Latest / 360 with Katie Woolf / Tourism Top End CEO Glen Hingley on new research that shows how much revenue the tourism industry generates, and why it means the Government must keep investing in this space

Transcript

Tourism Top End CEO Glen Hingley on new research that shows how much revenue the tourism industry generates, and why it means the Government must keep investing in this space · 360 with Katie Woolf

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Well, I think it's pretty obvious.
• 0:01
  Speaker 2: We all know that tourism is a major, major draw
• 0:05
  Speaker 2: card and a well major money maker. I think you'd
• 0:09
  Speaker 2: say here in the Northern Territory, and the Northern Territory
• 0:13
  Speaker 2: has had a really tough time when it comes to COVID.
• 0:16
  Speaker 2: I think that's happened all around the nation and all
• 0:18
  Speaker 2: around the world. However, yesterday the reopening of those international
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: borders happened for double vaccinated tourists and in conjunction, Tourism
• 0:27
  Speaker 2: Top End has then released some research that they've done
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: by p WC outlining the value of the visitor economy
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  Speaker 2: to the Northern Territory. And in twenty nineteen we know
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  Speaker 2: that tourism generated two point six billion dollars for the
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  Speaker 2: Northern Territory's economy and delivered four hundred and twenty seven
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  Speaker 2: million dollars in tax revenue for the government. Now, Glenn
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  Speaker 2: Hingley from Tourism top End, the general manager, joins me
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  Speaker 2: on the line right now.
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  Speaker 1: Glenn, good morning to.
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  Speaker 3: You, Katy, good morning and good morning listener.
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  Speaker 1: Now, Glenn, why was this research commissioned?
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  Speaker 3: Katie. It's been a long two years for the territory
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  Speaker 3: and it's been. I think every Territorian has felt which
• 1:10
  Speaker 3: they never thought about the tourism industry. Before. Tourism industry
• 1:13
  Speaker 3: was always those caravans that you see on the up
• 1:15
  Speaker 3: and down Stuart Highway, out in Kakadu, down in Litchfield,
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  Speaker 3: all these different places in them all and there are
• 1:22
  Speaker 3: lots of people having a good time, and often we
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  Speaker 3: would talk about how many tourists arrived in this last
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  Speaker 3: quarter or this last year, and how long did they
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  Speaker 3: stay and how much did they spend. What we found
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  Speaker 3: is that we knew coming out of this pandemic, which
• 1:39
  Speaker 3: still went not through yet, we've got to rethink about
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  Speaker 3: what does tourism mean for territorians and what does that
• 1:51
  Speaker 3: mean in terms of the need to keep investing in it.
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  Speaker 3: As great as those images were of those English folk
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  Speaker 3: and others jump getting off the plane yesterday and so
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  Speaker 3: happy to finally be in Australia, there were one hundred
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  Speaker 3: and eighty people on the plane that's right shutting off.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, And so we're a long way away and
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  Speaker 3: it's going to take the sustained development. But part of
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  Speaker 3: that is, I think for more than just the tourism
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  Speaker 3: operators who have felt this acutely is to delve deeper
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  Speaker 3: into it, not just look at the government stats, but
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  Speaker 3: look at the broader information that's available at a national
• 2:27
  Speaker 3: level and at a territory level. So that's why we
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  Speaker 3: commissioned PwC look into this report to say, we think,
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  Speaker 3: because we're in tourism, yep, that tourism is pretty important,
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  Speaker 3: but is it really And so that's what this research
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  Speaker 3: piece was for them to really give us a sense
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  Speaker 3: of where we fit in the economic schemes and importantly
• 2:45
  Speaker 3: in the social fabric of the territory and Glenn.
