Qatar Airways call to deter investment

The Australia Qatar Business Council has warned the decision to deny Qatar Airways more flights to Australia will have ‘knock on’ consequences.

Senator Jane Hume at the Economics Legislation Committee Senate Estimates at Parliament House in Canberra. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Martin Ollman

Preventing Qatar Airways operating more flights into the country sends the “wrong message to investors”, and the government has shown a “lack of transparency” in making the decision.

Simon Harrison, chairman of the Australia Qatar Business Council, said Qataris were “amongst the highest spenders on vacation” and estimated current investments into Australia were about “$6bn and rising”

“This runs the risk of sending the wrong message to such investors at a time when we see a withdrawing of, or unease, as to Chinese interest in Australia,” he said. “I think the message it sends is one of a lack of transparency on Australia’s part.”

Mr Harrison said that Qatar had about 5 per cent of the Australian international air travel market and this could have “been easily doubled if it were not for this decision”.

Writing for The Australian online, opposition finance spokeswoman Jane Hume questioned why Labor would want to “discourage more visitors, more freight (and) more money flowing into our tourism economy, and cheaper prices for Australians?”

“Honestly, we don’t know, because Labor won’t tell us,” she said. She accused Transport Minister Catherine King of repeatedly failing to “justify her decision to block more competition in the aviation market”.

“She (Ms King) said that more competition and more seats is not in the national interest.

“She has said that ‘it was not just one factor that led to this particular decision’, referring variously to human rights concerns, sustainability, and to protect jobs.

“But unless the minister can come forward with more information, none of these reasons cuts the mustard.”

Asked about the decision on Thursday, Jim Chalmers said that “these agreements aren’t commercial agreements – they’re agreements between countries”.

“It’s a bilateral arrangement that countries strike with each other and the Transport Minister, in this case Catherine King, is asked to make these sorts of judgments from time to time, and asked to judge what is against the national interest.

“And in her view, in the government’s view, the proposal ­before us wasn’t maximising the national interest.”

The rejection last month of the Qatar Airways bid confounded the tourism and travel industry which had been crying out for more airline ­capacity to put downward pressure on fares.

Speaking earlier this month, Ms King said that “there’s a range of factors that the government takes into account in terms of those bilateral agreements and they have to be in the national ­interest. We determined that in the case of Qatar Airways, owned by the Qatari government, this was not in our national interest.”

Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry tourism chair John Hart has warned the decision will cost the tourism industry an estimated $788m a year.