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Until now, the Qantas Aussie AirPass was always the best deal for travelers visiting Australia and wanting to see a few different parts of this huge country. The deals vary, but you usually get two or three cities or stops in Oz included in your ticket, and you can buy extra legs for $123. But wait: things are changing.

Low cost carriers are old news in North America or Europe, but they’re just getting started Down Under. And while Qantas and its latest rival Jetstar have admittedly been getting the costs of flying from city to city a little lower in recent years, nobody can tell me that a $400 airfare from Perth to Melbourne is really a budget flight, when I can fly from one side of Europe and back again for a quarter of that.

But now Tiger Airways Australia (nearly half of it belongs to Singapore Airlines) has announced what I’d call authentically budget-priced fares, and that’s such good news. From December they will fly from Perth to Melbourne for A$59.95 (that’s just over U$50), including taxes and charges. For a flight that can take around four hours, that’s a price I’m truly happy to pay. Visitors from abroad can now probably afford to shop around for the best fare into one Aussie city and then hop around on budget flights when and how they want. It’s not quite the heaven of European skies and there probably won’t be any one dollar flights, but it does mean people will find it more affordable to see more of Australia - even the oft-abandoned west coast.