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  Speaker 2: It really has demonstrated, you know, just how much tourism
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  Speaker 2: means to the economy in the Northern Territory and the
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  Speaker 2: social fabric and employment. I mean, when you look at
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: these numbers in two in nineteen to twenty, fifty five
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: percent of all jobs in tourism were located outside of Darwin,
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  Speaker 2: compared to the NT average of thirty eight percent. We
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  Speaker 2: also know that tourism provides invaluable social and economic benefits
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  Speaker 2: to our regions and pre COVID nineteen, the tourism industry
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  Speaker 2: generated that tax revenue to government of four hundred and
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  Speaker 2: twenty seven million dollars growing at four point nine percent
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  Speaker 2: since two thousand and eleven. I mean, we know based
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: on these figures what tourism does for the Northern territory,
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  Speaker 2: So how do we need to get back there and
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  Speaker 2: what do we need to do.
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  Speaker 3: We need to have confidence that investing in marketing the
• 3:41
  Speaker 3: territory at a domestic and an international level will bring returns.
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  Speaker 3: So from a government level, we're asking the government to
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  Speaker 3: commit to because it's treasury planning time right now, fifty
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  Speaker 3: five million dollars, which is less than two and a
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  Speaker 3: half percent, less than two and a half percent of
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  Speaker 3: the two thousand nine teen income tourism generated, which is
• 4:01
  Speaker 3: two point six billion dollars. If we can invest that
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  Speaker 3: over the next five years, we feel that there's a
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  Speaker 3: couple of game changes that will be over the next
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  Speaker 3: four years, A couple of game changes in that that
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  Speaker 3: we would be able to see on the other side,
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  Speaker 3: and that means not only more jobs for territorians and
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  Speaker 3: that employment stats a really great stat that we talk
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  Speaker 3: that we found in This was something that I have
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  Speaker 3: to confess I didn't say because we often think about tourism.
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  Speaker 3: I had the majority of jobs will be in Darwin
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  Speaker 3: and our Springs. But in fact, the majority of tourism
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  Speaker 3: employment happens outside of Darwin, and we know that once
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  Speaker 3: we get in into our regions and our communities, also
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  Speaker 3: that tourism employees are a far higher percentage of territories
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  Speaker 3: in the rest of Australia, particularly amongst Aboriginal territorians. So
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  Speaker 3: it supported the TERSI report that was commissioned by the
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  Speaker 3: government when we were going into this pandemic, and that
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  Speaker 3: found that tourism is the highest job potential creation amongst
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  Speaker 3: all sectors, in particular at outline Aboriginal cultural tourism opportunities
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  Speaker 3: both significant significant economic opportunities, and i'd say which is
• 5:08
  Speaker 3: the invaluable economic opportunities socially.
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  Speaker 2: And so Glenn obviously tourism operateds tourism top end. Really
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  Speaker 2: calling on the Northern Territory government to invest at fifty
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  Speaker 2: five million dollars per annum over four years. Like you've said,
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  Speaker 2: it's the equivalent to less than two point five percent
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  Speaker 2: of the Northern territories two point six billion dollar pre
• 5:28
  Speaker 2: COVID visitor economy. So I'm assuming that realistically, you know
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  Speaker 2: what the government has announced so far over the last
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  Speaker 2: week and a half it's really not going to be
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  Speaker 2: enough for us to bounce back.
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  Speaker 3: It's not. So what we talk about is some stop gap,
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  Speaker 3: welcomed stop gap. Important things are moving quickly, get the
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  Speaker 3: funding out, but that funding is up until the end adjourn.
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  Speaker 3: And if we think about it in a sense of
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  Speaker 3: when we as individuals are thinking about our international holidays
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  Speaker 3: and where we want to go, we're not thinking about well,
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  Speaker 3: possibly some of us are right at the moment, but
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  Speaker 3: in normal times we're thinking we're going to be next year,
• 6:05
  Speaker 3: in the year after, yeah, thinking about those places we
• 6:07
  Speaker 3: want to travel to. That's how people in the in
• 6:10
  Speaker 3: Europe and America think about their travel when they come
• 6:14
  Speaker 3: thinking about Australia, and in particular when they're thinking at
• 6:16
  Speaker 3: that time, we need the territory to be on their
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  Speaker 3: agenda front and center.
