Airport exec says air services agreements disadvantage Perth

By Andrew Curran.

Airlines are directing capacity to Australia's east coast airports at the expense of Perth, according to Perth Airport's Chief Commercial and Aviation Officer, who is calling for Australia to enter into more open skies agreements.

Speaking at the CAPA Asia Pacific Airline Leader Summit in Adelaide last week, Kate Holsgrove said caps contained within various bilateral air services agreements were forcing foreign airlines to pick and choose which Australian airports they could serve, with many opting to skip Perth (PER).

She said more open skies agreements, which generally contain no or very few flight limitations, would benefit Perth and other Australian airports. Australia has just seven open skies agreements, including with the United States, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, China, India, Japan and Singapore.

Twenty-three foreign airlines fly to Perth Airport and Qantas uses it as its so-called Western Hub for flights to the United Kingdom, Europe and South Africa. While Perth Airport recorded its busiest year on record in the 12 months to June 30, 2026, processing more than 18.3 million passengers, only 5.55 million of those travelled on international flights.

Bilateral air services agreements can limit flights

Air services agreements negotiated by the Australian Government frequently limit how many services a country's airlines can operate to Australia's five designated primary airports, which includes Perth.

Australia has air services agreements with more than 90 countries, and they vary considerably. Some, such as the Australia – Singapore agreement, are open skies agreements with no limits on passenger capacity, flight frequencies or cargo services. Others, such as the Australia – Qatar air services agreement, are far more restrictive.

Consequently, Singapore Airlines operates 28 weekly round-trips between Singapore and Perth, while Qatar Airways can operate a maximum of seven weekly round-trips between Doha and Perth.

"It's an interesting challenge," Holsgrove said. "Perth is part of the caps, and we talk to airline partners, but (often) all of the available capacity is already taken up. Perth has been left behind and trying to increase and grow capacity out of Perth has been really challenging because of the bilateral agreements."

Not all bad news for Perth Airport

Holsgrove said Perth Airport has had a couple of recent wins, but in many cases all available capacity under the bilateral agreements has already been allocated. However, recent developments suggest it is not all bad news.

China Southern Airlines is moving to year-round Guangzhou (CAN) services, while earlier this year Qantas started flights to Johannesburg (JNB) and Auckland (AKL). Jetstar is now flying to Manila (MNL) from Perth, and TransNusa is operating double-daily flights to Denpasar (DPS).

Cathay Pacific, Malaysia Airlines, Air New Zealand and Philippine Airlines have all increased capacity into Perth, either by using larger aircraft or operating more frequent services.

Nonetheless, Holsgrove said airlines should not forget her airport.

"Perth has been left out of the opportunity," she said.

"We're close to Asia, we've got direct connectivity to Europe, and when we're talking about bilaterals, we've got to make sure that Western Australia is front of mind."

"Anything we can do to move towards the open skies model… to make it easier to travel to and from Australia, is in everybody's best interests."

Photo: AI-Generated.

Contact the writer: andrew@aerosouthpacific.com