Departing Qantas boss Alan Joyce’s new life revealed
Departing Qantas boss Alan Joyce will receive millions of dollars in hidden perks, including free flights, sparking fury from the industry and shareholders.
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Departing Qantas boss Alan Joyce will receive $2 million of free flights over the next 20 years in a hidden perk despite leaving as the airline is in free fall.
Mr Joyce is entitled to four free international flights and 12 domestic flights for each year he has been in leadership.
That’s on top of the $125 million he’s earned from Qantas since he took over as chief executive in 2008.
Mr Joyce is also expected to collect a $3.5 million bonus this year, which investors say should be blocked.
The head of the Flight Attendants Association of Australia, Teri O’Toole, said the Qantas board should review Mr Joyce’s travel perks and bonus.
“Flight attendants can lose bonuses if they damage the reputation of Qantas, it seems unfair that Alan Joyce gets his financial bonus and his ongoing staff travel. The board should not be allowing this,” Ms O’Toole said.
While some Qantas stewards get paid just 80 cents more an hour than fast food workers, Mr Joyce has been soaking in a life of luxury.
He was planning a trip to Antarctica and a visit to his mum in Dublin after this week bringing forward his retirement by two months following a string of scandals under his watch.
When he gets those done, he also has builders on standby to double the size of his apartment in the Rocks in Sydney to a six-bedroom, six-bathroom palatial pad, after paying $9 million for his neighbour’s flat this year.
Flight Centre chief executive Graham Turner said Mr Joyce was likely to take on more part-time roles, like his position as chairman of the Sydney Theatre Company.
“I think he will retire from a full time role. He’s not just been at Qantas, that’s a high pressure job, I’m sure he will look at board roles,” Mr Turner said.
Mr Joyce was an all-powerful chief executive at Qantas, but his legacy is now under a cloud.
The airline lobbied for the Federal Government to block Qatar Airways from adding 21 extra flights a week into Australia.
Flight Centre, one of Qantas’ biggest customers, took out full page advertisements in last weekend’s newspapers criticising the decision.
“Qantas is very good at lobbying, they’ve always got people in Canberra, good luck to them,” Mr Turner said.
“This government is keeping airfare prices high and they haven’t given any good reason for it yet.
“Airfares are 50 to 60 per cent higher than they were pre-Covid. It’s also making it hard to get the tourists back into Australia.”
Mr Joyce’s early exit came after Qantas was hit with a $600 million Australian Competition and Consumer Commission lawsuit for selling tickets on cancelled flights.
The airline’s scandals have all happened under the watch of Qantas chairman Richard Goyder, with multiple aviation sources saying he has “to go”.
Transport Workers Union boss Michael Kaine said of Mr Goyder: “To the extent that he said anything, it’s been to mouth platitudes and to praise Alan Joyce as some kind of CEO messiah.”
Mr Goyder, who also chairs the AFL Commission, was also in line to receive four international flights and 12 domestic flights free each year if he leaves Qantas.
Business class flights from Sydney to London cost almost $20,000 this month, according to Qantas’ website, meaning the gold plated executives can receive up to $100,000 in free travel each year.
Mr Kaine said Mr Joyce was pocketing “obscene bonuses” while he sacked 1500 Qantas ground workers during the pandemic.
Qantas’ service also suffered last year, with as many as one in four flights cancelled and a spike in lost baggage when travel returned following the easing of Covid-19 restrictions.
“Joyce’s literally flying off into the sunset, $24 million under his wings, Chairman’s Lounge whenever he wants, free flights and these obscene bonuses – it’s so incongruous to the destruction that he’s brought on the aviation sector,” he said.
“And who’s gonna give him those privileges? Richard Goyder.”
Investors this week have called for Mr Joyce to be stripped of his bonus, with a powerful group that represents several big Qantas shareholders this week saying it was concerned about the deal he struck to climb into the ejector seat early.
“The question investors will ask is, how does the board justify any bonus outcomes given the legacy issues Mr Joyce is leaving behind?” the chief executive of the Australian Council of Superannuation Investors, Louise Davidson, said.
Mr Joyce was in line for a short-term bonus of up to $4.3m and despite leaving the airline in disarray may still receive more than $3.5m because he is understood to have shot the lights out on his performance benchmarks, which were set by the board under Mr Goyder’s leadership.
He was also entitled to a little over 3.1m shares – the value of which has shrunk over the past few months to about $18m because the airline’s woes have sent its share price into a tailspin.
