Page 939 - Week 06 - Wednesday, 26 July 1989
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think we have tried to do an impartial job and look at the benefits for and the costs against such a development.
I would like to remind members of the terms of reference of our inquiry, the first of which was to determine and report on "the extent to which...a casino may be expected to contribute to Territory revenue having regard to revenue received by State and Territory Governments from casinos established in the respective States and Northern Territory". A lot of people do not seem to realise that in talking of a casino we are talking about a substantial revenue raiser. Apart from the ongoing revenue that would be received in the first year of operations of a casino - an estimated $5.4m - there are also the other revenues and benefits which would flow to the community from just the building of a complex of the type we are talking about on section 19. In the construction phase alone we are talking about 2,700 jobs being required to build the proposed development on section 19. That is an enormous input into the Canberra community - 2,700 jobs - and we all know that the Canberra economy at this stage is in need of a push of some kind. Whether it is the Museum of Australia or other proposed developments, the fact remains that this proposal will provide those jobs. When the casino and hotel complex is operational, we are talking about 1,800 jobs. Not all of them will be full time; we believe it would be in the order of two-thirds - 1,200 full-time jobs and 600 part-time. That seems to be the mix of jobs that a casino-hotel complex operates on.
In the Canberra community which has severe and grave doubts about the ability to provide jobs to our school leavers, these are factors which have to be taken into account. Those, of course, have a flow-on in regard to revenue for the Government right through the Canberra economy. So there is no doubt about the fact that a casino-hotel development in the Territory will have a substantial impact on Territory revenue.
The second item we had to look at was the practicability and desirability of locating any casino in Canberra at a site in Canberra other than on section 19 and the revenue implications of so doing. The committee looked at a number of sites, as this report clearly spells out. I think it goes without saying that there is no question, in my mind anyway, that section 19 is clearly the most appropriate place to place a casino in Canberra. Other sites simply could not match the benefits that would accrue from having a development like this placed on section 19.
There are reasons for that which the report clearly spells out, but I will simply go through some of them shortly. The simple situation is that the revenue implications of having this development placed on any other site are mainly common sense when you think about it. It is a prime site and if the casino and hotel development was to be placed elsewhere in the city the premium to be paid by the developer would simply not match that to be gained from placing the development on section 19.
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