Page 3215 - Week 12 - Wednesday, 18 November 1992
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that, but heaven only knows where you are going to get the money from. These projects grow and prosper, but if you are fair dinkum about equity, if you want everyone to live in an environment which promotes prosperity and growth at this end, you have to change the big picture factors.
Tourism, as I said before, is big business - more than a million visitors; 7,000 jobs; $8m into the economy every week. But it is business and it reacts like business to a change in economic environments. No-one is suggesting that we can change national factors overnight - national factors like the recession that we had to have, or the unemployment that will not go away, even when there is an election pending. However, there are things that we can do here in Canberra which will make a difference. For want of repeating myself time and time again, we could look at things like payroll tax, minimum youth training wages, enterprise bargaining, reduced business taxes and charges, and many others. We can also listen to some of the Chief Minister's advisers who say, "Listen, what about deregulation of trading hours?". That is something that is going to affect tourism directly; it is something that can be done directly by this Government.
The Government has promised all sorts of things, but we are not seeing any action in those areas. There are a lot of things that you can do in the big picture as well that will encapsulate and improve tourism. Let us try to be sensible. I am glad that Mr Berry is back in the Assembly. Bringing in the occupational health and safety legislation which reduces the designated work group to 10 is just plain ridiculous. You know that it is ridiculous. Every tourism and other organisation has told you that it is ridiculous. Let me tell you; they will tell you very loud and clear next time you go to the polls.
What I am saying is: Congratulations on your successes, but what about changing the big picture for everybody? The Tourism Commission has been given more money, but during the Estimates Committee meetings there were examples of some problems with some of the ways that money was spent. We need a lean, mean Tourism Commission - we all agree to that - with the best people and the best marketing strategies. Let me conclude these brief comments of mine by referring to that. Whilst I praise the Tourism Commission for a lot of the work that it has done - - -
Mr Lamont: I will move for a short extension of time.
MR DE DOMENICO: No; I still have eight minutes to go.
Mr Lamont: I am sorry.
MR DE DOMENICO: Just relax. You will have your turn later on.
Mrs Grassby: He was being nice.
MR DE DOMENICO: I am still being nice. Give credit where credit is due.
The second part of the subject of the matter of public importance is the potential for the future. That is something that we should concentrate a bit more time on. We heard the Chief Minister say the other day phrases like the commission and Canberra are competing more than favourably with any other city in Australia. We heard Mrs Grassby and Ms Follett talk about the 12 per cent increase in accommodation. We heard about the Vietnam veterans, Floriade, casinos, events units and all sorts of things. We did not hear anything about, for example, the
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