New Qantas chair named, airport crack down

Qantas has named former Telstra chairman John Mullen as the man who will takeover from retiring leader Richard Goyder. Photo: AAP
Qantas has named former Telstra chairman John Mullen as the next leader of its board as the airline continues its leadership changes.
Mullen will join Qantas as chairman-elect on July 1 and take over the role once Richard Goyder retires prior to the annual general meeting in October.
It comes as Australia’s busiest airport is set for reforms to boost competition and give travellers a better chance of reaching their destination as scheduled.
Mullen was chairman of Telstra for seven years and serves the same role for pallets and containers provider Brambles as well as Treasury Wine Estates.
He will make changes to his roles to accommodate Qantas.
“I am conscious of the time commitment that this prestigious role requires and will be adjusting my other professional obligations to ensure that I can be fully focused on this exciting challenge,” he said.
Mullen has had plenty of experience leading transport and logistics providers including roles at DHL, Macquarie Airports and TNT.
In the same announcement, Qantas said Nora Scheinkestel will join the board from 1 March as a non-executive director. Ms Scheinkestel is on the board of Brambles, Origin Energy and Westpac.
Qantas is due to provide its first-half earnings on Thursday.
Mullen and chief executive Vanessa Hudson will give Qantas a fresh leadership team after Hudson’s predecessor Alan Joyce departed last year.
Meanwhile, regional communities and travellers facing cancellation due to weather or security events are set to benefit from proposed reforms to Australia’s busiest airport.
Airlines will also need to explain how they use their allocated slots at Sydney Airport in a bid to make the system more competitive and give travellers better information.
Regional carriers will be able to apply for available slots in changing peak periods beyond their previous allocations in a bid to improve connectivity.
The government also plans to introduce a “recovery period” to temporarily allow more planes to take off and land after severe weather events or security issues that disrupt travel.
The reforms do not impact the 11pm curfew and focus on “improving the use of this significant piece of national infrastructure while maintaining community protections,” Transport and Infrastructure Minister Catherine King said on Wednesday.
The airport’s management welcomed the proposed reforms, saying they will boost efficiency and competition for its 40 million annual travellers and benefit the aviation industry more widely.
“Sydney Airport is the biggest hub in Australia’s aviation network, so when we get disrupted, the whole system is severely impacted,” chief executive Scott Charlton said.
Storms on Monday led to the cancellation of 50 domestic services in 45 minutes, he said.
“In the future, with a recovery mechanism hopefully it won’t be necessary to cancel these flights.”
The two-hour recovery period after service disruptions will allow for up to 85 movements per hour, above the scheduling cap of 80 flights per hour, which will remain in place.
“There will be no increase in the overall number of flights for that whole day … only flights that are already scheduled to happen that day will be able to take off or land.” Ms King said.
How those slots are allocated and used will also be a target for greater transparency, with published audits to verify airline-provided information on reasons for cancellations or major delays.
The audits will detect and crack down on anti-competitive behaviour, Ms King said, with the first to be carried out before the end of 2024.
Peak periods will be reduced by three hours, beginning at 7am and 5pm, rather than the current 6am-11am and 3pm-8pm timeslots.
The slot manager will be required to consider giving priority to regional services among other considerations in allocating peak slots.
It’s hoped modernising the allocation of aircraft slots will make the system more competitive and efficient.
– AAP