bullish on Qantas’ future performance, adding that it was “a great time to take profits” and its market capitalisation was “punchy”.
Zucchini fritters aside, Angus Aitken has a long list of reasons to sell Qantas. Angus Aitken “How can every analyst love a stock that underneath it all has many cyclical elements? You should worry about a broker research panel that looks like this with no sells,” Mr Aitken wrote, adding that earnings could “easily go back to” $3 billion from around $4.5 billion for the last financial year.“This sad-looking packet of vegan zucchini fritters served to me on a flight to [Queensland] to me sums up Qantas as a business and a brand,” he wrote, attaching a photograph of a meal he had been served.
“You pay a sh**load of money for what should be a premium product and the service is Z grade for those high airfares. I reckon even the hosties were embarrassed to serve this rubbish to the customers.”
RELATED QUOTES
QANQantas
$6.190 3.17%1 year1 dayAug 22Feb 23Aug 234.2005.6007.000 Updated: Aug 7, 2023 – 10.25pm. Data is 20 mins delayed.View QAN related articles In particular, Mr Aitken was scathing of Qantas chief executive Alan Joyce’s decision to ban The Australian Financial Review from its lounges, writing managers “who don’t take criticism well always worry me”.
“Part of getting paid ... as a CEO in a public company is copping some negative heat, if you don’t like it, then don’t accept tens of millions in salary and bonus and go drive an Uber,” he said, adding that many investors will look back after Mr Joyce departs and wonder why they did not sell.
In May, Qantas removed The Financial Review from its lounges after Mr Joyce was criticised in the Rear Window column. The carrier has previously pulled advertising from The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age after what it perceived to be negative coverage of the company in 2014.
Mr Aitken said investment was needed in the fleet after five years of Qantas doing “as little as possible” to invest in both the fleet and service overall.
“Qantas reminds me of Woolworths about 15 years ago when they were number one and invested nothing in their business, then suddenly Coles came along and started beating them,” he said.
Acknowledging he might be six months early given expectations for record profits of between $2.4 billion and $2.5 billion when the airline reports its full-year results on August 24, Mr Aitken added that “the stock is fully valued and priced for zero cyclicality longer term”.
Analysts say Qantas is facing as much as $15 billion in looming capital expenditure as it takes delivery of narrow body domestic aircraft over the coming five years. But it also has to replace its fleet of A330s, which some analysts, including Morningstar’s Angus Hewitt, expect will “absorb meaningful cash flow and constrain returns to shareholders”.
“There is a lot of pent-up demand at the moment and that’s really driving tremendous profitability. We think this is about as good as it gets for airlines,” Mr Hewitt wrote in an earlier note to his clients.
Among reasons Mr Aitken gave to sell Qantas shares was the airline’s poor service, and the likely increase in competition from international carriers.
“The service is rubbish. It is hard to speak to a single person who has flown this airline in recent years who has anything other than negative anecdotes about them. That is very, very bad for Qantas’ brand,” he said.
“For full disclosure, no I am not a Chairman’s Lounge member and no, I am not writing this due to being replaced as a member by ‘working class’ Albo’s son,” he added, referring to a report in Rear Window last week that Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s son had been given access to the luxury invite-only club that is usually reserved for executives and celebrities.
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And another..brilliant piece for tomorrow’s AFR, unpaywalled for you.
Alan Joyce’s retirement tour storms Canberra
Joe Aston
Columnist
Aug 9, 2023
Rear Window
Wednesday was a crucial day out in Canberra for Qantas chief executive Alan Joyce and chief executive designate Vanessa Hudson, a petrified hostage on her predecessor’s interminable farewell tour.
When a CEO repurposes an iconic brand in his own image, for his own reasons (and with the total acquiescence of his weak chairman), can you really expect him to relinquish that brand in an orderly fashion? Whatever Hudson might’ve hoped for, Joyce’s months-long meltdown, his bonfire of brand equity, is just the price of accession for any heir to a mad king.
Alan Joyce performed his final tour of Canberra on Wednesday. Rhett Wymannone
Each of King’s explanations has been more implausible than the last. What of the thousands of local jobs that would spring from 28 new flights per week bringing 150,000 foreign tourists to Australia annually?
Secure Australian jobs! Joyce removed nearly 8000 jobs from the Qantas workforce in the 11 years he ran the company before COVID hit.
Qantas just launched new flights to New York via Auckland, crewed by Kiwis. Cheaper New Zealand-based flight attendants are operating Qantas flights between Brisbane and Los Angeles, and Melbourne and Delhi. Qantas’ trans-Tasman flights are crewed by Kiwi flight attendants and pilots. Qantas’ London flights are operated by London-based cabin crew.
