Airline competition in Australia

In announcing the direction, the Treasurer stated that the ACCC’s monitoring will assist in protecting competition in the sector for the benefit of all Australian airline travellers.2 The Treasurer also said that the reporting role and focus by the ACCC would provide another avenue for those wishing to raise concerns about anti-competitive conduct in the sector. [...] To address this, the report includes commentary on the most up to date developments at the time of publication (June 2021), in addition to analysis of airline data based on the state of the industry 3 months prior (January–March 2021). [...] The competition has primarily been driven by the entry of Rex on to the route in March, as the first step in an expansion by the regional airline into intercity services. [...] 2.4 The ACCC is considering the impact of increases in capacity and price discounting on certain routes As the airline industry recovers from the impacts of COVID-19, the ACCC is watching for behaviour that may be interfering with the ability of airlines to compete on certain routes and/or across their broader networks. [...] 3.1 Passenger numbers in March 2021 were the highest recorded since the beginning of the pandemic The domestic airline industry has continued to recover with 2.7 million monthly passengers in March 2021, which was the highest monthly figure recorded since the beginning of the pandemic (see figure 2).