We acknowledge Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the First Peoples and the Traditional Custodians of Ngunnawal Country, the land on which we meet today. We pay our respects to Elders past, present and emerging, and also recognise any other people or families with connection to the ACT and Region.
Jonathan Kobus, Director of VisitCanberra, opened the forum.
Jonathan reminded us to get along to Floriade from 16 September to 15 October, its expected to be one of the best in years.
- Nightfest will feature a Speigeltent.
- Invite your family and friends.
- 427,000 people attended last year, with $52 million contributed to the ACT economy.
VisitCBR is hosting a morning session post-Floriade, speaking about domestic and international campaigns. Date to be confirmed.
James Goodwin, CEO Australian Airports Association (AAA)
James spoke about recent news coverage covering aviation, and what goes on 'behind the headlines'.
The AAA is the national voice that represents more than 340 airports and aerodromes Australia wide – from the local country community landing strip to major international gateway airports.
Situation report
- Domestic travel is almost back to pre-pandemic levels, but international passenger movements are still down 20% compared to pre-pandemic.
- Full recovery is expected in 2024 for domestic and 2025 for international.
- We don't yet know the 'new normal' is vis a vis environmental concerns and the impact of online meetings.
Canberra - Sydney route
Canberra to Sydney is Qantas' most cancelled domestic route, which reduces national and international connectivity.
- In July, 52 of Qantas' Canberra to Sydney flights were cancelled, compared to nine Virgin flights.
- The statistics for the past six months reveal similar figures for Qantas. It has be argued these are planned cancellations, used to secure landing slots at Sydney airport. Qantas is facing legal action over similar cancellations internationally.
- While there's always another flight, it impacts the time advantage of flying over driving. An extra hour in the airport means you could have driven to Sydney.
- The impacts on tourism goes further - cancelled flights impacts reservations and missed business meetings. It has social and economic impacts for our territory.
- Additionally, airfares to and from Canberra continue to remain high.
Qatar Airways
- James gave some background on the Government's recent decision to reject a bid by Qatar Airways to add 21 weekly flights to the 28 it already operates between Europe and Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne.
- This has a significant impact on tourism and flight prices, and the travel industry and consumer rights groups have accused the Government of protectionism in favor of Qantas.
"Instead, we should be rolling out the red carpet for any international airline who wants to fly here."
- International air rights are managed under Air Transport Agreements. The rejection of Qatar Airway's bid sends a bad message about dealing with Australia and negotiating future agreements.
- Under the enhanced regional package, Qatar was flying to Canberra. While it would be ideal to have them back, we need to understand the national impact of this decision.
What is the value proposition to expanded flights for Qatar Airways?
- Air freight - most air freight is in the belly of passenger aircrafts. Our local goods can be shipped out of the ACT on these planes.
- There's also the obvious benefit of being able to bring in tourists.
- Even without an international link to Canberra airport, more international travel benefits us. 30% of people who book a domestic flight, are international visitors. They'll fly into Sydney and then onwards.
Tourism and aviation working together
Tourism and aviation need to work closer together. Lower airfares, freight, and more connectivity benefits us both.
- We also need to break the hold Qantas has, with their recent planned cancellations and the denial of Qatar airways showing the extent of their influence.
- 95% of domestic routes are covered by Qantas and Virgin, 66% of those are Qantas.
Recommendations:
- The Aviation White Paper will be released in September. James encouraged attendees to speak up and share their opinion on this when it is released.
- How Sydney Airport allocates landing slots needs to be more flexible. Currently, there's an 80.20 rule, if an airline uses their landing slot 80% of the time, they can keep it. James' suggests it should be higher - more like 90%. For example, Bonza cannot land into Sydney at the moment.
The tourism sector must speak up on issues like this.
Hidden Disability Guidance
New education offering from AAA, developed in partnership with Aspect (Autism Spectrum Australia). It covers:
- Hidden disability awareness – what is a hidden disability
- How to create inclusive environments
- Practical examples to support people with hidden disabilities
Attendees present at the Forum were offered a significantly reduced cost.
Question: Western Sydney international airport - will it be a threat to attracting international carriers to Canberra?
James Goodwin: There's opportunities and threats. Western Sydney Airport will be curfew-free, which is different to Mascot and an advantage.
However, connectivity is important, and we're yet to see which carriers will fly there and that disruption will continue as these airlines settle into using either Sydney Kingsford Smith Airport or Western Sydney.
Shane Rattenbury MLA, Leader of the ACT Greens and ACT Attorney General
Shane spoke on the ACT Tourism Strategy, the Drugs of Dependence (Personal Possession) Amendment Act 2022, and other topics impacting tourism and hospitality in the ACT.