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  Speaker 2: Well, especially when you're talking about no overseas holiday. You know,
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  Speaker 2: not many of us have the money to just be
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: able to go, Oh, next month, I'm going to go
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: to you know, to Europe, or next month if you
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: live in Europe, I'm going to go to Australia.
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  Speaker 1: It's something that you've got to plan for some time.
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  Speaker 2: Are we as attractive as what we used to be
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  Speaker 2: to those European and other countries, you know, even the
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  Speaker 2: likes of America. I know that in some cases they
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  Speaker 2: sort of refer to us as being like a fortress.
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  Speaker 3: Right now, I think we are. I think I think
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  Speaker 3: we've got a particularly good brand. We maintained a good
• 6:53
  Speaker 3: brand internationally. I think, you know, if we think about
• 6:59
  Speaker 3: as a federal when they put travel bands or travel
• 7:02
  Speaker 3: advices on certain destinations six months ago, and could we
• 7:06
  Speaker 3: name those places at six months ago that was named
• 7:08
  Speaker 3: for No, these things will come and go. If we
• 7:11
  Speaker 3: think about the in relation to the pandemic, true Australia,
• 7:16
  Speaker 3: we're still one of the most highly sought after destinations
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  Speaker 3: in Australia. The challenge we've got as a territory is
• 7:23
  Speaker 3: we're being outspent big time by Victoria, like Queensland, by
• 7:29
  Speaker 3: New South Wales. And through working with PwC through this
• 7:32
  Speaker 3: project over the last few months, there's some of the
• 7:35
  Speaker 3: stats that we were seeing from other states. Every time
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  Speaker 3: I saw the next version or the next input of
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  Speaker 3: data that it changed again. Just two weeks ago, Queensland
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  Speaker 3: government announced a two hundred million dollar fund just to
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  Speaker 3: attract international planes to Queensland. Yeah, the million dollars.
• 7:53
  Speaker 2: Zaia not market around in Queensland. There's no doubt about that, Glenn.
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  Speaker 2: What is going to happen if we don't see so
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  Speaker 2: serious investment in this space.
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  Speaker 3: Well we'll be left behind as a destination will be
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  Speaker 3: we will be having to find different ways of funding
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  Speaker 3: infrastructure in the territory. Now four hundred and twenty seven
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  Speaker 3: million dollars was this the research found was raised by tourism,
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  Speaker 3: by tourists. By tourists coming here to the territory and
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  Speaker 3: spending their money and having a great time employing locals.
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  Speaker 3: That tax generated was four hundred and twenty seven million dollars.
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  Speaker 3: That's going to that now comes back into the territory
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  Speaker 3: for schools, roads, hospitals. The more tourists that come to
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  Speaker 3: the territory, the less tax territorians have to pay for
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  Speaker 3: us to enjoy the facilities we got. We've seen in
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  Speaker 3: the last week this great new development down at Waterfront
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  Speaker 3: potential right for locals to enjoy that. We need tourists
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  Speaker 3: and that's a really good example of what needs to happen.
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  Speaker 3: So not funding tourism means we fall behind, not only
• 9:00
  Speaker 3: in employment of people and tour operators, but as territorians,
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  Speaker 3: the livability of our destination, of our place and where
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  Speaker 3: we love fall behind the roads, the infrastructure around national
• 9:12
  Speaker 3: parks as well things like that.
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: Well, Glenn Henley, we are going to have to leave
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  Speaker 1: it there.
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  Speaker 2: I always, I always appreciate your time and enjoy our discussions.
• 9:21
  Speaker 2: We will talk more about this, and thank you so
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  Speaker 2: very much for making us aware of this research.
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  Speaker 1: And let's see where the government goes with that. Great
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: thank you, thank you, Thanks Glenn.