Page 3095 - Week 09 - Thursday, 13 October 2022
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If we spent $8 million elsewhere, or the $100 million in total that we have spent and pledged so far, we would make many, many more jobs than that. We could spend it in the public service and make jobs directly. We could make jobs in health, housing or the environment. We could spend it in the arts, which is a sector that famously generates more jobs and a greater return on investment than almost every other sector. We would make many, many more indirect jobs that way. Why do we hand it over to a private sector industry and let them spend one quarter on direct jobs, with vague notions that it is making more elsewhere, untracked?
I have previously noted that the amount of taxpayer money we give to the horseracing industry is around the same amount as they give out in prize money. It looks like we are publicly funding prize money for horseracing. We are certainly not paying for jobs and we are not buying jobs that support the public interest.
Of course, there is an economic impact, and indirect jobs, as a result of the horseracing industry. That is true for any industry and for any use of money. Every business buys equipment, buys stock, needs transport and uses advertising. There are indirect jobs from all of those activities, and this industry is no different. It spends money and it has an economic impact in the ACT. What exactly is this economic impact? It is very unclear. I asked the Treasurer in estimates. He could not tell me either. He did say:
… there is clearly a degree of economic activity. There will be various expectations around modelling of what that economic contribution is. Invariably, those who seek to boost the industry’s status will overstate that economic contribution and those who seek to end the industry will seek to understate it …
My view, for what it is worth, is that the industry tends to overstate the economic contribution.
The Treasurer says that the horseracing industry are likely to be overstating their economic contribution, and I tend to agree because I have seen some pretty high numbers reported but I have not seen much evidence to back the numbers up. The government obviously agrees with this, and that is why the current MOU requires an economic impact report in the first and fourth years. Those reports will cover turnover, employees and visitor attendance. I am really looking forward to seeing these reports. I think they will give us a much clearer picture of what it is Canberra bought for its $100 million investment in this industry.
But no government hands over funds to an industry purely for the economic impact. If we did that, we would be happy to pay people to smash windows, because repair costs and glaziers are good for the economy. We support the economy whilst also promoting the public interest. We put money into services that the public needs, and we do it in a way that also makes jobs.
We Greens are really concerned about the workers in this industry. We know that transition periods can do real harm to people, lifelong harm, particularly when their industry is not managing the transition well. That is why we have moved to phase out the funding over five years. (Second speaking period taken.) We do not think it is in
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