The ACT Government released the ACT Tourism Strategy, setting an ambitious goal to expand the sector by 2030.
- Tourism is clearly a key provider of jobs and income in the ACT, with the strategy set to make it a $4 billion industry by 2030.
- 97% of our visitors last year were domestic - does this mean we look towards valuing domestic tourism, or attracting international visitors? Perhaps both.
- Shane noted that James' presentation offered some insight into the difficulties of getting international visitors here.
- Shane has recently been on a cycling tour, looking at local artworks he had seen before but never investigated. Its a small example of our value proposition - what is Canberra's story?
- Cost of living has seen pressure on discretionary spending, we're just hearing anecdotal evidence of this on hospitality. Are we going to see the drawback soon? Or perhaps it will be a boon for domestic travel, people wanting to stay closer to home.
- It highlights the need for diverse accomodation offerings - particularly family-friendly options.
Shane covered a number of other issues:
- Skills shortage and low rate of unemployment in the ACT: the Government is very aware of the difficulties in recruiting workers.
- Affordable accommodation: if you're in a lower-income job, Canberra is a tough place to live. What role does government have in fixing this? We cant keep pushing people out to the edges, causing time and travel poverty.
- Airbnb: it is evident people are using potential full-time rental properties as tourism rentals. It's taking accommodation from residents and causing less regulated competition for our hotels.
- ACT Heritage Council: the ACT Greens are reviewing the legislation and understanding its impact on tourism.
- ACT Food Strategy: the ACT Greens are setting a plan to grow and develop the food sector in Canberra.
- Convention Centre should be a priority for the ACT, over a stadium. Convention facilities will offer us more.
- Train to Sydney: We need a stronger focus on train connection to Sydney, its a desirable form of travel and Sydney is a huge market for us.
- Acton Waterfront consultation is open with the NCA until 22 September 2023. Please have your say.
- Support for small businesses to electrify and phase out gas: the ACT will electrify by 2045, phasing out gas. Gas is 22% of ACT's carbon emissions. In Canberra its mostly used for heating in large buildings, however small businesses are impacted too, and there's support available to transition.
- Eligible hospitality businesses can now apply to take part in the ACT Government’s Commercial Kitchen Trial.
ACT Election in 2024
The Greens are in policy development, Shane encouraged the audience to reach out if they have questions or thoughts.
Question: Will the Greens come out in support for a new Convention Centre? We've been talking about it since 2008 and the expected date is 2030s.
Shane Rattenbury MLA: "We've [ACT Greens] long supported the need for moving forward with a new convention center be able to ultimately release this site for other purposes...It is clear if we do not upgrade, we will be left behind. We are missing out on opportunities at the moment. We need to get on and do it."
Question: Last week, you said you were surprised about the introduction of the recent drug decriminalisation laws in the ACT?
Shane Rattenbury MLA: "It was more a question of timing. I think it's well known the Greens have long held the view that we want to see drug policy move from being a criminal justice issue to a health issue.
My observation last week simply was that through the last election in 2020 there wasn't a lot of public discussion about this, and generally the Greens have been castigated for being a bit too liberal on these things.
To see a Labor Party member come in and drop a private member's bill straight after the election that was not spoken about in the election campaign was the thing that caught me by surprise. I think if you're going to take something into parliament, you should take it to the election."
Question: The drug and alcohol court, is that working?
Shane Rattenbury MLA: It's successful. We see a lot of people committing crimes to support their addiction. These courts help them address those underlying reasons for offending.
While it seems 'soft' compared to jail, its quite hard work. But it has positive outcomes - none of the people who have graduated from the program, have re-offended.
Question: With the new drug decriminalisation laws, if there is a big increase in drug taking and crime, and that impacts on the tourism sector, will the legislation be reviewed?
Shane Rattenbury MLA: "We don't want to see people ending up in the criminal justice system because of personal drug use. And we want to see police capability focused at tackling those suppliers who really are the problematic people in this space.
ACT Policing have expressed their concerns, and we're monitoring with them to see how these changes go.
An important part of this reform is making sure that we provide the services to help people break their drug habits and get the support to rehabilitate.
Of course, if it goes horribly wrong, as with any piece of legislation, one needs to retain an open mind about whether we need to change direction, or whether we need to tweak things.
But I think the important thing is to give this a go. We have spent decades following the American model, and that hasn't worked."
Question: Any comments on the changes for how the Greens will now choose their leaders?
Shane Rattenbury MLA: "We've always prided ourselves on grassroots democracy so it's kind of a logical extension for us."
