Tourism Australia cuts 20 jobs at Sydney offices

With the recent Federal budget having reduced its funding, Tourism Australia is understood to have cut 20 roles from its Sydney-based marketing team.

The reduction of what is believed to be around 10% of its staff team follows the agency’s budget being cut to $169.1 million in 2023/24, down from $208 million in the current financial year, which Australian Treasurer Jim Chalmers attributed to “the end of COVID-related additional tourism marketing campaigns as international travel resumed.”

This message was repeated today by a Tourism Australia spokesperson who told media “with the return of international travel more than a year ago, Tourism Australia has continued to ramp up its efforts towards attracting visitors to Australia from overseas and rebuilding our visitor economy.

“We continue to work through how we best resource our business to maximise the opportunities to grow demand and convert that demand to visitation to Australia.”

However, the spokesperson went on to claim “structural changes were being made to our Sydney operations which do involve some redundancies”.

A number of the staff being made redundant recently worked at Australian Tourism Exchange 2023 on the Gold Coast and had a role in Tourism Australia’s latest campaign, a $120 million video titled, ‘Come and say G’Day’.

The global marketing campaign, launched at the end of 2022, featured a computer-generated kangaroo named Ruby as Australia’s brand ambassador.

Speaking at the National Press Club on Thursday, Federal Minister for Trade and Tourism, Don Farrell made no mention of the redundancies said the tourism economy would, “continue to be a driver of Australian prosperity.”

Senator Farrell noted “the pandemic restrictions have shown us clearly that the movement of people holds the same strategic and economic value as the movement of goods and services.

“That’s why in tourism - one of our largest services exports pre-COVID - we’re supporting major events and visitors to return.”

Equally, Tourism Australia Managing Director Phillipa ‘Pip’ Harrison made no mention of the cuts at Tourism and Transport Forum (TTF) Australia’s Outlook Conference in Sydney yesterday.

Images: Tourism Australia Managing Director Pip Harrison (top) and Ruby, the computer-generated kangaroo and star of Tourism Australia’s latest global marketing campaign (below).