Jul 31, 2026 – 9.00amThe Alan Joyce comeback tour is now in full swing, and I am so here for it. Nobody – I repeat, nobody – wants this man back in public life more than I do. Joyce says he has so much more to offer Australian companies, and he can go right ahead and list me as his first referee.As I first observed this week in my column for Rampart, it is quite extraordinary to see someone hounded out of public life emerge after nearly three years to spout the same discredited talking points that landed him in the wilderness in the first place. Joyce is validating everything I wrote in this newspaper in 2023, and later in The Chairman’s Lounge, about his enchanted spectacles, his magical world, his psychological safety bubble. He’s come so far (and earned so much), but learned so little.Subscribe to gift this articleGift 5 articles to anyone you choose each month when you subscribe.Subscribe nowAlready a subscriber? Joe AstonColumnistJoe Aston is the founder of Rampart and the best-selling author of The Chairman’s Lounge: The inside story of how Qantas sold us out. From 2012 to 2023, Joe helmed The Australian Financial Review’s Rear Window column.Fetching latest articles