Scott Morrison defends tourism plan amid controversy
NSW bush mayors have blasted a $1.2 billion scheme halving the cost of flights to mostly QLD destinations but Scott Morrison has defended the plan.
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Prime Minister Scott Morrison has defended the government’s tourism and airline support package, saying that it was designed to help parts of the country that were hardest hit by the closure of international borders.
He did not rule out extending the program to include destinations in the regions.
The half-price flight program was announced on Wednesday night and will see the government cover 50 per cent of selected airfares between April 1 and July 31.
Tourism destinations in Queensland make up the lion’s share of the program which will cost $1.2 billion to rollout. The only NSW town included in the initial rollout was Merimbula, on the south coast.
Speaking at a Qantas maintenance hangar at Sydney Airport on Thursday morning, the prime minister responded to criticism the program was too Queensland-centric and was leaving regional NSW behind, saying “this isn’t about interstate politics. This isn’t about arguments between premiers, this is about jobs for people on the ground.”
“What we’re focused on here are those areas that are heavily dependant on international tourists and on planes coming in to support that tourism, and those destinations have been devastated by that,” Mr Morrison said.
“In NSW in particular, in many locations we’ve seen the return of internal travel … we have seen (people taking) tours of NSW down the south coast to out west … you couldn’t get a hotel in Orange. That’s something to celebrate,” he said.
“We’ll look at what we can do and we’ll work with the airlines and we’ll work with the tourism operators to see what other destinations may well be potentially added to the list.”
“But in NSW … many of those locations are already going very nicely.”
However industry experts are concerned the move may result in job losses in Sydney.
“Other than Merimbula, this package isn’t going to provide direct benefit to many other destinations across the NSW regional visitor economy still struggling to return to normal,” NSW Tourism Industry Council Executive Manager Greg Binskin said.
The package has also been criticised for failing to support Australia’s international gateways.
“For Sydney and Melbourne where 80 per cent of the market is from international and corporate markets which are still not operating due to government restrictions, the lack of support in this package will result in a loss of jobs and slow our recovery once borders are open,” Accommodation Association CEO Dean Long said.
Dubbo Regional Council Mayor Ben Shields told The Daily Telegraph he hoped the whole scheme was a typo.
“The federal government has been largely excellent with their coronavirus response but they have gotten this terribly wrong,” mayor Shields said.
“We’ve lost about $5 million from our airport not trading. There’s also been an impact on our medical industry – not jus tourism – lots of health professionals fly to Dubbo to service the area and lower flights would really help them.
“I’m really just hoping this announcement was a big typo.”
His thoughts were echoed by nearby Orange City Council Mayor Reg Kidd who said he was disappointed they were not included in the scheme.
“Anything that could help bring people to the area would be a big help,” he said.
“We’ve suffered the drought here, we’ve had fires and then COVID too. I would love to know what government matrix was used to figure out that Merimbula should be included but we were not. I also feel for towns like Broken Hill – the flights are normally so expensive there. It seems like it could have been a really good opportunity to inject some tourism there.”
There was little ill will towards Merimbula from councils on NSW‘s far north coast.
Coffs Harbour City Council Mayor told The Daily Telegraph that they were happy the south coast town was included in the scheme.
“I would never knock back any government money or funding,” she said.
“But largely we have been okay here in Coffs. Our tourism has been at about 85 per cent capacity since covid hit. We are one of the lucky ones who have managed to be okay.
“Merimbula has had a lot to deal with in terms of fires and the shutdown in Victoria so I hope this make a difference for them.”
CHEAP FLIGHTS PLAN SLAMMED FOR OVERLOOKING NSW
The Tourism Minister is facing criticism for overlooking regional NSW in a plan aimed at boosting tourism across the country.
Dan Tehan appeared on breakfast radio this morning to spruik the $1.2 billion support package which will see the federal government cover half the cost of any airfare for specific routes between April 1 and July 31.
Flights are offered from Sydney to destinations in tropical Queensland, Alice Springs, Broome and Tasmania but the plan includes just one route into NSW – from capital cities to Merimbula on the south coast.
Mr Tehan was slammed by 2GB’s Ben Fordham who was critical that the plan favoured Queensland after Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk’s hard border rules.
“It is like having two children, one of them is the naughty one and one is the well behaved one. One of them follows the rules and the other ignores them,” Fordham said on air.
“And then you get a cupcake and you think who am I going to give it to, you give it to the brat who would ignore the instructions and never listen to a word you said.
“Meanwhile you’ve got goody-two-shoes Gladys Berejiklian who has done the right thing. So the people of NSW get nothing.”
The Minister explained the program had been set up to help towns that are not typical tourist destinations, adding that Byron Bay was not included as it had fared well during the pandemic.
He said there would likely be more NSW locations added to the scheme.
“We have had to step in and support those locations which predominantly have international tourists fly into them which have been incredibly hard hit by the pandemic,” he said.
“They are in locations that are four to five hours away from capital cities and they’re the areas which really need our support.”
From April people will be able to log onto major airline websites including Qantas and Virgin, and book as many discounted flights as they want on 13 designated routes including to Launceston, the Gold Coast, Cairns, Uluru and Kangaroo Island.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison said the cheap airfares would be the tourism sector’s “ticket to recovery” with thousands of businesses expected to benefit from the increase in domestic travel.
“This package will take more tourists to our hotels and cafes, taking tours and exploring our backyard,” he said.
“That means more jobs and investment for the tourism and aviations sectors as Australia heads toward winning our fight against COVID-19 and the restrictions that have hurt so many businesses.”
The flight subsidy will be demand driven, but the government estimates it will fund 46,000 trips a week or 800,000 for the life of the scheme.
The government’s airline support package will also include direct funding to international carriers who provide assurance they will maintain a set level of flight readiness for when overseas travel resumes.
Each month from April until October 31, when international flights are expected to resume, Qantas and Virgin would be required to demonstrate they have kept on staff.
It is expected to keep about 8600 international airline workers in a job.
The government will also offer low interest loans to small and medium businesses in the tourism sector who have been on JobKeeper in the most recent quarter, but is due to end this month.
The loans of up to $5 million for 10 years with a 24-month repayment holiday could be either credit or to refinance.
The government will also fund an aviation services accreditation support program from the end of March until September to cover the cost of ground handlers maintaining their mandatory training, certification, and accreditation.
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