The last week has been a very long one for those who don’t follow the AFL or the West Coast Eagles in Western Australia. (Our name should tell you that we clearly don’t!) You would think that nothing else had happened in Australia, let alone in this great state. Everywhere you look there has been reflected glory in the team’s success. Maybe it sells newspapers, maybe it pulls in a few hundred extra viewers, but surely 48 hours after the game, which is all it is, is now part of history and we move on?
It has come as no surprise that there are those who will use the team’s success to justify their own positions.
Anyone who has followed the development of Optus Stadium will know just how the stadium development was hijacked by Australian Rules Football, and hopefully in years to come we may be given a clearer picture of some of the details that saw what was supposed to be a multi-purpose stadium, become predominantly a new stadium for Australian Rules Football. One that will to be fair also host the odd major cricket, rugby, and football match.
There is no doubt the stadium is fantastic. There is also no doubt that being a modern stadium with far better views of the action it will attract more people to attend games than the old Subiaco Oval, which was well past its use by date.
It was interesting to read this week in the West Australian an Opinion piece written by the Tourism Council of Western Australia’s Chief Executive Evan Hall, claiming that the the Tourism Council told the Government that their economic research in 2014 “showed 38,000 out-of-State AFL visitors across the entire AFL season (not including finals) would generate $117 million in economic output and create 550 full-time equivalent jobs. At this rate, the economic return of AFL tourism to the State will cover the cost of the stadium in a little over 10 years.”
These are impressive figures and also impressive claims.
Mr Hall went on to state in his article that “for every AFL match, 6000 seats are set aside for general admission and 1000 seats are set aside for tourism packages. The stadium’s extra seating capacity, and this open availability of tickets, has allowed tens of thousands of regional West Australians and interstate visitors to visit Perth and experience an AFL match here for the first time. The tourism industry worked with Optus Stadium to develop affordable packages for interstate visitors.”
He did concede that for AFL tourism to be a success it required Tourism WA to come up with an “extremely effective marketing campaign” and that “AFL tourism is driven by great footy.” A clever move as the Tourism Council of WA is sponsored, therefore part funded by Tourism Western Australia. It may also be worth mentioning the Crown is another sponsor and they would no doubt benefit from such a promotion. It is questionable how the other 1499 members of the Tourism Council will benefit to the same extent.
Yet as we wrote in our 2017 piece “It Doesn’t Add Up” there is again a huge coincidence in relation to the claims being made.
In March 2018 the new Chair of Tourism Western Australia, Nathan Harding announced an Action Plan to attract tourists to Western Australia. He was quoted as saying at the time, “The action plan has a big focus on attracting more visitors from the east coast, with measures including an AFL tourism strategy to attract 18,000 additional people.”
In his Opinion piece Mr Hall declares that “Tourism Council WA conservatively estimates those matches – 14 AFL Matches at Optus Stadium – secured more than 20,000 additional visitors to WA.”
Note that this his 20,000 figure is just an estimate. It is however funny how the figure almost perfectly corresponds with Mr Harding’s prediction.
Mr Hall may be challenging Nostradamus when it comes to predictions as he also stated “we confidently expect to have attracted more than 35,000 visitors by the end of the season.” It is amazing how close that is to his prediction of 38,000 of 4 years ago. If they finally publish a figure of 35,000 this would equate to 1400 interstate visitors at each of the 25 games played at Optus Stadium by the Dockers and the Eagles in 2018.
It is just like when Manchester United visited Sydney in 2013 and played an A-League All Stars side, the prediction by those who coughed up the $3million to bring the team over – the New South Wales Government – was that the game would generate $16million for New South Wales. The game was held on Saturday night and on Monday morning it was revealed that the game had done just that, generated $16million to the economy.
Of course that justified those who made the decision to spend $3million on bringing Manchester United to Sydney. Just as the figures being quoted in this piece justify the Stadium being skewed more to use for Australian Rules Football than any other sport.
Sadly none of the media outlets in Perth have asked for proof of these claims that Western Australia has actually attracted 18-20,000 AFL fans from interstate to Optus Stadium. Based on the 14 games he mentioned in his piece that means that there were on average over 1250 interstate fans per game.
Having made a few basic enquiries Not the Footy Show has been unable to establish that there were any questionnaires given to arriving passengers at Perth Airport on the weekend prior to a games. One would have thought that would have been quite easy to arrange as Perth Airport is another sponsor of the Tourism Council of WA. There also does not appear to have been anybody collecting data outside the stadium on a match day, asking fans where they have come from, and if they are from out of Perth how long they are staying, and where they are staying. So where do these figures come from?
