WA tourism operators bracing for huge losses after Australian Government announces closure of country’s borders to visitors from China

WA tourism operators are bracing for huge losses as the Australian Government announced it was closing the country’s borders to visitors from China. Tourism Council of WA chief executive Evan Hall said the aftershocks would be “significant and immediate” given Chinese visitors spent $347 million in this State last year. Several operators said they accepted the Federal Government had little choice but to act on the health advice it received to keep the coronavirus out of the country. They said it was a case of “short-term pain for hopefully long term gain”. But there were fears smaller businesses would be decimated. Prime Minister Scott Morrison rang WA Premier Mark McGowan to inform him of the Chinese tourist ban just prior to announcing it to the media this afternoon. The extreme action was decided at a meeting of the National Security Committee of Cabinet following “new and urgent information regarding the novel coronavirus situation”. “Based on updated health advice from the Commonwealth’s chief medical officer and the Australian Health Protection Principal Committee and the increased risk posed by the spread of novel coronavirus, we have decided to introduce strict new travel restrictions and new travel advice,” the Government announced. “Effective immediately, foreign nationals — excluding permanent residents — who are in mainland China from today forward, will not be allowed to enter Australia for 14 days from the time they have left or transited through mainland China.” Officials at Perth Airport confirmed a China Southern Airlines flight from Guangzhou that was due to land just after 10pm would be processed as normal. WA Tourism Minister Paul Papalia said the entire Australian economy and not just tourism would cop a massive hit, but said WA tourism industry was positioned to be least impacted. “In WA, Chinese visitors represent our fifth biggest source of overseas visitors,” he said. “In every other State or Territory they are the number one or two source of overseas visitors.” But Mr Hall claimed Chinese visitors were by far the biggest spenders here. “Make no mistake we’re hurting now. There are (tour) buses cancelled. We’ve had whole group bookings that have just dropped out already,” Mr Hall said. “It’s group stuff, accommodation, tours, transport — it’s everything. It’s retail shops that specialise in selling to China’s visitors, your pearl or gold jewellery places, wineries who do a lot of sales, particularly high-end red wine to the Chinese. They will all be significantly impacted.” Geraldton Air Charters is among the businesses reeling. “We will unfortunately be considering over the next few weeks whether to lay off staff,” managing director Wendy Mann said last night. “About 80 per cent of our clientele is from mainland China and Hong Kong. We’ve already had around 105 cancellations.” Ms Mann said they were taking precautions to protect staff from contracting the virus. The ban coincided with a non-stop Shanghai to Perth flight trial, which began on January 15 and was due to end on February 17. It will now end two weeks early. Mr Papalia said the initial success of the direct flights meant China Eastern Airlines could already see they were viable. He expected them to resume once the coronavirus was under control. Australian Hotels Association (WA) chief executive Bradley Woods said the Federal Government’s actions were understandable. “The situation we’re dealing with is an unprecedented one that very few governments have had to deal with in the past,” he said. “For WA it’s particularly disappointing that it’s happened at a time we’re trying to expand our tourism opportunities out of China.” He said the impact would be far worse if the outbreak wasn’t contained in the short-to-medium term. “What we will be doing is working with organisations like Tourism Australia, Tourism WA, relevant State and Federal ministers and looking at how the industry can be best supported during what will be a difficult and challenging time, but also around starting to plan for recovery once the virus has been contained as well.” He urged West Australians to holiday at home.