$2.7 million grant for koala research facility reallocated for Steel Taipan construction

[StingRay]

7 minutes ago, Naazon said:

Can someone clear this up for me? the $3m was a grant right? doesn't need to be paid back? Village $70mill was a loan? and DW $67million was a loan also? (numbers rounded) Is that right?

I also have no opinion on this, I just pay my taxes, use services available to me and like theme parks. 

I'm not entirely sure about the VRTP loan. That's a little confusing because they were given around $30 million for SW and other amounts before covid. 

From what I understand (without using the Google machine) both company have loans that are of very high value. Your figures however could be right. 

[New display name]

There was definitely other grants given to both companies under the Tourism Icons program.  The loans given to the parks was given out after the grants ran out.   We should also not forget the cheap and free tickets you could get under different schemes.

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

11 hours ago, joz said:

My point in pointing this out isn't to cry unfair, but to point out to those that were trying to defend Ardent by saying 'Village got the same!' that it's not true. It also has zero relevance even if it were true btw, but as it an aside, it's not.

Given the $3M was already 'awarded' to them in 2019, it stands to reason the gov wouldn't give them the same $70M they gave village when $3M was already unspent and on the table - it's not like Ardent received 'favourable treatment' by getting to keep $3M of it - they got a smaller loan because there was already cash on the table. 

If the grant hadn't been sitting there already, you can absolutely bet your arse both companies would have gotten exactly the same money.

It's pedantry, but since we seem so hell bent on splitting hairs, It would be correct to say that Village received more covid relief funding than Ardent did. The fact that it was because they already had unspent grant money is beside the point. They could have spent that prior to covid and still put their hands out for $70M and nobody would be crying that they got more money then.

Thread title needs changing too, now we've determined it wasn't a koala research grant, but an international tourism grant.

[New display name]

1 hour ago, DaptoFunlandGuy said:

it wasn't a koala research grant, but an international tourism grant.

So really it was about DW attracting new customers and never about the Koala Research.   

 

Side note:  Dreamworld house (I don't know if they still do) misplaced Koalas on the GC with an a agreement with the Gold Coast Council.  When the the land next door to DW got bulldozed for the shopping centre the Koalas were moved to DW. (the reason why Vintage Cars now has Koalas.

[Richard]

A good place to start with grants and funding would be here: https://www.parkz.com.au/article/2020/08/11/692-Structural_changes_funding_injection_sees_Gold_Coast_theme_park_future_secured.html

In short (and to augment the above with newer financials), during COVID:

Village loans totalled $70M from existing lenders (i.e. banks) + Queensland Treasury Corporation (Qld Govt's investment vehicle). The exact breakdown between private loans and QTC is unclear, but they received $34M in government loans and grants in the second half of 2020, of which $1.7M was a grant under 'Supporting Australia's Exhibiting Zoos and Aquariums'. We lose public visibility of Village's financials after the BGH deal, but JobKeeper subsidies to June 2020 totalled $42 million. And under the guidelines of the 'Major Tourism Experiencing Hardship' Qld grant they would have been entitled to $3-4 million in the second half of 2021.

Ardent received $66.7M loans from QTC + a no-strings $3M grant. It's unclear if this $3M is just the repurposing of the $2.7M koala grant (which itself is tied into a $1.8M grant for genome research announced as far back as 2016), but Ardent received government grants and subsidies totalling $8M in the second half of 2020, inclusive of JobKeeper. There was a $2M 'Major Tourism Experiencing Hardship' grant in the second half of 2021.

I don't see anything to suggest Village were 'given' $30 million for Sea World before or during COVID, @StingRay. Feel free to dust off that Google machine and provide more info if you've got it.

The fact that a STEM tourism (read: local school groups) project was to be funded by an Asia tourism development grant and pitched foremost as a research project to me is an indictment on government grants and the lobbying industry. But that's certainly not isolated to this situation.

All in all it's totally irrelevant to try and compare the two operators. They are two vastly different businesses that faced vastly different problems during COVID and this is reflected in the fact that they took different approaches in the peak of the pandemic, and required different assistance packages. Dreamworld has been unprofitable for six years and even in their heyday was a business a third the size of VRTP. Village also has other Australia and Queensland based businesses. Of course they're going to get different things from government.

Are the optics of this reallocation of funding great? Not really. But that's the worst you can say about it.

