Hold fire on tourism body
Grant’s warning to state
FORMER Geelong tourism boss Roger Grant has warned the State Government to be “very careful” about consolidating regional tourism boards, but believes the city’s work over the past 25 years will save it from the chop.
The former executive director of Tourism Greater Geelong and the Bellarine, who now offers tourism consultancy after retiring from the role, made the comments in the wake of recommendations of the Victorian Tourism Industry Council.
VTIC has delivered several recommendations to the State Government in a bid to improve regional tourism, including some suggesting a change of structure could give the industry a boost.
Mr Grant said it was fair to consider the future of some regional tourism authorities that were not viable.
“The real key to any structural change is to not throw the baby out with the bathwater, so they have to be very careful that the organisations that are doing very well, that are well structured, well supported by industry and have great partnerships with local government, like TGGB, that they’re not compromised by any structural change,” he said.
“At the moment you’ve probably got too many regional tourism boards that aren’t viable. They don’t get the same level of support TGGB gets from local government, and consequently there’s some parts of the state that have a pretty complex capacity because of a lack of funding partners, but that’s not the case for TGGB.”
Mr Grant hoped the review addressed the underfunding of regional tourism in Victoria.
“By comparison to any other state organisation, the state undervalues and undersupports regional tourism. They’re saying: ‘Well we’ve got budget constraints, maybe the best way to achieve efficiency is through consolidation,’ ” he said. “That may be OK in some parts, but Visit Victoria, the state agency, is an important but junior funding partner (for TGGB), particularly by comparison to CoGG
“The big advantage with the structure of TGGB is every cent the state puts in actually goes out into the marketplace and into the programs. It’s not absorbed by administration.
“Many other parts of the state don’t get as much support from industry and local government, so they’re reliant on a fairly mediocre amount of resources provided by the State Government to survive.”
VTIC chief executive Felicia Mariani said the recommendations provided a comprehensive and cohesive industry position on what was needed to keep regional tourism competitive.
While VTIC would like to see regional boards rationalised, Ms Mariani said the role of regional cities and the support and relationships they had developed with local government should be respected.