By Kishor Napier-Raman and Noel Towell
Senate committees have their critics but CBD is indebted to the one chaired by the Nationals’ Bridget McKenzie to look into the murky affair of those Qatar Airlines flights that never took off, for revealing how national carrier Qantas makes its presence felt in the corridors of power.
We didn’t know, for example, that Transport Minister Catherine King – who’s been under a bit of scrutiny for her role in canning Qatar’s request for extra flights – had sponsored a parliamentary pass for a Qantas employee, which was revealed in answers to questions on notice asked by committee member David Pocock.
Credit: Benke
They don’t call her the minister for Qantas for nothing!
Turns out former Nationals leaders Barnaby Joyce and Michael McCormack have also signed off on access to Parliament House for the airline’s representatives, as have their Liberal colleagues Simon Birmingham, Julian Leeser and Andrew Bragg.
Nor would we have known that a dinner chucked by retired Qantas chief executive Alan Joyce and his successor Vanessa Hudson at Parliament House’s private member’s room dining during his farewell tour in August – with catering by the nation’s leading culinary ponytail Neil Perry – cost $5700.
We haven’t managed to get hold of the guest list for the nosh-up. It was referred to by the committee as the “Neil Perry cabinet dinner” and was reportedly an exclusive, pollies-only affair. But that’s a handy bit of soft power flexing for less than the price of a return business class ticket to London.
Speaking of fares, we were also intrigued to learn, via McKenzie’s copious questions about Qantas’ support for the Yes case in the Voice referendum, that the airline has so far thrown in $300,000 of free flights as part of its support of the Uluru Dialogue and the Yes-23 campaign.
We sense that McKenzie – a vocal no-campaigner – might not approve.
LATHAM’S LOVER
It’s been just over a year since Mark Latham announced via a Facebook post that his marriage of more than 20 years to Janine Lacey had ended “in rather unique circumstances”.
Latham later clarified that those unique circumstances were simply “the challenges of COVID-19 and its lockdown restrictions”.
It would be a year of separations for Australia’s ultimate divorced dad – the implosion of his political marriage with One Nation and Pauline Hanson in August shocked precisely nobody.
But things are looking up on the home front. For months now, the rumours about Latham’s involvement with businesswoman Nathalie Matthews have swirled – the two just happened to be gallivanting around Europe at the same time, taking in the Ashes at Lord’s and a spot of tennis at Wimbledon.
On Saturday, the couple were spotted together at the Chairman’s Club at Rosehill racecourse for the Hill Stakes. Latham later hard-launched that relationship for good on Instagram, putting an end to all that speculation.
“Great day of racing at Rosehill with the Town Crier and the very beautiful Nathalie Matthews [heart eyes emoji],” he captioned a picture of the pair.
Matthews runs an eponymous freight service business out of Dubai and divides her time between the Middle Eastern shopping mall city and Sydney, where she’s got ties to Liberal Party branches in the Sutherland Shire.
SURGICAL MYSTERY TOUR
CBD has been keeping a close watch on the travels of neurosurgeon Charlie Teo, who responded to being found guilty of unsatisfactory professional conduct by giving his passport and frequent flyer card a prodigious workout.
Months after being effectively banned from practising in Australia, Teo was in Brazil last week, donning the scrubs for a few happy snaps. He’d earlier given a few speeches at the Brazilian Neurosurgical Society’s annual meeting in Sao Paulo.
“I’m now travelling to several major hospitals throughout Brazil teaching and demonstrating to ‘thirsty’ neurosurgeons wanting to learn keyhole brain surgery,” Teo said on the socials.
The inquiry into Teo’s conduct by the Healthcare Complaints Commission’s professional standards committee found he’d slapped an unconscious patient across the face in front of her family, and failed to get a single supporting reference from an Australian neurosurgeon.
Clearly not an issue for the boys from Brazil.
CROWN CRUNCH
Looks like the honeymoon is over for Crown Casino’s new-ish owner, US-private equity giant Blackstone and the entertainment complex’s main workplace union, the United Workers Union.
It was only eight months ago that the two parties were exchanging terms of endearment after concluding a short-term deal giving the 8400 workers at Crown’s Melbourne and Perth operations a 5 per cent pay rise.
UWU casino director Dario Mujkic publicly described Blackstone as a “smart operator” while a Crown spokesdude lauded the union’s “commitment to negotiating”.
But last week, the Fair Work Commission granted consent for the union to ballot the Melbourne workforce on protected industrial action, suggesting that talks for a longer-term deal which have been under way for months, aren’t going so well. Workers will be asked to vote on work stoppages of 24 hours or more with the ballot due to be wrapped up by October 30.
The casino operator was unable to get us an on-the-record statement on Sunday, but Crownsters, speaking on background, reckon that talks with the union are actually going quite well.
The union did not return our calls on Sunday.
The parties have been ordered by Fair Work into compulsory conciliation.
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