Business by Jeremy Pierce
Premium Content The final fling of the summer holidays has delivered an estimated $300 million windfall to the Queensland economy. With Australia Day falling on a Tuesday, thousands of Queenslanders booked an extra day of annual leave - or took a good old-fashioned sickie - to create an epic four-day weekend ahead of the return to work and school today. It comes after promising signs that saw $2.7 billion pumped into the state s tourism industry during the September quarter, in another injection of good news for an industry left reeling by border closures and travel bans. From July to September, Queenslanders injected an average of $30 million a day into the state s tourism industry according to statistics released this month by Tourism Research Australia.
Two Coalition MPs urge further bailouts for Australia s Covid-hit tourism industry Paul Karp
Two Coalition MPs are calling for the Australian tourism industry to receive further bailouts after jobkeeper finishes in March because domestic holidaymakers can’t fill the void left by lost international revenue.
The assertion by Warren Entsch and Llew O’Brien is backed by the infrastructure department in its submission to a parliamentary inquiry on the future of aviation, which warned that domestic trips “tend to be shorter, lower yield and involve fewer activities”.
The submission also said the industry may suffer from fewer business trips and “a hesitation among holidaymakers and visiting friends and relatives to fly”.
The Echo titled
A short history of our rail line debate is anything but. It’s full of personal assumptions, rumours, guestimates, and lacks any research or accuracy. (
Echo 13/1)
There’s no comparison with the slow, once a day XPT train service with a light commuter train service providing public transport for locals and six million tourists. They are very different, as are the costs and benefits, but the writer doesn’t bother with this vital fact.
The claim that the community was slow to react to the Casino to Murwillumbah (C-M) branch line’s closure, ‘probably because of the branch lines trifling impact’ is contrary to all the evidence and shows the writer has no idea what he’s talking about, or is being dishonest.
Tony Rehal from Brisbane enjoys Fathers Day at the beach with his 5-year-old daughter Kyah at Mooloolaba. Picture: Lachie Millard The September quarter results comparison showed the Gold Coast had 463,000 visitors at an increase of 4.8 per cent, Tropical North Queensland had 436,000 visitors at an increase of 8.7 per cent. Brisbane, however, had more than 1 million intrastate visitors but the numbers were 8.2 per cent lower than 2019. Visit Sunshine Coast believes the results came from a targeted drive market for people within 300km of the region after the most lucrative markets in NSW, Victoria and South Australia were locked out. Visit Sunshine Coast CEO Matt Stoeckel said the policy of targeting an intrastate market had insulated the region from being the worst impacted by COVID-19.