New Qantas boss Vanessa Hudson is brutally cut down by a senator over ‘Yes’ logos painted on the side of planes

New Qantas CEO Vanessa Hudson has been given a baptism of fire after being accused of channeling her predecessor Alan Joyce by failing to answer questions during a Senate inquiry.

The new CEO was slammed by the chair of the transport inquiry, Nationals senator Bridget McKenzie, for being unwilling to answer questions about the Yes campaign logos painted on the side of Qantas jets on Wednesday.

“I hope you will respect it because filibustering may have been the former CEO’s strategy,” she said. “I don’t appreciate it from the current one.”

Qantas showed its support for Indigenous Voice to Parliament in August by adding a Yes design to the side of three of their aircraft.

Ms Hudson had to answer a question about who made the decision to design the planes.

When asked who made the decision to support the Yes campaign, the airline said this was made by Mr Joyce and in consultation with the group’s management committee, and not by the airline’s board.

Mr Joyce will not appear before the inquiry after his lawyers confirmed on Tuesday that he would not be able to appear before the committee’s reporting deadline due to “personal commitments” abroad.

However, committee chairman Bridget McKenzie has said he will be summoned to appear when he returns to Australia anyway.

Senator McKenzie reiterated the coalition’s inference that the decision to support the Yes campaign was a kind of quid pro quo in exchange for the government’s rejection of Qatar Airways.

Slot arrangements at Sydney Airport ‘downright ridiculous’

Former consumer watchdog Rod Sims has condemned the “utterly ridiculous” slot system – which dictates take-off and landing times – at Sydney Airport.

Qantas and Virgin are accused of squeezing smaller rival airlines at the country’s busiest airport.

Mr Sims said reforms were needed to transfer the slot allocation process to an independent body.

“If you can’t get slots at Sydney Airport, you just can’t get into the industry,” he said.

He also said Australia’s current way of negotiating bilateral air timetables was “holding back the economy”.

“We need a bilateral aviation agreement that tailors these arrangements to the Australian traveling public and the Australian economy, and it doesn’t really matter what the other side does.”

The bombing of the virgin boss Qatar

Virgin Australia has rejected the government’s decision to reject Qatar Airways’ request to double its flight capacity, claiming there was ‘no coherent logic’ to the call.

Appearing before a Senate inquiry into the decision, the airline’s CEO Jayne Hrdlicka outlined two conversations she had with Transport Minister Catherine King before the final decision was made.

At the first meeting, held in January this year, Ms Hrdlicka said the pair discussed the Qatar application for “five minutes at best”.

But she left the hotel feeling ‘comfortable’ enough, despite a mention that then Qantas boss Alan Joyce was unhappy with the offer, not to raise the issue when she hosted Prime Minister Anthony Albanese as chairman of Tennis Australia.

“I got the distinct impression that the decision to proceed was very coercive and threatening,” she said on Wednesday.

The minister raised the airport incident in Doha with Virgin in May

But four months later, in May, Ms. Hrdlicka said Ms. King had changed her tune.

“The minister indicated there was some challenge in relation to the Doha airport incident in 2020,” the Virgin chief said.

Ms King has repeatedly said she rejected Qatar’s request in the “national interest” but admitted the incident provided relevant “context” for her decision.

Earlier this month, Ms King revealed her decision was made on July 10, the same day she wrote a letter to the Australian women detained by Qatari authorities at Doha airport in 2020.

During the incident, five Australian women were ordered off the plane at gunpoint and searched after officials found a newborn baby in a garbage bin.

After Ms. Hrdlicka’s conversation with Ms. King, she requested a meeting with Mr. Albanese, which was not granted until July 13, three days after the Qatar decision was made.

“He also expressed concern about the incident at Doha airport in 2020,” Ms Hrdlicka said, revealing there was no indication a decision had been made.

“I was surprised by this as I understood that a diplomatic solution had been reached between the government of Qatar and the federal government on this issue.”

Virgin confirmed it was still waiting for a formal response from the government to a letter it wrote after the decision was made public.

Earlier on Wednesday, Qatar Airways senior vice president of aviation policy and corporate affairs Fathi Atti claimed the incident was not raised with the airline during the government’s consideration of the application.

But Matt Raos, the airline’s senior vice president of global sales, assured that the “very extreme” incident was “a one-off.”

“We view this as a one-off isolated problem and we want to ensure this does not happen again,” Mr Raos said.

“Let me assure you that never before in our history have we experienced such an extreme incident, and we are fully confident that something like this will never happen again.”

When asked by Senator Sheldon whether Qatar was voluntarily involved in mediation procedures of the women involved, the airline had to take note of the question.

Qatar claims it was informed of the decision through the media

Qatar Airways was “surprised and shocked” to learn its request to double the number of flights to Australia had been rejected by the government.

Mr Raos said he learned of the decision through media reports and only received official notice six days later.

“We were surprised and shocked by the Australian government’s decision to reject our application for additional flights to Australia,” he told a parliamentary inquiry on Wednesday morning.

‘Even more surprising was that the government gave us no reason to reject our application.’

Mr Atti outlined the investigation the airline requested on August 22, 2022 for the 28 additional flights.

It was not until July 10, 2023 that the airline learned of Ms. King’s decision through the media. A formal letter, dated July 14, was not received by Qatar until July 20, Mr Atti said.

It is understood the letter was sent via email from the Ministry of Transport to the Qatar Civil Aviation Authority on the same day it was dated.

But Labor senator Tony Sheldon insisted the first mention of the Qatar decision did not reach the media until July 18.

“We can check that,” Mr. Atti replied.

Qatar’s swipe at Qantas

Mr Raos said Qatar added 48,000 weekly seats to Australia at the start of the pandemic, making it the country’s largest international airline in 2020.

In a thinly veiled swipe at Qantas, he stressed that the airline had “never stopped paying refunds to our customers and travel agents during Covid-19”.

However, the airline is not convinced by the government’s claim that the rejection of more flights was done in the national interest.

Qatar estimated that the additional flights would have generated approximately $3 billion in economic benefits over five years.

Mr Raos said the airline is contesting the “outcome” of the decision. The senior vice-president said the airline could, at best, provide additional services to Australians around Christmas.

James Goodwin, head of the Australian Airports Association, said the industry was also “surprised” by the government’s call.

He told the Senate inquiry that the sector would like more information about ‘how and why’ the decision was made.

‘Australia is far away from the rest of the world. And it makes sense to have as many open-air airlines as possible to get more airlines in and out of Australia,” he said.

‘That’s good for Australians who want to visit family and friends. It is good for inbound tourism and also for freight exports.”