The federal government has contracted a boutique Perth consultancy to come up with a plan to address Broome’s shortage of tourism workers.
The Department of Resources, Energy and Tourism has awarded the contract for what it has called a Tourism Employment Plan to Perth-based Carpe Diem Strategic Solutions.
The consultancy is run by Malcolm Goff and Cheryll Meade, who have consulted on workforce and employment development across the state. The contract is part of the department’s drive to improve employment in the tourism industry in eight locations around Australia.
Broome will be the first to have a bespoke plan established, followed closely by the Red Centre region in the Northern Territory.
The department said the plans would deliver practical measures to ease labour shortages by assisting tourism and hospitality businesses with targeted information, assistance in accessing existing programs and strategies for improving staff retention.
The shortage of tourism workers in Broome led it to becoming part of the government’s expansion of the Pacific Seasonal Worker Pilot Scheme, with a small-scale trial of workers from East Timor given approval.
The government approved three accommodation providers to take in the Timorese workers – one being the Cable Beach Resort, which employs about 280 staff.
General Manager Ron Sedon said six workers were working at the resort as general housekeepers during the six-month trial. Despite them arriving without the necessary skills, Mr Sedon said the pilot had benefited the resort.
“I can’t say that this was a desperate solution to a recruitment problem, it wasn’t; we have a number of options,” he said.
“But this has been quite good for us in that we will be certainly looking to explore other options with the Timorese in the future.”
Other measures being pursued by the federal government include establishing a labour template agreement to help tourism operators recruit workers from overseas.
It is also due to announce new locations for a separate three-year trial of horticultural and seasonal workers from East Timor, Kiribati, Nauru, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu.
Mr Sedon said it was clear there was a labour shortage in the tourism industry and more needed to be done to help tourism operators.
“There needs to be a more open policy to recruit from overseas, particularly for semi-skilled staff,” he said. “I think the immigration process and visa process need to be a lot quicker and a lot more seamless; it still takes too long and it should be less expensive for us to have access to staff from overseas.”
