Tourism Australia's 'free lunch' job search slammed by union

An advert pinned up in a Canberra hostel calling for two young people to star in a video promotion for Tourism Australia that would have seen them paid in food only has drawn criticism from both media organisations and the general public.

The advertisement read "there is such thing as a free lunch.

“One male, one female on each day. Talent must be active, happy to do a lot of walking (wear good shoes!), able to ride a bike and confident in front of a camera.”

It asks for the pair to be available between 10am and 3pm on two days of the week.

It adds "while this is an unpaid activity, lunch will be provided each day and all activities are free of charge."

Although not an internal ad for Tourism Australia, the Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance shared it on Twitter with the caption, “Does 10 hours of work for a free lunch sound like a fair deal?”

Speaking to Yahoo News, a Tourism Australia spokesperson said the poster should not have been created as it “did not reflect its normal practices around the use of talent”.

The spokesperson added "this is only something we became aware of on Tuesday night. We immediately asked for the poster to be removed

“The request is certainly not in line with our normal social media team practice and was a one-off mistake. It has been our long-held practice that talent involved in shoots are paid for their work.”

No applications had been received.

Tourism Australia’s promotion of the annual Australian Tourism Exchange in Perth last week has also been viewed as being a failure, with the event capturing little media interest.

The event also used unpaid TAFE tourism students for roles ranging from event officers to delegate experience officers.