Could a competent PR team have seen this coming a mile away and easily preempted it? I think so, but competent public messaging doesn't belong in the same sentence as government or Ardent.

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

Competent PR seems to be lacking in general.

[New display name]

@DaptoFunlandGuythe media was camped out at the budget estimates hearing waiting for any Government is bad moment.

Do you think the media would run with DW's pre-emptive media release or what was released in the hearings?

 

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

3 minutes ago, New display name said:

@DaptoFunlandGuythe media was camped out at the budget estimates hearing waiting for any Government is bad moment.

Do you think the media would run with DW's pre-emptive media release or what was released in the hearings?

 

My general comment was moreso directed at the recent incompetent PR we've seen from another theme park company building a rollercoaster that is otherwise unrelated to this story.

[New display name]

Oh,  The Leaning Coaster of Leviathan.  My bad.

[Naazon]

3 minutes ago, New display name said:

Oh,  The Leaning Coaster of Leviathan.  My bad.

At this point its an art project.

[Rivals]

10 minutes ago, Naazon said:

At this point its an art project.

maybe all the delays is just an effort to try and convince the government for more funding😭

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

9 minutes ago, Rivals said:

maybe all the delays is just an effort to try and convince the government for more funding😭

What would Sea World do with a bunch of Koalas?

[New display name]

Feed them to the dolphins @DaptoFunlandGuy 

Dolphins eat 200kg of food a day.  That's a lot of Koalas.

Edited July 29, 2022 by New display name

[Rivals]

22 minutes ago, DaptoFunlandGuy said:

What would Sea World do with a bunch of Koalas?

who mentioned koalas at sea world? i said funding to build the rides🧍🏽‍♀️

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

3 minutes ago, Rivals said:

who mentioned koalas at sea world? i said funding to build the rides🧍🏽‍♀️

That's how you get ride construction funding these days. 

[StingRay]

4 hours ago, Richard said:

 

I don't see anything to suggest Village were 'given' $30 million for Sea World before or during COVID, @StingRay. Feel free to dust off that Google machine and provide more info if you've got it.

It was my understanding from a source that the company was given some money by the state government for the “Atlantis Land” to help with local tourism. I could have seen an article maybe back in the day (around the project announcement) but I can't recall from the top of my head. 

I understand others have much higher up and better sources also. 

[Mr. A]

Looking through social media at the moment. People are really mad about this. I understand why. Because Jeez, I'm slightly shocked hearing about this. Are they still gonna build the koala research or has that been cancelled?

Edited July 30, 2022 by Mr. A

[Slick]

Aaaaaaand we're back.

[Smol bean]

So I'm confused the repurposing of the money had to approved by her and now she is mad at dreamworld for something she approved of?

Edited August 2, 2022 by Smol bean

[New display name]

18 minutes ago, Smol bean said:

So I'm confused the repurposing of the money had to approved by her and now she is mad at dreamworld for something she approved of?

She is in a hole and she is trying to dig her way out.

[rappa]

She's a politician... it's basically in their job description

 

[Archer]

[Brad2912]

2 hours ago, Archer said:

Is Kenny really small, or the chess board really big? 

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

Yeah, the fact that a politician has backflipped on a prior commitment isn't news, and it doesn't change the legalities of what happened.

It is lip service. The media were spinning the repurposing of the tourism grant as an environmental catastrophe for Koalas, and making Qgov look bad - So she makes a public statement that has no legal or other obligation that makes her look better (but will no doubt still be dug up by the LNP at the next state election) and in a few days the story is buried by newer news, and everyone forgets about it again (until the election).

Just remember - come election time, it was a tourism grant, and it was used to increase tourism. 

Also remember - a lot of projects have been impacted by covid (like Leviathan, apparently) and some things got cancelled altogether (I just discovered Qantas permanently stopped their valet service at brisbane airport, for example).

Projects have been cancelled all over the world as a result of this pandemic, and lots of the funding for those projects has been diverted to other more useful endeavours to keep people in jobs, and to keep essential services running. The point is, the world has changed, and if you're going to sit and insist that someone should do something really expensive because they said they would prior to the pandemic - and you don't realise that practically all bets were off in the first lockdown, you're either a fool, or you have an ulterior motive.

[Archer]

The caption at the bottom of the ad is a classic 🤣