Qantas was estimated to have already paid him about $125m during his tenure as CEO – a period during which it consistently reduced the conditions of its staff.
He grounded the airline in 2011 in a fight with pilots, engineers and baggage handlers.
Airline stewards now get paid as little as $950 a week, or $49,400 a year.
Qantas has also set up subsidiary companies, including QantasLink, which runs flights between capital cities and Canberra, that allows them to pay staff less.
Keith Tonkin, a former Qantas pilot who now runs consultancy company Aviation Projects, said he was disappointed at what had happened to the airline.
“I’ve talked to a lot of people and no-one has a good story to tell about Qantas, it used to be known as the spirit of Australia but it doesn’t match the marketing anymore,” Mr Tonkin said.
ALAN JOYCE’S CAREER: KEY MOMENTS
June 30, 1966
Alan Joseph Joyce born in Tallaght, Ireland – a village that is now an outer suburb of Dublin. His mother, Colette, was a cleaner at a swimming pool and his father, Maurice, had four jobs that included working in a factory and being a postie. The oldest of four brothers, he studied physics and mathematics at the Dublin Institute of Technology and Trinity College.
1988
Joyce joins Ireland’s national carrier, Aer Lingus, as a research analyst.
1996
Joyce departs Aer Lingus for Qantas’s Australian rival, Ansett, where he works in network planning and strategy.
2000
Joyce joins Qantas to work, again working in network planning and strategy.
2001
Ansett collapses, throwing 16,000 employees out of work and causing havoc in the aviation industry that leaves Qantas in a dominant position.
2003
Joyce becomes head of Qantas’s budget offshoot Jetstar, which was then in its infancy.
2008
Joyce is elevated to chief executive of Qantas, replacing Geoff Dixon. He trousers pay of more than $5m, including a cash bonus of $1.2m.
2009
In his first full year as Qantas CEO Joyce’s pay falls back to a still chunky $3.66m.
October 29, 2011
Joyce shocks Australia by grounding the entire worldwide Qantas fleet and locking out workers as part of an industrial dispute. The unprecedented move throws the travel plans of tens of thousands of people into chaos and is estimated to cost the airline $20m a day. The lockout lasts less than three days – on October 31, 2011 industrial umpire the Fair Work Commission ordered it to end. Joyce’ pay for the year once again rockets past the $5m mark, up 71 per cent from $2.92m in 2010.
2014
Joyce starts a price and capacity war with rival Virgin Australia as fuel prices soar, plunging Qantas into financial distress. It lays off 5000 people, sells aircraft and delays buying new ones. The airline’s plea for a taxpayer bailout is rejected by prime minister Tony Abbott and it makes a record loss of $2.8bn for the year. Joyce’s pay is $2m.
2016
After $2bn in cost-cutting, an end to the war with Virgin and falling fuel prices bring a bumper profit of $1bn – and a bumper pay packet for Joyce of $12.96m, up from $11.9m the previous year.
May 9, 2017
At a business breakfast in Perth, Joyce is pied in a protest over his pro-gay marriage views.
November 2, 2019
Joyce marries his long-time partner Shane Lloyd in a ceremony on the rooftop of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney attended by 120 people including former governor-general (and former Qantas board member) Sir Peter Cosgrove and former David Jones boss Paul Zahra.
2020
As the Covid pandemic smashes the worldwide aviation industry, Qantas lays off 6000 people and keeps 15,000 – half its workforce – stood down. Some of the sackings are later ruled illegal by the courts but Qantas appeals to the High Court. The company raises almost $2bn in fresh capital to keep itself going. Rival Virgin collapses into administration after Joyce publicly lobbies against a bailout. Qantas plunges back into the red, recording a $1.9bn loss for the year and Joyce’s pay is slashed from $6.5m to $4.7m.
April 8, 2022
As air travel booms back post-pandemic, Joyce blames long lines delays and bedlam at airports around Australia on customers not being “match fit”.
June 1, 2023
Joyce sells most of his 2.5m in Qantas shares, pocketing about $16.87m. He says this is to fund the purchase of the apartment next to his – but this costs only $9m.
September 5, 2023
Joyce resigns, two months earlier than planned, amid customer fury over continuing poor service, high prices and a failure to repay Covid-era travel credits as well as political uproar over the Albanese government’s decision to deny flight rights to Qatar Airways.
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