Overhead and Underhand.

The dog has never charged me for the good end of the couch. She simply occupies it, has always occupied it, and considers the matter settled. There is no loyalty tier. There is no add-on. She was there first, and being there first is the whole argument.

Jetstar has taken a different approach.

Until now, an economy fare included two bags: one in the overhead locker, one under the seat, seven kilograms between them. That was the arrangement and nobody thought about it further. From the 2nd of February 2027, the fare includes just one of those. The underseat bag, no larger than 40 by 30 by 20 centimetres. A handbag. A laptop bag. A backpack. The other one, the one that has sat above people's heads without incident for decades, now requires Priority Carry-on, starting at twenty-five dollars one way on a good route on a good day. The Guardian found examples above a hundred dollars on others. I have flown enough not to notice a bag going overhead. That is what included means. Nobody comments on it. It goes up, the door closes, everyone gets on with the flight.

Jetstar's chief executive, Stephanie Tully, described the new arrangement as 'giving' customers an underseat bag. "By giving customers an underseat bag with the option to add Priority Carry-on, we can make better use of overhead locker space, streamline boarding and help more flights depart on time," she said. I have read that sentence several times, in the same way I have read the label on a tin claiming to be soup. It is about locker space. It is about streamlining. It is about flights leaving on time. The twenty-five dollars is not in it anywhere, despite being the only part anyone will actually feel at the gate.

The underseat bag was not new. It has been there the whole time, travelling quietly beneath economy passengers long before this announcement in whichn nothing was given, something was removed, and the remainder was called a gift.

Passengers who booked before the change keep their overhead bag for free. Group bookings of ten or more, exempt. Jetstar Japan, exempt from the whole arrangement. That is three separate escape hatches written into one press release. Senator Bridget McKenzie called it a cash grab, on social media, which is the modern equivalent of shouting it across a departure lounge. A thing that was free is no longer free.

Locally, this lands on people who were never travelling with excess in mind. The retirees flying out of the Sunshine Coast twice a year to see grandchildren in Melbourne. The families doing Bali on a budget precisely because Jetstar was the airline that let them. These are not the passengers hauling golf bags and two hard-shell suitcases through the gate. These are the passengers with one soft bag and a jumper for the plane, who chose the cheap airline because it was cheap, and who will now discover that cheap had conditions attached, filed under a word that sounds like a gift.

Jetstar and Qantas were found by the Federal Court in 2015 to have misled passengers about the real cost of a fare, a practice the court called drip pricing. Advertise one number. Collect another, a little at a time, until the total looks nothing like the number on the search page. The court's finding didn't stop it. It just meant the drips needed better names. This one is called Priority.

The dog remains unbothered by all of this. She has never once described her position on the couch as Priority Seating. She doesn't need to. Nobody has ever tried to move her off it, and if they did, they would not enjoy their boarding process.