Qantas, Virgin livid over Queensland border closures

Qantas and Virgin Australia have both lashed out at the Queensland Government’s border announcement.

Qantas Group CEO Alan Joyce has slammed the Queensland Government’s reluctance to reopen the border to Sydney, as “ridiculous”. Picture: Flavia Brancaleon

Qantas and Virgin Australia have both lashed out at the Queensland Government over its continued border closure to residents of greater Sydney and Victoria.

On the eve of the state election, Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said Queensland would reopen to regional New South Wales from 1am on November 3, but not greater Sydney.

“Frankly this is ridiculous,” said a statement from Qantas Group CEO Alan Joyce.

“Sydney is the biggest city in Australia and it probably has one of the best track records globally of managing a virus that is clearly going to be with us for a long time,” he said.

“Keeping the doors bolted to places that you can’t reasonably call hot spots makes no sense from a health perspective and it’s doing a lot of social and economic damage as well.

“Compare this to the far more rational approach of Tasmania, the Northern Territory and South Australia.”

Mr Joyce added that by the time Queensland opened up to Sydney people “may have made other plans”.

Qantas had been ready to schedule more than 1000 extra flights in November to meet demand for travel between Sydney and Queensland, had the borders reopened.

Virgin Australia also expressed its disappointment in the Queensland government’s decision, just weeks after accepting a $200m investment to ensure the airline retained its Brisbane headquarters.

“Today’s announcement by the Queensland government is disappointing for many of our customers and team members who we know want to return to work, do business and reconnect with family and friends,” said an airline spokesman.

“Our decision to reintroduce Queensland services which were suspended as part of our response to COVID-19 is reliant on the Greater Sydney region reopening to Queensland.”

He said the carrier would double frequencies between Brisbane and Newcastle from three to six flights a week, in response to the reopening to regional New South Wales.

“Virgin Australia will continue to monitor border restrictions and make any changes to our network as travel restrictions ease,” the spokesman said.

Qantas also added seats to its Sydney-Byron Bay flights, by putting a larger aircraft on the route from November 9.

Boeing 737s will operate the route until the end of March increasing capacity by almost 5000 seats.