Maria Kovacic (NSW, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

No, it's my turn to speak. Thank you. The Airline Passenger Protections (Pay on Delay) Bill 2024 is a bill for an act to require the transport minister to make rules prescribing carriers' obligations and for related purposes. I'm going to read the outline from the explanatory memorandum so we have an understanding of what this is actually about.

The purpose of this Bill is to require the Minister for Transport to make rules to prescribe certain obligations to passengers for airline carriers operating in Australian airspace.

That's pretty reasonable.

The obligations would be designed to protect passengers who experience a delay, cancellation or denial of boarding.

Again, that's pretty reasonable.

The Bill also requires the Minister to establish an airline code of conduct that provides for the protection of passengers and third parties from improper conduct by carriers.

I can't see anything wrong with that.

The Bill is in response to the increasing level of consumer complaints lodged against airlines in Australia. The latest ACCC airline monitoring report confirms once again that the sector is not where it should be—

so this is the ACCC airline monitoring report; it is not an opposition report. It is the latest airline monitoring report—

as does that fact complaints to the ACCC concerning aviation have risen by nearly 200% since 2018.

With around 93% of market share, Qantas and Virgin have a tighter grip on domestic air travel than another notable duopoly—Coles and Woolworths—do on the supermarket industry. The reality is that domestic airlines have been held largely unaccountable for their poor performance because Australian consumers have not had the option of choosing other operators.

In the international sector, airlines operating in Australia are already subject to similar requirements in other jurisdictions, such as the European Union, United Kingdom and Canada. The new rules would ensure foreign carriers operating in Australia are subject to the same consumer obligations as domestic carriers.

That all sounds pretty reasonable.

For me, in a nutshell, this is about three things. This is about fairness, transparency and communication. It's requiring carriers in Australian airspace to be fair and transparent and to properly communicate with their customers. I can't see anything wrong with that.

As my colleague Senator Henderson pointed out, plane travel isn't a luxury. It's not something that you always go and do just because you can. For many, many Australians, it is a necessity. The scale and geography of our country require people to fly to places. We can't always drive there and we can't always get a train there. We have to fly. That could be for medical appointments, medical treatment, a business trip or—if it is, in fact, a special luxury for a family—a family holiday, or, as Senator Henderson noted, it could be for a sad reason. It could be for a funeral. It could be for something you don't want to go and do but you need to go and do.

When you buy that ticket, when you pay that money—particularly in the current cost-of-living crisis if your family has saved to go on a holiday or has pooled what resources it has to go see a family member who is unwell—you have certain expectations. Those expectations are that you are actually going to get to the place that you have booked the ticket to go to, that you are going to get there in a reasonable time and that your bags are also going to be there when you get there. Those are not unreasonable expectations when you hand over a lot of money to purchase your airline ticket. But the failings of our major airlines over recent years have left many Australians frustrated, distressed, inconvenienced and out of pocket as a result of poor service and poor outcomes. There is no question that we are currently navigating an extraordinary cost-of-living crisis. The last thing that Australians need when they make the decision to travel, whether out of necessity or because they have scrimped and saved for a holiday for themselves or their family, is to lose some of that money as a result of poor service from our airlines.

Those service standards are significantly lower today than they were prior to the disruptions caused by the COVID pandemic. The long-term average of flight cancellations prior to COVID was 1½ per cent. In January this year, it became 3.1 per cent. But the on-time performance is something that has more impact. That's the delay in flights, being late. On-time performance is much, much worse now than it was prior to COVID. In January this year, 26.6 per cent of flights were delayed. That means you had a one-in-four chance of your flight being delayed. That is a lot of delayed flights. The pre-pandemic long-term average rate of delayed flights was 17.8 per cent, so less than one in five.

I know that many Australians have faced delayed flights over the last couple of years. If it happens once in a while, you understand that this can happen. And it is not always the airline's fault. There can be weather issues and there can be technical issues. If there is a technical issue with a plane, none of us have a problem with that being communicated to us or with understanding that. We all accept that, for the safety of passengers, we want things like that to be resolved.

