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Transport Minister Catherine King has joined calls for Qantas to restart international services from Adelaide.
Speaking to Adelaide’s FiveAA radio, the minister agreed that Qantas “should do better” in the city, which currently hosts nine other international carriers, and indicated she would be willing to press the Flying Kangaroo to bring back international flights.
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Minister King joins voices such as SA Premier Peter Malinauskas, who last year called on the Flying Kangaroo to bring back Qantas-branded international flights out of Adelaide, which have not been seen since the axing of a Singapore service in 2013.
“Certainly I’ll raise it with them. I met with Qantas just last week to hear they are bringing more capacity back into the network, and that’s an important thing that they’ve been doing,” Minister King told host Graeme Goodings.
“Virgin obviously now is also looking to partner with Qatar internationally as well, and that might provide some opportunities. Of course, these are privately owned companies that are responsible for making money and that’s what they will focus on.
“I do also think particularly given Qantas [has] to be 51 per cent Australian-owned … it would be great to see them here and I’m very happy to raise it with them, and I’m sure the South Australian Government has been doing the same.”
While Qantas does not operate mainline services out of Adelaide in its own right, its low-cost arm does fly from Adelaide to Bali, and codeshare partner Emirates brought back services from Adelaide to Dubai in late October.
“[Adelaide is] what’s called a secondary airport, so there are no constraints on international carriers coming in here. I got in really late last night. I just managed to get in before the curfew because of the incredible delays that were happening, because of Sydney,” Minister King said.
“When Sydney crashes, the whole network crashes, and we’re trying to do something about that. We passed legislation just in the last days of Parliament that means that Sydney can have a recovery period when there’s been weather like that, [which] will help the whole network.
“But Adelaide is an airport where it’s not restricted in terms of the number of international flights that can come in, and I think it would be great if Qantas did come here.”
Qantas has said it does not have any updates on restarting international flights from Adelaide at this stage but is constantly reviewing demand to look for new international opportunities.
Richard Daniell
says:The minister says she’ll press Qantas to bring back flights from Adelaide, that’s a joke, she couldn’t press a shirt.