Qantas chief Vanessa Hudson says flight delays due to chronic shortages of air traffic controllers at Sydney Airport are unacceptable for travellers, Australia’s flagship carrier and the nation’s aviation industry, and has called on Airservices Australia to fix it.

Speaking on the day Qantas delivered its full-year results, Hudson said 60,000 of the airline’s passengers had been held up in July by Airservices’ ground delay programs, which are aimed at ensuring safe airport traffic during times of constrained capacity.

“We’ve been very clear with the air traffic controllers that we need to see that improve because the level of disruptions that we’ve had in July is not acceptable,” Hudson said. “They know that, and they are working really hard to improve that.”

Airservices “needs to address [the issues] because delaying that amount of customers – 60,000 across the group and tens of thousands more across the industry – is not OK.”

Airservices, which manages the day-to-day traffic at the nation’s airports, has come under fire in recent weeks, both because of a string of taxiway incidents in Sydney, and a pattern of delays which have rippled through the aviation system. Hudson also drew a line to gate bottlenecks at Sydney Airport, saying that the “pressure on gate availability does actually increase when airlines don’t operate to schedule”.

“This kind of gate pressure can be exacerbated by what we’re seeing in some of the ground delay programs that are introduced by air traffic controllers.”

Airservices declined to comment on Hudson’s remarks.

Hudson made her comments after revealing that Qantas’ profits took a hit as rising fuel costs sapped the benefit of sustained demand for international travel, and confirming that the airline will retire its popular A380 fleet, beginning in mid-2028.

Underlying pre-tax profit fell 13.7 per cent to $2.06 billion in the year ended June 30, down from $2.39 billion in fiscal year 2025.

The company said its fuel bill jumped by more than $600 million during the year, as it was hit hard by the ramifications of the Middle East conflict. The airline forecast revenue growth of between 8 per cent and 10 per cent in the current year, helped by higher fares and a reduction in seats.

Qantas shares jumped 5.2 per cent in Thursday’s session.

The airline plans to begin retiring the much-loved, but high-maintenance A380 fleet from 2028, saying the planes will be “successively retired in the years beyond that”, according to Hudson.

She said the double-decker Airbus has had “an important role [...] for the group in terms of responding to the impact and the growth in demand that we see as a result of the Middle Eastern conflict.”

Disruptions caused by the Iran war have driven up fuel prices – adding $610 million in costs for Qantas – and accelerated the cost-of-living crisis in Australia, which had an effect on bookings.

“The final four months of the [financial] year saw business and consumer confidence fall as the conflict and economic headwinds created uncertainty,” forcing some large corporates and government customers to cut travel budgets, Hudson said.

“In response to the surge in fuel prices, we quickly adjusted fares and capacity, and redeployed aircraft to give customers more options to fly to Europe,” she added.

“These actions, along with other mitigations, limited the net impact on earnings to $420 million, despite a $610 million increase in our fuel bill,” she said.

In this climate, newer, more efficient planes help contain costs. In addition to the 12 Project Sunrise aircraft on order, Qantas now has firm orders for 12 more A350s and 12 Boeing 787s Dreamliners, with the first of those set to arrive in the 2028 financial year.

Qantas said premium-cabin revenue is growing at twice the rate of economy revenue across its international network. Consequently, the newer planes will have a higher proportion of premium seats.

Auckland-based Alton Aviation Consultancy director Clark Johns said high fuel prices make the “next-generation aircraft and associated fuel savings more substantial”.

“They’ve already locked in those orders before the current fuel crisis, so if anything, it makes [them] more valuable with the ability to burn less fuel in this higher-price environment.”

Carriers build their fleet plans with flexibility, said Johns.

“If demand does go into a contractionary cycle, from a business perspective, airlines across the globe generally want to make sure they have the flexibility to retire aircraft earlier ... to contract the fleet and match supply with demand.”

Hudson defended Jetstar’s controversial decision to begin charging for priority access to overhead bins, announced earlier this month, saying the change will “improve on-time performance, and it will also improve the safe loading and boarding of that aircraft.”

As the Iran war and the cost-of-living crisis started to bite, Qantas’ loyalty program has continued to function as a reliable profit centre for the airline, delivering 12 per cent underlying pre-tax earnings growth of $625 million. From December 8, Qantas will allow frequent flyer members to earn status credits, which offer access to lounges and more perks for shopping rather than just flying.

The loyalty program is forecast to generate underlying pre-tax earnings growth of 5 to 7 per cent in the 2027 fiscal year, with a pre-tax target of $800 million to $1 billion in 2030.

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