The airline Virgin Australia have made an
announcement:
Quote:
Virgin Australia has announced that it will give Defence Force veterans priority when boarding and acknowledge with an on-board announcement.
This is annoying. They're my preferred airline, but I hate stuff like that (mostly the announcement, I don't care about priority boarding). To the credit of the Australian Defence Association, they gave this a pretty lukewarm reception:
Quote:
ADA executive director Neil James echoed Mr Chester’s concerns and cautioned there was a “fine line” between embarrassing people and thanking them for their service.
“There’s a fine line between acknowledging veterans and going over the top like Americans do... “By all means thank people but it’s the practical assistance that needs to come first. Don’t overdo the thanks because it’s not the Australian way. A genuine proper thank you is better than an effusive hollow one.”
Edit: Also a pretty good statement from Qantas, Virgin's major competitor:
Quote:
“We’re conscious that we carry a lot of exceptional people every day, including veterans, police, paramedics, nurses, firefighters and others, and so we find it difficult to single out a particular group as part of the boarding process,” Mr McGinnes said.
This seems to be Virgin mashing buttons in an attempt to stop losing money. They lost 600 million last financial year and have been in the red for 5 years straight.