It’s easy to forget that Anthony Albanese has been in Canberra for a very long time. Entitlement to largesse is a lifelong practice.
The recent decision by the Albanese government to block Qatar Airways from launching 28 new flights per week between Doha and Australia has caused quiet amazement in the corridors of Parliament House.
Transport Minister Catherine King’s clarification last week elevated the matter to high farce. She insisted the decision was not related to a human rights incident at Doha Airport in 2020 and instead linked it to her desire “to decarbonise the transport sector”. That was such an arrant non sequitur that the only rational response was laughter.
Anthony Albanese and his son Nathan – Alex Ellinghausen
The dazzling irony is that King offered this implausible explanation for yet another government measure fortifying Qantas’ market power as she stood in London touring Britain’s high-speed rail lines – a mode of travel Qantas’ lobbying machine has successfully obstructed in Australia for at least the past 30 years.
It is genuinely difficult to fathom the hold Qantas seems to have over this government. Air fares are at record highs (and a key factor in high inflation) while customer service levels are recovering from record lows.
In the year to June 30, 2022, the Australian Competition and Consumer Competition received more complaints about Qantas than any other company – the airline blamed COVID-19 disruption but claimed “things have improved and we are getting Qantas back to its best”.
Breaking news: the ACCC told this column on Wednesday that Qantas remained the most complained about company in Australia in the year to June 30, 2023!
And yet King forced the ACCC to discontinue its airline monitoring program in June by refusing to extend its funding. It’s scandalous, but it’s only in keeping with the long tradition of every Australian government indulging Qantas to an immoderate extent. If there’s any evidence to the contrary, please show it to me.
To be understood, all of this must be viewed through the lens of Anthony Albanese’s incredibly tight relationship with Qantas CEO Alan Joyce, a bond that jars so badly with Albo’s misty-eyed working-class origin story.
What Australian company has in recent years done more to bleed mug punters and even its own workers? Qantas illegally sacked 1700 baggage handlers in November 2020 (all while sucking back $2.7 billion of non-recourse government COVID-19 subsidies). An appeal was heard in May by the High Court, where every presiding justice is a member of the Chairman’s Lounge.
Tinpot republics
Speaking of the Chairman’s Lounge, which comfortably generates the highest return on invested capital in the entire Qantas Group, you would not believe who has earned himself access to the pleasures hidden behind its discreet entrance. None other than the prime minister’s 23-year-old son, Nathan Albanese. It’s the stuff tinpot African republics are made of.
Everyone knows Joyce personally curates the Chairman’s Lounge membership list. Did Qantas offer this extravagant benefit to Albanese or did Albanese request it for his son? When asked this week, neither the airline nor the Prime Minister’s Office would explain. But did any of them really think a university student sweeping into the Chairman’s Lounge like a lord wouldn’t stand out like dog’s balls?
Albanese has never disclosed Nathan’s membership in his statement of registrable interests with the parliament. The PM might argue it’s not required if his son is not technically a dependent (although the Labor leader did say in 2022 that “We’re close, we live together”).
Irrespective of the sophistry relied upon, his son has received this benefit only because of his father’s position. It should be declared, especially by the guy who was elected on an integrity platform. Ask yourself: would Ben Chifley have done this?
Otherwise, where does it end? Should young Nathan get an unlimited balance in his SportsBet account or perhaps a discount from Meriton on his first apartment, all beyond our line of sight?
I have sympathy for Nathan. This is not even about him. This is about the prime minister’s inability to resist a secret freebie, a sly gratuity of public office, or to grasp how compromised he looks.
Albanese was regulating Qantas as transport minister for six years in the Rudd and Gillard governments. What other favours might Qantas have done him (or those close to him) that he felt were unnecessary to declare?
It’s easy to forget Albo has been in Canberra for a very long time. Entitlement to largesse is a lifelong practice. He will barely have opened his own wallet in 30 years. Yet, he’s no worse than the next institutionalised MP, just one inhabitant of a swamp full of chancers.
Remember, it always starts small. It’s the little favours. Please, let the valet take your car. Only the best table in the house. Don’t worry, I know a guy. We’ll make your problem disappear. Before you know it, it’s become normal for your family to be ushered through airports like royalty.
This is what ultimately comes from public officials accepting gifts from Qantas, an industrial-scale, multi-generational influence peddler. They are better than the mafia.
This is how they do it, and why Qantas gets whatever it wants from government, whenever it wants it. It’s why no matter how poorly the company treats Australian voters, the officials that voters depend upon to keep the company accountable can be depended upon to look the other way. Alan Joyce puts Albo’s son in Qantas Chairman’s Lounge – Joe Aston – AFR
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Bonus grifting supplement
German government opposes Lufthansa executive bonuses
While the ALP ramps up its calls for the government to throw vastly more public money at the failed Virgin Australia, key front benchers are found to have failed to disclose tens of thousands of dollars of gifts from the foreign-owned airline. Virgin is throwing $1 million a year or more at politicians and public servants – who’s looking after the taxpayers? Anthony Klan (April 22, 2020)
Virgin Australia considers going into administration as Labor calls for government rescue
Shadow transport minister Catherine King and shadow assistant treasurer Stephen Jones have been forced to disclose tens of thousands of dollars worth of free memberships they received to the ultra exclusive, top-tier airport lounges run by Virgin Australia and Qantas.
As the ALP further ramps up its calls for taxpayer money to be used to bail out Virgin, which was swept into administration yesterday, we can reveal both King and Jones have updated parliamentary records to disclose having received the highly valuable “gifts”, following an investigation by Michael West Media.
And you can bring along two mates – three if you do happen to be flying that day.
Only the best foods that money can buy are served – meals cooked up specially by renowned chefs – and while you’re eating to your heart’s content, you can quaff away on some of the world’s finest wines.
Aged whisky? Port? A few boutique brews? You got it.
Don’t want to get a cab home from the airport? Don’t worry! Now you’re one of us, a VIP limousine will pick you up.
And none of it will cost you a cent. – The Club: will Virgin Australia’s political influence deliver taxpayer subsidies for its foreign shareholders? by Anthony Klan – Michael West News
It also appears opposition leader Anthony Albanese has failed to disclose many years of complimentary memberships to Virgin’s top-tier secretive lounges, known as “The Club”, as well as free memberships to its rival’s equivalent, The Qantas Chairman’s Lounge.
“The Born to Rules” lead privileged lives and don’t face the same consequences for their actions as we do. Blatant bribery to obtain favourable policy decisions, is considered a perk by “our betters”. Donations that garner a massive Return on Investment are commonplace, as are the jobs with corporations after politics.
Labor leader Anthony Albanese charged taxpayers $17,269 to stay in his own Canberra flat
Labor leader Anthony Albanese has refused to ban MPs from claiming a $291-a-night allowance to stay in their own apartment in Canberra if elected, a practice that has allowed scores of MPs to pay off their mortgages.
MPs paid thousands to stay in their own homes under travel allowance rules
Labor leader Anthony Albanese claimed $17,169 in travel allowance from taxpayers to stay at his mortgage-free Canberra apartment for 59 nights during Sydney’s marathon lockdown while staging “guerilla” campaign missions into Queensland and Tasmania.
