Covid-19 Gold Coast: Businesses facing closure running out of money and getting little financial support

Thousands of Gold Coast businesses, including some of the city’s biggest, are believed to be in “dire straits” as a result of the ongoing lockdown. THE WORST AFFECTED >>>

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TENS of thousands of Gold Coast businesses, including some of the city’s biggest, are on the ropes, ineligible for government financial support and desperate for a lifeline.

Sole traders, theme park giants and small tourism firms are “practically trading insolvent” with the city locked down and cut from both domestic and international tourists.

Village Roadshow theme parks have been forced to stand down the bulk of its 4000-strong workforce as a result of the lockdown but its fixed outgoing costs, including the care of their large animal attractions and maintenance of infrastructure remain high.

Chief Operating Officer Village Roadshow Theme Parks, Bikash Randhawa Picture: Jerad Williams

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Parks chief operating officer Bikash Randhawa said existing support from the state and federal government for locked-down businesses would be a drop on the ocean doing little to stem the haemorrhaging.

“Many small business are practically trading insolvent and in Village’s case we are burning cash with our ongoing costs which is a really significant burden,” he said.

“For us to survive, we need (government) support in lockdown, out of lockdown and it needs to go to December 31. I speak on behalf of every hotel, every accommodation house in this city, and of all the small business here who are in dire straits.”

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The Gold Coast is facing a tough road ahead. Picture: Brendan Radke

The Gold Coast’s economy has been left devastated by two snap lockdowns in quick succession and more than a month cut off from major tourism markets Sydney and Melbourne. The city lost $250 million during July alone.

The state government this week announced a $260 million package which includes one-off payments of $5000 to businesses across the state, regardless of whether they are in a lockdown area. However, sole traders are not eligible.

Martin Hall. Picture Glenn Hampson

Gold Coast Central Chamber of Commerce president Martin Hall said the announced fiscal support was not good enough: “Even with the $260 million on the table, that will only cover 52,000 businesses. The Gold Coast alone has 66,000 small businesses.

“This support is too little so all we can do is survive until we can open again.”

Chamber of Commerce and Industry Queensland advocacy general manager Amanda Rohan said less than 40 per cent of state businesses were eligible, leaving many Gold Coast traders facing financial ruin.

“Those businesses work just as hard to earn a livelihood and contribute to the Queensland economy and similarly, they are just as significantly impacted from Covid lockdowns and restrictions,” she said.

Gold Coast-based holiday booking firm Experience Oz director Ben Manns warns the $5000 payments did little to help those firms pay their staff.

“It doesn’t matter how big your business is, many cannot go on and in our case, $5000 doesn’t even pay our wages for a whole day,” he said. “Nobody is trying to make a profit right now we’re all in survival mode. This is much worse than the initial stages of the pandemic.

Many Gold Coast businesses are facing closure Picture: Christian Gilles

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“There’s no rent relief, no JobKeeper and we do not have the cash reserves we did at the beginning.”

Government support for lockdown residents includes:

• Federal payments of $750/week for staff losing 20-plus hours in lockdown, but the application isn’t available until August 7. Those losing eight to 20 hours will get $450;

• State government one-off $5000 payments to business with annual turnover of $75,000 or more and a payroll of $10m a year or less, regardless of whether in a lockdown.

Mayor Tom Tate said relief did not go far enough: “If this keeps up, there won’t be any businesses left to compensate.”

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