Media reports recently and over the weekend say that QANTAS CEO Alan Joyce has already visited Melbourne for talks with Victoria Premier Daniel Andrews regarding the possibility of shifting its headquarters to the city.
It appears that Victoria is trying to convince Joyce to move QANTAS’ HQ along with the apparently 5,000 remaining jobs currently based in Sydney and also, and this may be the catch or the key, to protect the around 1,000 jobs of QANTAS’ subsidiary Jetstar located in Melbourne’s Collingwood.
Back in September, QANTAS announced what was said to be a three month HQ review, with the HQ being at the new Western Sydney Airport possible, along with looking for any possible financial and other incentives from states to relocate, with the review focussed on non-aviation facilities, including QANTAS’ leased 49,000sqm HQ in Mascot, Sydney and Jetstar’s leased Collingwood, Melbourne HQ, with one option being considered of having all its company HQ facilities in one location.
You could say that all this adds to the views of many of the QANTAS of today, as now a solely money making and return on shareholder investment machine.
It is rather sad to see how the mighty have fallen, with the QANTAS of the past a prestigious airline, a national flag carrier, a company of global status and pride for Australia, but now the company’s HQ is being touted around by its CEO, like a snake oil salesman, trying to get the best possible bucket of cash from any of the states that would come up with a big enough incentive in a price war between the states, which the Premiers are crazy enough to get dragged into, forgetting we are one Australia after all!
Imagine the scenario if Northern Territory kicked the can with a few billion with the QANTAS HQ moving there, a great city but not the location for the HQ of one of our leading global brands and I have to say, neither are Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, Adelaide or Hobart!
Hang on though, what about Shanghai? The Chinese have loads of money and would be thrilled to have QANTAS headquartered there, silly as it may seem, but in a post COVID world with Alan Joyce at the helm, can happen, but I hope I am joking! If only QANTAS was still run by James Strong.
With QANTAS having already cut 6,000 jobs and announcing a further 2,500 ground handling jobs to go by being outsourced, many other QANTAS staff who have been stood down and many on Jobkeeper and waiting to go back to work, will be concerned at the prospect of having move to another city, many away for families and friends.
A report in the Sydney Morning Herald about Joyce’s Melbourne meeting with Premier Andrews said that they also discussed how QANTAS could increase flights in and out of Victoria and that Joyce personally looked at locations that could house a new QANTAS HQ, with Victorian Premier Dan Andrews saying in September, “We think that we have a very attractive offer to make and we’ll work through that to try and have as many jobs as we possibly can in our city and state”.
Interestingly, as he was formerly QANTAS CEO Qantas Domestic and QANTAS Group Executive Operations, now CEO of Melbourne Airport has said the area’s proposal is “really strong” and would be “incredibly hard to match anywhere else”, with “The most recent commitments to airport rail underscore just how highly Victoria values aviation”.
QANTAS has already said that “anything that can move” is “on the table”, including its facilities in Mascot, Collingwood and Brisbane and it has also said that some aviation facilities, such as the flight simulator centres in Sydney and Melbourne and the heavy maintenance facility in Brisbane could move, too.
While QANTAS has said it has no intention to offshore facilities and insists the move is entirely due to the job losses already announced and to save money on the $40 million annual spend on leased office space, QANTAS has a long track record of having some aircraft maintained overseas, so best to assume that nothing is off the agenda!
So be prepared…anything is possible!
A report and opinion collated from various sources by John Alwyn-Jones
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