The Australian government has defended its decision to block Qatar airways from almost doubling its flights to Australia, but has distanced itself from Qantas by insisting the national airline should compensate customers for pandemic flight credits. On Tuesday Prime Minister Anthony Albanese responded to consumer anger about $470m of unclaimed Qantas and Jetstar flight credits, and the assistant minister for competition, Andrew Leigh, called for the introduction of more low-cost carriers to bring prices down. Meanwhile, Qantas has acknowledged it has been scheduling more domestic flights than it can actually operate, but denied doing so deliberately, as critics allege. Its representatives were grilled at a parliamentary inquiry into promoting economic dynamism. That came a day after its outgoing CE, Alan Joyce, faced tough questioning at a separate Senate committee. The transport minister Catherine King’s decision to reject a request from Qatar to fly an additional 21 services into Australia’s major airports has renewed interest in the political power of its corporate rival, Qantas. The opposition leader, Peter Dutton, has targeted Labor, accusing it of “running a protection racket” for Qantas. The controversy was fuelled also by the assistant treasurer, Stephen Jones, arguing on Monday that Qantas’ financial viability was in the national interest. Joyce faced questions at the parliament’s cost-of-living inquiry on Monday, revealing that although Qantas’ unclaimed flight credits had fallen from $500m to $370m, its subsidiary Jetstar owed about another $100m of flight credits to its customers.<br/>