Tasmanian tourism operators are fearing for the future of their businesses as the impacts of interstate lockdowns and state border restrictions take hold, with hundreds of operators predicting severe impacts.
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The Tourism Industry Council of Tasmania sent a survey to 400 tourism operators across the state, asking what impacts the current NSW and Victorian lockdowns would have on their business.
Half the respondents predicted they would lose more than 50 per cent of their bookings and future business activity, while almost 30 per cent said they would be forced to reduce staff levels over the next few weeks.
TICT chief executive Luke Martin said preliminary discussions with government had raised business cost assistance as a key priority, such as help with energy bills, licence fees and vehicle registrations.
Other options such as the return of free travel vouchers had also been discussed by industry.
Fingers crossed that Victoria is able to open sooner rather than later and then we can look at what we do to restart that market, but if they stay closed we are obviously going to do what we can to activate the Tasmanian market.
- TICT chief Luke Martin
A government spokesman would not comment on vouchers, but said border closures were known to have a significant impact on industry.
"We are working closely with [industry] on what we can do to help moving forward."
Mr Martin said high tourism demand over the last few months would sustain businesses for a short period, but after that, the situation was dire.
He said the absence of Job Keeper would make things harder this time around, adding that everything depended on how border restrictions progressed.
"We are looking at 80 percent of our market being closed, for potentially months. If it continues into the end of September and into October then clearly there will need to be some kind of business support," Mr Martin said.
In the event that the interstate markets remain closed TICT executive Luke Martin said the return of free travel vouchers to stimulate local travel was a good option, and free car fares on the Spirit attracted Victorians.
"We know that travel vouchers worked for the Tasmanian intrastate market, and free car fares on the Spirit worked for the Victorian market. When Victoria is given the green light we will certainly be encouraging these again."
West by North West executive Tom Wootton said he would fully support the return of free government travel vouchers to stimulate local travel.
"The silver lining is that more Tasmanians are visiting our region than was previously the case, and that has softened the blow somewhat ... it seems to me that providing Tasmanians with travel vouchers is a fantastic lever to pull, when the situation warrants," he said.
"I believe the spend ratio on the last program was approximately $5 for every $1 voucher redeemed. That makes it a great example of government stimulating public spending to support our industry, instead of the government wearing the cost."
The first round of free vouchers, worth $7.5 million, was fully subscribed within 40 minutes of opening earlier this month, and a second round worth $5 million was also offered.
