Page 6028 - Week 18 - Thursday, 12 December 1991
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A special word, by the way, on those overseas students: They do not come here for one day to play roulette. They come here for two, three, four years or more. In the course of their time here, their families from overseas also visit them. If we are looking for a kind of thriving long-term industry, then I believe that that is one we should concentrate on.
Fourthly in this list of appropriate industries for Canberra, of course, is the tourist and/or visitor industry. In a way I do not wish to make this a list of priorities. This tourist and visitor industry could be put higher up the list if you wish. Related to it, as I well understand, is the entertainment industry. This is an excellent and thoroughly desirable and appropriate industry for our national capital. May it grow and expand in ways appropriate to our national capital. I have long been associated with it personally and professionally, especially in connection with national and international conferences.
The ANU is not only an educational centre, a research centre, an academic centre, a training centre; it is also a conference centre. I am sure that this is true of other educational organisations around Australia. You are looking at a very complex economic activity when you look at universities. The best and most memorable examples for me of an industrial spin-off are worldwide academic and scientific conferences of literally thousands of people. Such a gathering earlier this year - and I thank the former Chief Minister for his role in this - was the assembly of the World Council of Churches.
This tourist and visitor industry, however, best thrives on what our city is at its best, namely, the national capital. We do not need to become either a Disneyland or an Atlantic City or a Monaco or a Monte Carlo. We offer the people of Australia and our foreign guests the image of a natural national capital. As such, we are not in the business of ripping them off. They do not leave us thinking that this is where they lost their money. May I just pause here to talk about the absolute bottom line about gambling casinos: They only make a profit from people's losses. You have to think of the economic effect of those losses on the people who have lost the money.
The fifth of these areas of appropriate industries for Canberra is a range of industries which arise naturally as the result of the many interests and activities of ACT citizens. You cannot really define these because it depends on who is here. If there were a Mr Sarich, would that not be wonderful for us? But we do have Maggie Shepherd and her fashion industry as an example of what I am talking about. That is, as a city of 300,000, of course we have a role to create industries out of people's
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