Emirates touches a nerve with QF
The escalating friction between Qantas and Emirates went up a notch yesterday with Qantas Chairman Margaret Jackson entering the debate with a well aimed return of serve to Emirates boss Tim Clarke.
“To suggest that Emirates is competing on similar terms as commercially-run airlines like Qantas is, quite frankly, fiction,” she said.
Jackson said government ownership provided a sovereign risk rating that allowed Emirates to carry debt levels far higher than publicly listed carriers such as Qantas.
She said Emirates paid no company tax in Dubai, and its chairman, Sheikh Ahmed Bin Saeed Al-Maktoum, was a member of the ruling family and head of the Dubai Department of Civil Aviation, which ran Dubai Airport.
“As Qantas has observed before, life must be wonderfully simple when the airline, government and airport interests are all controlled by the same people,” Jackson said.
“No one can be in any doubt that Emirates’ remarkable growth reflects the aggressive and coordinated strategies of its owners, the government of Dubai, to build a world class hub to grow tourism and business,” she said.
Jackson also remarked that any airline could grow and be profitable if it had the same “government sponsored” benefits as Emirates.
Of course, some would argue that Qantas has long enjoyed a “government sponsored” environment and may just be feeilng increasingly nervous at the prospect of Emirates and others using the new super class of airliners to erode its long haul profitable routes.
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