Neil Gaughan, ACT Chief Police Officer and Deputy AFP Commissioner
Neil spoke about changes in crime statistics and general policing efforts since he spoke at the Forum last year. Neil also gave a brief on the topical Drugs of Dependence (Personal Use) Amendment Act 2022.
In the ACT:
- We have seen a reduction in car thefts and theft from motor vehicles in the last 12 months.
- Following consultation with people in this room last year, we realised we had to put more focus on this area, so thank you.
- We've seen a fairly significant decrease in property crime and stolen motor vehicle crime is down 37% from this time last year. this is great for a smaller jurisdiction like the ACT.
Operation Toric - which targets recidivist offenders committing motor vehicle thefts, dangerous driving and other crimes in the ACT - has hit 300 apprehensions and 750 charges laid.
This follows a trend of property crime going down across Australia.
- There's less cash in houses and 'things to steal', so now the main things stolen are cars, jewelery and mobile phones.
- Unfortunately we see a continuation of bad driving habits.
- Since I last spoke, we've introduced online reporting in the last two months, and 200 people have used it. This was implemented after consultation with tourism leaders, for example people seeing crime in their carparks where a customer who lives interstate was a witness. This meant complainants were not reporting as they went home.
- You can report property damage, petrol drive-offs and collisions. Crimestoppers is still available.
ACT Policing's Aggravated Robbery and Burglary Prevention Booklet
Covers safety tips to minimise the incidence and impact of an aggravated robbery or burglary on businesses.
The booklet features a QR code leading to a video that covers the basics of safety and how the police work to prevent this.
Drugs of Dependence (Personal Use) Amendment Act 2022
The position of the ACT Police is that addiction should be treated as a health issue, these people should not end up in the criminal justice system.
- The Amendment covers most commonly known drugs up to approx. 1.5 grams.
- Msot drugs come from Sydney, via car. Our role is focusing on the groups and indviduals distributing these drugs.
- If someone is found in possession of these drugs, they can either pay a $100 fine or attend drug and alcohol counselling.
- Anyone dealing drugs, or in possession of over 1.5g will be dealt with as usual.
- You may have seen videos from the US, of states where drugs have been decrimalised. The ACT - and Australia more broadly - does not have the prescription drug or fentanyl reliance the US has. There have been no fentanyl seizures, this is probably due to the high profit associated with drug cost in Australia.
- The AFP are prepared for the drug reform, we're prepared for example, for Summernats, which may be an interesting period.
Question: We've been described as the 'cocaine capital' due to sewage results, are there a lot of drugs in the ACT?
Neil Gaughan: Yes, we do have high cocaine usage per population, but Sydney far outstrips us.
We saw a 20% increase in cannabis usage when it was decriminalised in 2020. We do believe we've seen saturation point though for the drugs being decriminalised, but only time will tell. The first wastewater testing will be in 2025.
Question: 1.5g is a lot, you said that was 15 hits?
Neil Gaughan: It is, and that's one of the issues we raised with the ACT Government. First we said 'don't do it', then we said just make it 0.7 grams, as street dealers don't carry much more for fear of being ripped off.
Question: if hotel staff find drug paraphernalia in a room, what should staff do?
Neil Gaughan: Personal use is not a priority for us. However, if there is any violence involved we will be there.
Question: What about concerns interstate visitors will be coming here to use drugs?
Neil Gaughan: It would be naive to assume this won't happen on some level. However, we won't know until it happens and we see the impacts of these changes.
We're more concerned that people don't know what decriminalisation means. It worries us that people will think it's legal, it's not legal, it still has a sanction to it, it's just that you're not going to go to court.
I've seen a lot in my almost 40 years in the police force, and I think I'll see some new things soon. In Civic and Braddon, my people will have to learn to be a bit more hands off.
David Marshall, Chair of the Leaders Forum Board, once again thanked the supporting partners who make this possible. Attendees can access special deals from our partners, on our website.
Final announcements
- The Royal Australian Mint has won two prizes at the international Coin of the Year awards. The Mint received awards for Best Circulating Coin for the 2022 $2 Honey Bee and the Most Artistic Coin for the 2022 Beauty Rich and Rare – Great Barrier Reef.
- The 'Know My Name, Making it Modern' exhibition is on until Sunday 8 October at the National Gallery.
Next forum Monday 9 October 2023.
Agenda:
- Alicia Payne MP, Chair of Joint Standing Committee on the National Capital and External Territories
- Chris Steel, ACT Minister for Canberra Transport and City Services, Minister for Tertiary Education and Multicultural Affairs
- Michael Milton, skier, cyclist, triathlete, world and Australian record holder, Paralympian and Olympian