20 jobs go at Tourism Australia after federal budget cuts

The roles in the firing line at the agency’s marketing team include people of varying seniority, and come after hefty federal budget cut.

Tourism Australia managing director Phillipa Harrison will face Senate estimates on Friday, after cutting 20 roles in the marketing authority.

Tourism Australia has wielded the axe in its own marketing department, weeks after the federal budget revealed less funding for the agency responsible for luring international visitors down under.

Tourism Australia confirmed 20 roles were being made redundant, amounting to about 10 per cent of its workforce.

The roles in the firing line are in the agency’s Sydney-based marketing team and affect people of varying seniority.

Many of those axed worked at the recent Australian Tourism Exchange on the Gold Coast, hosting hundreds of trade delegates and media from 30 countries.

The shock move followed a hefty budget cut attributed by the government to “the end of Covid-related additional tourism marketing campaigns as international travel resumed”.

A Tourism Australia spokesman said its budget was confirmed at $169.1m for 2023-24.

Although above pre-pandemic levels, the sum was well down on the last two years with budget papers showing Tourism Australia received $208m in 2022-23, and $175m the previous year.

“With the return of international travel more than a year ago, Tourism Australia has continued to ramp up its efforts towards attracting visitors to Australia from overseas and rebuilding our visitor economy,” the spokesman said.

“Now with Tourism Australia’s budget confirmed for 2023-24 at $169.1m … we continue to work through how we best resource our business to maximise the opportunities to grow demand and convert that demand to visitation to Australia.”

He added that some “structural changes were being made to our Sydney operations which do involve some redundancies”.

The agency’s latest marketing campaign, the $120m “Come and Say G’Day”, was rolled out late last year in New York, featuring an animated toy kangaroo called Ruby voiced by actor Rose Byrne.

The campaign was due to be launched in China in June, which was Australia’s biggest source of overseas tourists pre-Covid.

Two weeks ago, Tourism Australia managing director Phillipa Harrison told The Australian the agency was “very focused on the big job of getting international travellers to Australia”.

“We know we need the Chinese tourists back. We are seeing really positive signs (but) it is very early days,” Ms Harrison said.

Latest passenger traffic released by Sydney Airport showed numbers through the international terminal were back to 80 per cent of pre-pandemic levels led by Australian travellers.

Traffic was expected to increase as more airline capacity came on line with carriers such as Qantas and Singapore Airlines planning additional flights towards the end of the year.

Ms Harrison is due to appear before Senate estimates on Friday, where she is expected to face questions about the cuts.

Trade and Tourism Minister Don Farrell told the National Press Club on Thursday the visitor economy would “continue to be a driver of Australian prosperity”.

His office did not respond to questions about the Tourism Australia redundancies.