Building a 65,000 seat football stadium at Belmont Park and growing expertise in resource education are among Jeff Kennett's suggestions for how the state can grow its tourism industry.
Building a 65,000 seat football stadium at Belmont Park and growing expertise in resource education are among Jeff Kennett's suggestions for how the state can grow its tourism industry.
Speaking at a Tourism Council WA luncheon today on the topic of how Victoria's success in reinventing itself can be applied to create tourism success in the west, the former Victorian premier said WA needn't emulate Victoria.
"Perth is a city that is changing, Perth is a city that has a different face to market," he said.
"It would be wrong to think what we are doing in Victoria is right for Western Australia."
At the top of Mr Kennett's suggestions for WA was to abort the redevelopment of the former Subiaco oval (now Patersons Stadium) in favour of developing a 60,000 - 65,000 stadium at the site of the Belmont Racetrack.
As it stands the incapacity for Patersons Stadium to cater to eastern states AFL team members stops tourists visiting WA Mr Kennett said.
"I will leave you with the message that perhaps the biggest major event you have is AFL Football for 22 weeks of the year - do something with it," he said.
Mr Kennett suggested there are 4 other integral elements in developing Western Australian tourism; developing a long term blue print for the city and committing to infrastructure, amalgamating local councils and identifying what the major markets (Asia and the eastern states) want and then offering it and developing an expertise in education for the resources sector.
"I don't come in here today with any wand...but to me it is not difficult.
"I would ask you all not to be so short sighted, so that you worry about what is happening today or 12 months from now. Develop the blue print for 40-50 years.
"Commit yourself to the infrastructure, identify how it is going to be funded, understand what your overseas markets want quite clearly and feed that back to them in promotion.
"Trading hours you have under way, amalgamation of councils - you still have to bite the bullet, the opportunity for a new stadium at a Greenfields site that draws people from the east, and the value of education," he added.
He said establishing working partnerships with tourism industry leaders that had clout among not only the industry but the broader community would lead to a consultative plan that was forward planning.
He drew on the mistakes of the Perth Convention Exhibition Centre in planning.
"I will never get over the officer in charge of the convention centre approving a loading bay that faces the water," he said of the views going to waste.
He did however note that development in Perth is going well, with extended trading hours important to this; he also noted the advent of 30-odd small bars was integral to Perth's development of a multicultural and cosmopolitan city.
"You ask me if I see a change in Perth, the answer is I do," he said of the changes in Perth's cultural landscape.
Mr Kennett highlighted four other considerable points in developing WA tourism; with education high on the agenda.
"The reality is, mining is going to give the rest of community the resources it requires to serve citizens well," he said.
By developing specialty education programs in the field of mining, Mr Kennett said WA could establish itself as an educational Mecca for mining.
"If I had a say, I would like to see this investment in education, in the area of mining, become an integral part of tourism. If you want to have the best education in mining in the world, there is only one place to go, that's Western Australia, Australia," he said.
It is so important to your long term success, there are so many people coming here to work, the last thing you want is people going away and saying, great job, terrible place to live.
His last piece of advice was for the state to not cower in the face of critics of a state development plan.
"Make sure you don't give into the minority who try to slow down or stop Perth becoming a vibrant city. The often-times controversial politician said having a plan for the future was vital and governments needed to establish a collaborative plan for infrastructure development in WA, not focused on the now, but 2050 - 2060.