Qantas just wet-leased two Finnair A330s (supposedly with Finnair crew attached) to take over Qantas flights to Bangkok and Singapore for two years. That deal was on the basis, Joyce angrily exclaimed, “they are positive for the creation of [Australian] jobs and anyone who says anything else is just completely wrong”. It emerged last week that cabin crew for those two aircraft will be provided by Asian labour hire firms!
Qantas illegally sacked 1700 baggage handlers in 2020. Qantas, the TWU and King’s cabinet colleague Tony Burke – the Workplace Relations Minister who argued in support of the TWU – are awaiting the High Court’s appeal judgment.
In April, Qantas lodged a special application with Immigration Minister Andrew Giles to hire nearly 300 foreign pilots and engineers. While nothing has been announced, sources close to the decision say Giles has only allowed Qantas to hire 10 foreign training pilots and rejected the rest. Joyce was right – industrial relations is the one area where Albanese can’t give him whatever he wants.
As presaged elsewhere, Joyce and Hudson hosted an intimate dinner for a select group of parliamentarians in the members’ private dining room on Wednesday.
At 5pm, as a kind of ambush amuse-bouche, Labor Senator Tony Sheldon, his successor as TWU Secretary Michael Kaine, and ACTU president Michele O’Neilheld a briefing for the Labor caucus. “For those who are also attending the Alan Joyce dinner … the briefing provides an opportunity to hear both sides of the Qantas story,” the invite read. More than 20 members and senators attended.
At Joyce’s dinner, naturally, main course was lame duck. Minister King was a late scratching. We couldn’t confirm whether Burke or Giles attended. Peter Duttonwasn’t even invited. The prime minister dropped by, only to pick up a new Chairman’s Lounge card for his dog Toto.
Can’t you just visualise the bonhomie? Joyce the grizzled entertainer, repeating the same anecdotes, cracking the same jokes. This is how it’s done, Vanessa, they eat right out of my hand! The strain of fake laughter, MPs just desperate for the end – when they can form a line, like at a mafia wedding, to petition Joyce for their freebies. Flights for their mistresses. Free upgrades for their idiot children. It’s the Canberra bubble, baby, the circle of public life. Snigger all you like, but no wheel turns without grease.
Luckily, Wednesday was not Joyce’s final dance on the political stage. The Senate select committee on the cost of living has summoned him to appear before its inquiry on August 28 in Melbourne. For someone who’s not a public figure, you’d have to think this is a pretty unreasonable level of public scrutiny.
As for Australia’s cost of living crisis, Joyce brings deep personal insight to the table. Only two months ago he bought his neighbour’s apartment for $9 million so he could knock out the wall and create a $20 million penthouse. 18 months earlier, he might’ve picked it up for $7 million! Asset inflation – it’s killing working families.
I want to see Alan Joyce the econometrician explain to the Australian parliament how artificially restricting the supply of airline seats is good for lowering airfares. I want to hear the logical contortions fall from his lips. You betcha, he’ll try. Better yet, he’ll even believe it – and that, alone, will be worth the bus ticket.
Columnist
Aug 9, 2023
Rear Window
Wednesday was a crucial day out in Canberra for Qantas chief executive Alan Joyce and chief executive designate Vanessa Hudson, a petrified hostage on her predecessor’s interminable farewell tour.
When a CEO repurposes an iconic brand in his own image, for his own reasons (and with the total acquiescence of his weak chairman), can you really expect him to relinquish that brand in an orderly fashion? Whatever Hudson might’ve hoped for, Joyce’s months-long meltdown, his bonfire of brand equity, is just the price of accession for any heir to a mad king.
Alan Joyce performed his final tour of Canberra on Wednesday. Rhett WymannoneEach of King’s explanations has been more implausible than the last. What of the thousands of local jobs that would spring from 28 new flights per week bringing 150,000 foreign tourists to Australia annually?
Secure Australian jobs! Joyce removed nearly 8000 jobs from the Qantas workforce in the 11 years he ran the company before COVID hit.
Qantas just launched new flights to New York via Auckland, crewed by Kiwis. Cheaper New Zealand-based flight attendants are operating Qantas flights between Brisbane and Los Angeles, and Melbourne and Delhi. Qantas’ trans-Tasman flights are crewed by Kiwi flight attendants and pilots. Qantas’ London flights are operated by London-based cabin crew.