But this is where the airlines need to lift their game: they need to communicate this to us—to tell us. We shouldn't be sitting on a flight on the tarmac for an hour or an hour and a half with little knowledge of what is going on, with an inability to communicate to family or to work colleagues who might be waiting for us at the other end because we actually don't know what's happening. That is not okay. This is where I talk about the fairness and the transparency and the communication. We have purchased a ticket—we've paid the money for that ticket—and we have a reasonable expectation that that service be delivered to us in the way it has been described.

Deteriorating and persistent poor performance by domestic airlines has exposed these inadequate protections for customers under Australian law, with millions of dollars in flight credits still owed nearly four years on from the outbreak of the pandemic. So many of us became confused as to whether we had flight credits, whether we had the passes, what they were, how and when we could use them, what flights we could use them for, whether or not they expired and, if they had expired, when they had. That's not fair. That's not transparent. And that's not good communication.

This state of affairs has persisted because there haven't been consequences, because of a lack of competition. We don't have a lot of choice. We don't have other airlines to go to.

The Senate aviation inquiry last year, which was fiercely resisted by this government at pretty much every juncture, exposed that the government does not have a plan to address lack of competition and poor performance within the aviation industry. This inquiry recommended better protections for consumers across Australia. That isn't a radical recommendation. That's a fair and reasonable recommendation: better protections for consumers across Australia.

This isn't a coffee or a muffin or something that you've bought for lunch; this is a significant expense, with impacts to individuals if their flights are cancelled or not on time. People miss significant personal and family events. People can miss connecting flights. People who are travelling could miss the beginning of a cruise or another trip that they have planned that's connected to it. People who travel who have paid for hotels and accommodation and are delayed may miss a concert that they've decided to go to. People who travel may miss important business meetings, so small businesses may have the cost of airline travel for their staff who actually weren't able to complete the purpose of their trip. That is unacceptable.

The recommendation for better protections for consumers across Australia is a reasonable one. But the recommendations were met with silence from the government, and everything was pushed off into a review.

Again, the coalition has been forced to act in this space because Labor won't. I commend my colleagues Senators McKenzie and Smith for putting this bill forward. This bill will tilt the balance from market giants to everyday Australians by protecting the rights of passengers in circumstances where delays, cancellations or denial of boarding occur. This bill instructs the minister to create rules for airlines within 12 months to ensure that passengers are compensated and treated fairly when they experience disruptions and delays. That's not unreasonable. These rules would be similar to protections already enjoyed by passengers in Canada, the United Kingdom, Europe and the United States. It's not clear to me why Australian passengers—Australian consumers—shouldn't be afforded those same protections.

The minister is required to consult widely on the rules to ensure that all views are taken into account in determining what the minimum standards should be, including in relation to meals, hotels, refunds and, potentially, monetary compensation, and that's fair and reasonable as well. It also instructs the minister to create a clear definition of an 'airfare' in direct response to the defence being lodged by Qantas in the ACCC lawsuit. The bill would require an aviation code of conduct to be established within 12 months to protect passengers and travel agents from improper conduct by carriers. There are codes in the retail sector, in banking and in telecommunications. Why should aviation be any different? A transport sector as vital as aviation in a country like Australia, where so many of us rely on air travel, should be subject to the same frameworks that protect consumers in other industries.

There are a few key provisions in the rules required by the bill, and one that I want to talk about in particular is the protection of minors—children. Recognising the vulnerability of children, this bill would require the transport minister to make rules which mandate that minors under the age of 14 are seated next to their guardian at no extra costs. This means that parents get to sit next to their children on the plane without having to pay extra. Who else do you want your children to sit next to in order to ensure their safety? That's common sense. A parent or guardian should not have to pay extra to have their children seated with them. This provision is crucial for ensuring the safety and wellbeing of young passengers and for providing peace of mind to families and caregivers. (Time expired)