A spotlight on regional flight fares

Senate looks into 'unfair' pricing

Senate looks into 'unfair' pricing. Picture: Contributed

ONE-WAY flights from regional Queensland can cost as much as a return flight from London, a Senate committee sitting in Cloncurry will hear today.

Regional mayors are blasting the airlines for "blatantly treating rural and regional Queensland without care and almost with contempt”.

Cloncurry Shire Council's submission to the committee showed that while some flights to Brisbane cost as little as $360, one flight leaving the town to the capital on February 7 cost $1002.

Isaac Regional Council has also made a Senate submission, with Mayor Anne Baker concerned at the impacts at the high cost of flights between Moranbah and Brisbane.

"The price that people in Queensland's rural and regional areas have to pay is absolutely ridiculous,” Cr Baker said.

Greater Whitsunday Alliance also recently did a poll of Mackay, Whitsunday and Isaac business on airfare affordability and the impact on local companies, with initial results revealing 74 per cent felt there were not enough flights available and it was difficult to get a seat.

Mckinlay Mayor Belinda Murphy will tell the committee that the impact of high airfares on rural residents was not improving.

"The situation has become worse with the airlines blatantly treating rural and regional Australia without care and almost with contempt,” she said in her submission.

Mt Isa council is calling for an ACCC investigation into rural flight costs.

Qantas executive Andrew Parker has told the committee a range of factors impact rural flight costs, including fuel prices being higher in regional airports.

Mr Parker said demand in regional areas was skewed by fly-in fly-out workers, but that small populations in the towns meant there demand was not economically sustainable.

Originally published as A spotlight on regional flight fares