If they are correct, then maybe they can also advise where the 550 new jobs have been or will be created, whether these are full time or part time positions and in what industry sectors.
There is no doubt that having World class venues attracts world class events. The Perth Arena is a prime example of that. They pull in the big name music acts on their world tours because the management of these acts know that the venue is of the highest quality, and that it will showcase the act or star.
What does seem strange is that Australia, and in particular it’s Politicians continue to promote sporting events as a way of boosting the economy, while other countries around the world are now shying away from such a path.
Take the 2022 and 2026 Winter Olympics Boston, Budapest, Davos, Hamburg, Krakow, Munich, Rome and Stockholm all withdrew from the bidding process. A lack of candidates meant that the 2022 Winter Olympics was awarded to Beijing. This is a city with little or no reputation for Winter Sports. In 2017 London pulled out of hosting the start of the Tour de France, at a time when the Tour de France has become one of the best rating televised sporting events. Düsseldorf stepped in to replace them.
In fact if you look at the current trends, it is the emerging nations who are the ones looking to host major sporting events, the reason being it helps boost their position on a Global scale. Is Australia an emerging nation?These emerging nations are prepared to take the losses that come with hosting major sporting events in order to gain recognition globally.
If you look at the FIFA World Cup, this statement is backed up by the fact that all four World Cups from 2010-2022 will be hosted by a developing nation.
Those who follow such things will argue that the Olympics are however being hosted by strong established nations and cities, Tokyo, Paris and Los Angeles. That is very true.
The interesting thing in relation to the Olympic Games is that the International Olympic Committee recognised the declining appeal of hosting the Olympics, and came up with the Olympic Agenda 2020. This document was produced to provide bidding cities with a less complex bidding process and also put forward cost-saving measures. They also changed the bidding process by naming the hosts for two consecutive Olympics at the same time. The reason given was to give bidders more preparation time.
In addition they have been handing out concessions. Both Paris and Los Angeles were allowed to determine the exact timing of the event. There was no time dictated by the IOC. They also, it was reported, offered US$1.8 billion to the LA organising committee.
The global trend is no longer to host major sporting events for bragging rights, as the real facts show that few return a profit, and few economies can justify the risk. As mentioned, only those with the deepest pockets, such as Russia and Qatar, who do not need to turn a profit, put their hands up in order to have a stronger voice when it comes to global affairs.
Those with their finger on the pulse of the economics of sport will tell you that the world has changed. The economic world is far more fragile following the global financial crisis. In a more localised way in Western Australia the same is true following the mining boom. Adding to that fragility is the growing inequality when it comes to the distribution of wealth and incomes. Look at the salaries of sporting CEO’s and the fees being paid by juniors to participate for more proof. Not surprisingly this inequality has had a huge impact when it comes to sporting events. The man on the street has in many cases been priced out of going to watch his local team play. No longer can families afford to go and watch local sport every week. This is of course an opportunity for second tier sports, but one that they have yet to seize upon.
If families and individuals are doing it tough in day-to-day life, and cannot afford to watch their local team play it is understandable that they will be cynical when it comes to hosting major sporting projects which need vast funding and also the erection of new sporting facilities.
History has shown with many of the major events that there is often no genuine guarantee of any major discernible benefits to taxpayers. Understandably in these tough economic times they want to see proof to back up the claims of the Politicians and those with vested interests. It is time in Australia that more people started to question the figures that are thrown around, look at how often the outcomes match the predictions almost perfectly. Are these people so good at their jobs that their predictions are always so accurate? Or are the simply giving people the numbers they think they want to hear?
Tom Cruise’s film character Jerry Maguire famously said “Show me the money,” It is time that the public were shown just how much these events cost, and hard and fast facts on what the financial return on investment is. Yet if you ask those who follow the economics of sport it is very hard to gauge as there is no official way of recording how long people stay in a city when attending a sporting event or of knowing where they go.
However the biggest reason we need more information is because in Australia our politicians appear to be bucking a global trend.
This is another example of the West being a propaganda machine for people. It is a disgusting rag. The standard of journalism is lower than that of the University Prosh magazine. There should be a Government enquiry into how many “journalists” have cozy relationships with key people in certain industries and as a result only ever write propaganda about them. Of course there will never be an enquiry because the Politicians enjoy the same sort of relationships with certain people at this excuse for a news- paper. Keep exposing them please. Your website is a far better read.