Page 2019 - Week 06 - Thursday, 8 June 2006
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I want to talk also about the fanciful idea that the National Capital Authority is going to be the panacea for all ills and will take over marketing of the national capital. The NCA spends about $100,000 a year on marketing Canberra as a tourist destination. As Mr Smyth pointed out, while there was some cooperation between the two organisations, it is a struggle to see any sense or issues of duplication that would arise between the work of Australian Capital Tourism in attracting tourists to Canberra from around the world through extensive marketing campaigns and the NCA’s use of its very limited marketing budget.
Similarly, individual attractions spend money promoting themselves as destinations, not the ACT. The comparison is that the different attractions are fighting for a larger piece of the tourism pie. They are not about trying to increase the tourism pie overall. One possible exception may be the National Gallery of Australia. But, by and large, people are competing for a share of the marketing business. The Australian Capital Tourism Corporation was created to increase the size of the pie and it has sought to increase the number of visitors to Canberra so that all tourist destinations would benefit.
Successive governments of this territory have understood that tourism is important. It was a turn for the worse, unfortunately, when Mr Quinlan took over that role. I think that the first speech he gave as tourism minister is legendary now. He demonstrated basically a complete lack of interest in the industry. It was talked about for months and months afterwards. Sadly, the tenor in which he leapt out into tourism is being further reflected today by this rushed measure to get rid of the tourism corporation.
As I said, the benefits of tourism are substantial. In the government paper which was cited earlier, I believe, on the future economic and financial outlook of the ACT, Mr Stanhope has argued that we spend so much more than the national average. He uses that to justify cuts in tourism. Of course, national averages are good when it comes to attacking tourism, but they are not so good when it comes to how the hospital should perform or the average number of police per head of population that the ACT should have. I recall being attacked in the election campaign because I referred to per capita needs in health, education and policing. I was told then, “They do not apply. They are not good for the ACT and we should not be working on that.” But when it comes to tossing out the focus on tourism, suddenly per capita becomes a new measure. I find a remarkable inconsistency in the Chief Minister’s approach in this area.
A significant amount of the tourism budget is spent on major events such as Floriade and the Subaru Rally of Canberra. By doing these comparisons, as Mr Smyth pointed out, we have, in fact, seen where they have compared the spending here with that of other states as putting in and putting out events and not comparing like with like. Even when you compare like with like, as the Tasmanian government has worked out, if you sit back and do everything on a per capita basis you might as well close up shop because the basis on which you are marketing is such a competitive area, and it is competitive because it is becoming the world’s biggest industry.
Even the Americans, who have been natural recipients of large amounts of tourism, have come to realise at the White House that they have to invest substantial amounts in tourism or they are going to miss out. They have had a nine per cent fall in tourism since the September 11 saga as they have had to bring in all the fairly unpleasant security
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