BUDGET WE HAD TO HAVE

THE Roman statesmen Cicero famously said “while there’s life, there's hope”.

This was the apparent theme of Mayor Tom Tate’s ninth Gold Coast budget which he brought down yesterday, promising relief from the devastation of COVID-19.

Presented at the Evandale chambers yesterday to the 2014 song Rather Be, the budget presented a rosy road back to prosperity for a city which has been shaken to its core by the sudden and dramatic changes in fortune wrought by coronavirus.

It’s major measures include:

● $35 million to finish the HOTA art gallery. ● $8.9 million for planning and delivery of light rail stage 3

● $1.75 million for the commencement of planning for light rail stage 4.

● $586,000 for the deliver of the music action plan.

● $8.2 million for the design completion and construction of Robina City Parklands

● $9.3 million Major Events Gold Coast, the city’s new events body.

Gone were controversial items like an offshore cruise ship terminal on The Spit and the cableway in the hinterland.

On top of the rates freeze, it is by anyone’s reasoning, a solid budget.

This was a no-frills, no-thrills budget which delivers on the promise of a back-tobasics fiscal plan which will lay the foundations for the city’s post-COVID revival.

But it is clear Cr Tate and his team are setting the scene to keep the positive blue sky thinking going and bring life back to the city once the immediate COVID-19 crisis passes. The Gold Coast’s population was growing at record rates before the pandemic forced the closure of borders and social distancing.

Cr Tate is confident the love of the Glitter Strip lifestyle is still there and has only grown in recent months as people have been trapped in their homes. Now that the foundations have been laid for getting our city through the next year and creating hope, city leaders will have one on bringing life back, first through re-establishing migration, and eventually through tourism.

Eyebrows were raised yesterday when it was revealed Destination Gold Coast's pleas for $4 million of extra funding had fallen on deaf ears.

While the tourism body had maintained its $15.5 million funding, it had expected to get the funding to better market the city.

What they were not expecting was the tongue-lashing from Cr Tate who criticised the organisations initial presentation as “underwhelming”. The decision to hold off on tourism was justified as pragmatism writ large, given international tourism will not resume until next year. To their credit, tourism bosses took the funding snub and verbal on the chin — leaving Chamber boss Martin Hall to say a few words in response on their behalf.

It is not in question that when warranted, the city is going to need to support Destination Gold Coast to the hilt. But yesterday’s bold move by Cr Tate and his councillors will give tourism leaders time to regroup and develop an in-depth plan for how to market the city and revive our biggest industry, which has lost more than $4.3 billion in the past six months, leaving the Gold Coast’s economy on life support.

To paraphrase Paul Keating, this was the budget the Gold Coast had to have