Qantas just wet-leased two Finnair A330s (supposedly with Finnair crew attached) to take over Qantas flights to Bangkok and Singapore for two years. That deal was on the basis, Joyce angrily exclaimed, “they are positive for the creation of [Australian] jobs and anyone who says anything else is just completely wrong”. It emerged last week that cabin crew for those two aircraft will be provided by Asian labour hire firms!
Qantas illegally sacked 1700 baggage handlers in 2020. Qantas, the TWU and King’s cabinet colleague Tony Burke – the Workplace Relations Minister who argued in support of the TWU – are awaiting the High Court’s appeal judgment.
In April, Qantas lodged a special application with Immigration Minister Andrew Giles to hire nearly 300 foreign pilots and engineers. While nothing has been announced, sources close to the decision say Giles has only allowed Qantas to hire 10 foreign training pilots and rejected the rest. Joyce was right – industrial relations is the one area where Albanese can’t give him whatever he wants.
As presaged elsewhere, Joyce and Hudson hosted an intimate dinner for a select group of parliamentarians in the members’ private dining room on Wednesday.
At 5pm, as a kind of ambush amuse-bouche, Labor Senator Tony Sheldon, his successor as TWU Secretary Michael Kaine, and ACTU president Michele O’Neilheld a briefing for the Labor caucus. “For those who are also attending the Alan Joyce dinner … the briefing provides an opportunity to hear both sides of the Qantas story,” the invite read. More than 20 members and senators attended.
At Joyce’s dinner, naturally, main course was lame duck. Minister King was a late scratching. We couldn’t confirm whether Burke or Giles attended. Peter Duttonwasn’t even invited. The prime minister dropped by, only to pick up a new Chairman’s Lounge card for his dog Toto.
Can’t you just visualise the bonhomie? Joyce the grizzled entertainer, repeating the same anecdotes, cracking the same jokes. This is how it’s done, Vanessa, they eat right out of my hand! The strain of fake laughter, MPs just desperate for the end – when they can form a line, like at a mafia wedding, to petition Joyce for their freebies. Flights for their mistresses. Free upgrades for their idiot children. It’s the Canberra bubble, baby, the circle of public life. Snigger all you like, but no wheel turns without grease.
Luckily, Wednesday was not Joyce’s final dance on the political stage. The Senate select committee on the cost of living has summoned him to appear before its inquiry on August 28 in Melbourne. For someone who’s not a public figure, you’d have to think this is a pretty unreasonable level of public scrutiny.
As for Australia’s cost of living crisis, Joyce brings deep personal insight to the table. Only two months ago he bought his neighbour’s apartment for $9 million so he could knock out the wall and create a $20 million penthouse. 18 months earlier, he might’ve picked it up for $7 million! Asset inflation – it’s killing working families.
I want to see Alan Joyce the econometrician explain to the Australian parliament how artificially restricting the supply of airline seats is good for lowering airfares. I want to hear the logical contortions fall from his lips. You betcha, he’ll try. Better yet, he’ll even believe it – and that, alone, will be worth the bus ticket.
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Thread Starter
It won’t be the same when Joyce is gone and we won’t have these articles any more.
A great post:
Source: twitter.com/MikeCarlton01/status/1656521805807632384
The once much-loved Aussie icon, the Flying Kangaroo, has steadily been destroyed with the acquiescence of the Qantas Board and its 'weak chairman'.
Here's what it represents today...
So Alan Joyce is leaving Qantas. The highlight of his brilliant career: turning a much loved Aussie icon into a widely distrusted, expensive, money-grubbing and unreliable outfit that doesn’t give a **** about its passengers because it doesn’t have to. A great achievement.
The once much-loved Aussie icon, the Flying Kangaroo, has steadily been destroyed with the acquiescence of the Qantas Board and its 'weak chairman'.
Here's what it represents today...
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Wasn’t there a book that QF had banned from being published some years ago exposing the truth about the way this operation is run?
I don’t think the ‘truth about the way the operation is run’ is a trade secret these days. Joe Aston has summed it up in the last paragraph in his pieces.
May the articles continue.
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I understand that Alan’s speechwriter was blocked from releasing a manuscript that would apparently ‘damage the airline’. They came to a confidential settlement.
I don’t think the ‘truth about the way the operation is run’ is a trade secret these days. Joe Aston has summed it up in the last paragraph in his pieces.
May the articles continue.
I don’t think the ‘truth about the way the operation is run’ is a trade secret these days. Joe Aston has summed it up in the last paragraph in his pieces.
May the articles continue.
All hail Joe Aston!
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