Tourism Port Douglas and Daintree is disturbed by slashes to the State Government’s tourism budget.

In the latest state budget Tourism and Events Queensland (TEQ) funding has been reduced by about $20 million - from $111 million the previous budget to $91 million in the 2014-2015 period. 

The reduction has been met with worry by Tourism Port Douglas and Daintree executive officer Tara Bennet, who said reductions to the tourism budget were ‘always disturbing’.

“It is very disappointing especially when we are working so hard to try and reach our 2020 targets for increasing visitor numbers and tourism income,” Ms Bennet said.

“TEQ heavily supports our region and operators up here also benefit enormously from their familiarisation programs.

“I have seen some of the briefing papers and there’s about $33.9 million left in the tourism budget for marketing tourism and events across the entire state - which is not a lot of money, not a lot of money at all. 

“The sad thing is that TEQ has been doing a very good job - the latest figures on growth in domestic and international visitors has been very impressive and we’d hate to see that go backwards.”

State Opposition leader Anastasia Palaszczuk blasted the government over the cuts, claiming they ‘kicked sand in the face’ of Queenslanders working in tourism. 

“Ripping 20 per cent from Tourism and Events Queensland threatens tourism jobs across the State and the reduction in marketing and promotion of Queensland will hurt the myriad of businesses which rely on holidaymakers,” Ms Palaszczuk said. 

“TEQ has been enormously successful and commands respect and admiration from the tourism sector and envy from its competitors.

“Why is it ok for the LNP to spend up to $20 million on taxpayer funded political propaganda for their asset sales campaign, while the tourism sector has to do without?”

The Newman Government identified tourism as one of the Four Pillars of the Queensland economy when it took office in 2011.

State Touism minister Jann Stuckey said her government was still committed to developing tourism in Queensland. 

“The Government is delivering on its promise to grow tourism as one of the four pillars of the economy through continued strong support for tourism marketing campaigns and vibrant events programs,” she said. 

“We will continue the positive momentum gained over the past two years with Tourism and Events Queensland receiving funding of $98.7 million for 2014?15.

“To date the Government has allocated an additional $49.5 million for Tourism and Events Queensland across three years that was not in the forward estimates when our Government took office.”