Qantas has gone from national icon to just another big business | David Penberthy

One of the best things the SA Government has done of late was to jump out of the blocks to criticise the blocking of the Qatar Airways, writes David Penberthy.

As I was sitting down to write this column, an email landed in my inbox which was both timely and pertinent.

It was some unsolicited but pleasant spam from Adelaide Airport spruiking an enticing flight deal with Malaysia Airlines, which for many years has been doing a great job for us South Aussies operating direct international flights in and out of Adelaide.

“Enjoy up to 15 per cent off flights with Malaysia Airlines,” it read.

“Fly from Adelaide to Asia from $985 return economy class and $4385 return business class. Book here to experience heightened comfort like never before, but act quickly, as this offer ends September 30.”

Sounds like a pretty sweet deal.

It’s the type of deal you can get here in SA not just from Malaysia Airlines but other international carriers such as Singapore Airlines and Qatar Airways which also run direct overseas flights out of Adelaide.

There’s one notable airline which can’t offer you such a deal.

That airline is Qantas, our putative “national carrier”, for which South Australia might as well not exist when it comes to servicing us internationally.

Outgoing Qantas boss Alan Joyce. Picture: Peter Boer/Bloomberg via Getty Images

That’s not just for South Australian holiday-makers but for local exporters trying to sell their products overseas and business people heading away on international work trips.

It’s been the case for 10 years now, one of studied neglect for South Australia, from an airline which South Australians helped “save” through their taxes during Covid, like every other taxpayer in Australia, only in our case with nothing in return.

The reputational collapse of Qantas has been driven by many factors. Its treatment of staff through the outsourcing of jobs while simultaneously pocketing millions of dollars in taxpayer-funded JobKeeper payments designed to shield workers from dismissal.

Its disregard for customers in terms of cost, reliability and service. Its sale of non-existent flights.

The shoulder-shrugging attitude of former CEO Alan Joyce to all criticism, his board blithely handing him obscene bonuses purely on the basis of the company’s returns to shareholders, with no broader focus on the nosedive in the airline’s standing.

Its hostility to competition in the form of its campaign against Qatar’s bid to access more direct flights in and out of Australia, conduct which drives prices higher by keeping competition lower.

All of this begs a bigger question as to how Qantas is perceived.

Neither Qantas nor the federal government seems to know whether the airline is a private entity which operates in pure accordance with free market principles, or whether it is a national icon which needs to be mollycoddled and protected by both the commonwealth and the taxpayers.

If it’s the latter, someone better give Qantas and its board a map, as it is in cities like ours here in Adelaide where Qantas’ claim to be the airline for all Australians really starts to fall down.

One of the best things the Malinauskas Government has done of late was to jump out of the blocks to criticise the blocking of the Qatar Airways bid for an extra 28 flights into Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth.

Premier Peter Malinauskas at Adelaide Airport. Picture: Picture: Brett Hartwig

When the story broke a few weeks ago, a spokesman for the Malinauskas Government was quoted in The Australian applauding Qatar for the work it had done repatriating foreign-based Aussies during Covid and for the loyalty it had shown with its direct flights to SA.

The nature of those comments suggested the state government was so fired up about the issue that it had actively sought to make sure its support for Qatar was known publicly, despite whatever extra pressure that placed on the federal government and Transport Minister Catherine King over the vetoing of the flight request.

This week, Premier Peter Malinauskas amped up the pressure even more with strong public statements suggesting Qantas has let SA down.

Mr Malinauskas revealed he had raised the issue of direct international flights with the former CEO Alan Joyce but to no avail, and that he would now raise it with his successor Vanessa Hudson as a priority.

“It’s been, I think, a decade since Qantas has served Adelaide on an international route. We would love to see that change,” he said.

The Premier was deliberately effusive in his praise for Qatar and the role it had played in servicing SA.

“Qatar was flying in and out of Adelaide when others weren’t,” he said.

“They backed in people who wanted to be repatriated, they backed in movers of freight, and that really mattered to the South Australian economy when others went missing.”

As Qantas seeks to restore its battered reputation, it would do well to reflect on the final comments the Premier made about his affection towards Qantas versus any other airline.

“I’m in one respect agnostic about the airline. Emirates, Qantas, China Southern, Cathay Pacific – we want them all,” he said.

His ambivalence is something I suspect most Australians now share.

As Qantas has made the slide from beloved national icon to just another business, most people feel zero brand loyalty towards the Flying Kangaroo.

This is Alan Joyce’s most damning failure as CEO.

I flew with Singapore Airlines earlier this year and would quite happily never bother flying Qantas overseas again, having had a hassle-free and smooth experience in economy class with Singapore, which came with the added tasty bonus of nasi lemak for breakfast.

Once the mere mention of the name Qantas invoked misty-eyed sentiment on the part of Aussie travellers.

That fact will be central to its reputational recovery.

If we were in love with it before, we can be made to fall in love with it again. But like any relationship that’s been tested, this process will take time and require meaningful signs of change.

To that last point, as far as South Australia is concerned, for “meaningful signs of change” read “direct flights”, ideally priced along the same lines being offered by the good people at Malaysia Airlines.