VTIC warns tourism will “crash and burn” without sustained support

REGIONAL Victorian tourist operators will welcome the latest tranche of funding help, according to the Victorian Tourism Industry Council (VTIC), but businesses will “crash and burn” without a sustained support package.

On Sunday, the federal and state governments announced a $146.6 million initiative following the extension of Melbourne’s COVID-19 lockdown to regional Victoria, with the grants to be paid to about 20,000 regional businesses automatically without the need for them to make an application.

VTIC president Felicia Mariani said the spending was welcome relief, but the situation was “dire” and all governments needed to work together to deliver the same kind of support on offer during the height of the pandemic in 2020.

“This cycle of rolling in and out of lockdown, and in between contending with severe operating restrictions, has decimated our critical tourism, hospitality and events industry and without consistent support to the end of the year we will see many businesses crash and burn,” she said.

“Support packages linked to designated hotspots and mandated lockdowns are vital but without the safety of a sustained wage subsidy program, as was in place during 2020, many businesses will not be able to see out the rest of year as they try to navigate shutdowns and limited operations.

“These businesses are out of resources and out of hope, and need to see a major step-change to the level of support to sustain them.”

Tourism Greater Geelong and the Bellarine executive director Brett Ince said his organisation, as well as all of Victoria’s other regional tourism boards, backed VTIC’s proposal.

“In Victoria, we are losing $1.34 billion per month from the loss of domestic tourism spend alone,” he said.

“Worse yet, to the end of June, it’s estimated that we’ve lost 156,000 direct jobs from our sector.

“We realise that these disruptions are part of our world until we can escalate the vaccination rates to hit the 70-80 per cent threshold targets agreed by National Cabinet.

“All governments have acknowledged that Delta has changed everything we thought we knew about COVID, and we now need to see a national response of business support to include wage subsidy support similar to JobKeeper in 2020.”