Alex Antic (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the answers given by ministers to questions without notice asked by opposition senators today.

Eighteen months ago, on this side of the chamber, we told the Australian people that, to coin a phrase, it wasn't going to be easy under then opposition leader Albanese, but, as it turns out, that was gravely underestimating how things played out. In fact, it's more than not easy now. With cost-of-living pressures and high energy prices, life in this country has, frankly, become an absolute cost-of-living nightmare for the Australian people under the now prime minister, Anthony Albanese. And the shambles doesn't end just at those two items. There is now, of course, and new fissure line in this flimsy excuse for a government, which is, of course, the state of the aviation industry in this country.

This government's policy of protecting a carrier and slugging Australian travellers with the high cost of airfares is yet another impost on Australia and the Australian people. This opposition wants to see, as do all Australians, an affordable, reliable and safe aviation industry where our airlines are prosperous, are functioning properly and are providing well-paying jobs around the country, but that is simply not what we're seeing. Don't take it from me; take it from Professor Rico Merkert, who is a professor of transport and supply chain management at, I think, the University of Sydney. Professor Merkert says that the government's decision to deny Qatar Airways the right to fly an extra 21 flights per week into Australia's three biggest cities is, in actual fact, more than likely returning Australia to the old days when we protected a national carrier at the expense of Australians and their hip pockets. In fact, he has calculated not only that it does not end there but that this may in fact be a billion-dollar-a-year impost on Australians, in terms of economic damage. By conservative estimates, the decisions may actually cost the economy that figure per year in lost income from things like tourism, visiting friends and relatives, business travel, freight and all sorts of other things.

What we're seeing at the moment in the airline space, I think, is things getting significantly worse before they even getting anything like close to better. Cancellations and delays are on the rise month by month. The Albanese government is making decisions that are actually stifling competition and keeping airfares high, and this is all happening right in the middle of an already crippling cost-of-living crisis. Australian travellers and tourists have been paying up to 50 per cent more for airfares since the COVID outbreak of three years ago. Minister King's decision to reject the proposal from Qatar Airways really is now shown to be nothing more than another economic disaster, and a tourism disaster as well, for this government.

This Qatar proposal was to increase passenger and freight capacity by a further 28 flights per week, which would have doubled the existing capacity. In simple terms, that is one extra flight per day to Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth. The criticism doesn't stop just at Professor Merkert. Former ACCC chairman Rob Sims said if there was ever a time to allow new entrants into the market with these cost-of-living pressures and a return from the COVID times then this surely would be it. The Prime Minister and Minister King claimed to be protecting the markets but the executives of every major airline except Qantas actually support a review of this decision. Even former Labor Treasurer Wayne Swan has joined the call for these matters to be reviewed.

The cost of airfares is now a crippling matter for Australians. International airfares are now 50 per cent higher and seat capacity is 25 per cent lower today compared to prior to the COVID outbreak, according to the latest bureau data. We know that more seats on more flights means more competition. This is what we on the side of the chamber know: it is how you use the market properly, how you use the deflationary pressure on airline fees and on airfares. Industry research suggests this decision by the Albanese Labor government could actually have brought the economy an additional $788 million a year in economic activity.