News: Qantas and Emirates have lift off , page-4

More truths from Ben. Sorry the italics dont appear when pasted.
GLTA@QF !

Who misled Minister Albanese over Qantas-Emirates?
BEN SANDILANDS | MAR 27, 2013 12:56PM | EMAIL | PRINT
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Students of ministerial statements will be well aware that the busier the minister the more likely that a daft statement will be written for him or her and circulated by the messaging machines deployed by all political parties.

Such as this statement which has just been circulated for the Minister for Infrastructure and Transport and Leader of the House, Anthony Albanese.

I welcome today’s final determination by the Australia Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) to approve the commercial partnership between Qantas and Emirates.

The Flying Kangaroo has a special place in the heart of all Australians and this is good news for Australian travellers and the Australian economy.

Millions of travellers stand to benefit from cheaper fares, reduced travel times and greater access to more destinations in the Middle East, Africa and Europe.

The partnership will also bring overseas tourists to more regional destinations in Australia and better access to international markets for regional Australians.

In just 10 years passenger numbers between the United Arab Emirates and Australia have tripled. The partnership between Qantas and Emirates will strengthen the growing relationship between the two countries.

The emphasis in italics above is where the statement in contrary to the real situation for Australian consumers.

The Qantas-Emirates alliance means that Qantas, the flying kangaroo invoked with such affection by the minister, has cut off Australians using Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth airports from using Qantas flights to London, and is instead trying to punt them onto Emirates flights.

Does the minister imagine that those travellers will not feel regret, in their hearts, that Qantas has dropped them from being able to fly all the way to London on Qantas aircraft?

Does the minister realise that when foreign business travellers now fly from their capitals in Europe or the UK to Perth, our resource capital, or Brisbane, the rising giant among eastern cities, or Adelaide, the defence capital of Australia, they-won’t-be-able-to-even-choose-to-fly Qantas?

Our national carrier wants them to fly Emirates, a national-carrier-of-the-UAE.

Could the Minister explain how making Qantas even smaller in the international market than it has already made itself this century, is actually going to make Australians value their iconic airline even more, even as it continues to disappear?

But that’s an unfair line of questioning. I don’t believe the Minister would have ever approved the message in this form. His real problem is that as the wisest, smartest and most experienced parliamentarian left standing in cabinet his leader is just going to work him to political death.