Qantas boss Alan Joyce blasted over eye-watering salary

Qantas CEO Alan Joyce has been savaged after it was revealed the airline chief made an eye-watering amount in just 10 years.

Qantas CEO Alan Joyce has been savaged by 2GB radio host Ben Fordham after it was revealed the airline chief was paid almost $80 million in just 10 years.

The eye-watering salary comes despite heavy criticism of the airline over its performance since Covid lockdown restrictions were lifted.

Travellers have complained about massive queues, cancelled flights, lost baggage and having to wait months for refunds for flight tickets that were never used.

Meanwhile Mr Joyce oversaw an aggressive cost-cutting program – which included the axing of 9400 jobs and the outsourcing of baggage ground handling, resulting in 1700 redundancies.

But despite Qantas’ mounting troubles, Mr Joyce has been earning millions as its CEO, raking in $75 million between 2012 and 2020, and another $4.2 million in the last two years.

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Alan Joyce, chief executive officer of Qantas. Picture: Brendon Thorne/Bloomberg via Getty Images

On Tuesday, radio host Ben Fordham fired up over the revelation, making it clear he was less than impressed.

“That just blows my mind,” he said as he unloaded on the Qantas boss, whose $19 million home was egged in a mystery attack in July.

“It’s shameless that while thousands of people are stranded on the tarmac, the boss gives himself a massive payday.”

In 2017, Mr Joyce earned a staggering $25 million in just 12 months.

Even in the midst of the pandemic – when the airline was effectively shut down, Mr Joyce still made $4.2 million in 2021 and 2022.

And when Qantas made a $2.8 billion loss in 2014, Mr Joyce managed to earn $50 million in salary and shares in the three years that followed, reported the AFR.

Qantas said it restored Mr Joyce’s base salary to 2019 levels because he took no pay for three months in 2020 and for one month in 2021, in addition to three months on reduced pay in 2021.

In addition to his $2.17 million base pay, Mr Joyce was given 698,000 share rights that depend on Qantas turning to a profit by August 2023.

Qantas shares are currently trading at $5.28, meaning the bonus shares could be worth over $3.6 million if the shares were to remain at a similar level.

Qantas has been heavily criticised by passengers. Picture: NewsWire/Sarah Marshall

However, his reign as CEO has seen the company’s reputation slip from the third-highest in the world to now ranking eighth in the World Airline Awards.

Despite the passenger backlash and the mounting issues facing the airline, Qantas has been putting flight prices up.

Citigroup analyst Samuel Seow found Qantas ticket prices have risen by almost a third on pre-pandemic fares in 2018-19.

“It is staggering – and with eye-watering amounts of money being paid to the CEO comes some critical attention,” Fordham continued.

“The buck really has to stop at Alan Joyce’s desk and when you’ve got so many bucks going to Alan Joyce, the pressure is really on the Qantas CEO.

“When a company’s reputation is copping a hit, people start asking questions, and they look towards the CEO.

“With such an extraordinary amount of money being paid to one individual, that pressure on that individual is going to mount so they need some performance improvements, and they need them fast.

“If that doesn’t happen soon, I think Alan Joyce is going to have a tough time justifying his jumbo-sized salary.”

Fordham said the board and shareholders were to blame for backing Mr Joyce.

“Part of me says good luck to him,” added Fordham.

Ben Fordham savaged Joyce on his Tuesday show.

“If you’ve got the shareholders behind you and the Qantas board all saying, ‘Well, this is what he’s worth,’ then good luck to him.

“But is Alan Joyce worth it?”

Fordham isn’t the only one to criticise Mr Joyce.

Federal Labor senator Tony Sheldon described Joyce’s pay packet as “offensive as all hell”.

“It’s shameless that while thousands of people are stranded in Bali and everywhere else, he gives himself a massive payday,” he told the Sydney Morning Herald. “Flights are still being cancelled right around Australia. All the jobs lost, all the lives ruined, and this is what it’s all been about, Joyce’s pay packet.”

Qantas has said it is seeing a significant turnaround in our recent operational performance.

A Qantas report on Friday showed Mr Joyce’s pay is 77 per cent below pre-Covid levels. Across the key senior executives, it is 65 per cent down.

It states the reason that Mr Joyce has had a year on year increase of 15 per cent, is because he voluntarily took a 15 per cent pay cut last year, so this is his base pay normalising to his contracted amount.

His base pay has been frozen for three years and no annual bonuses have been paid, meaning he was the only incumbent ASX100 CEO not to receive a bonus in either FY20 or FY21.

Alan Joyce’s pay history

FY22 (concluding on June 30, 2022): $2.27 million

FY21: $1.98 million (including one month of zero pay and three months of reduced pay)

FY20: $1.74 million (including three months of zero pay)

FY19: $9.99 million

FY18 (the 12 months ending at March 31, 2018): $10.86 million