We need to identify why the Ministers have fallen and a simple analysis points to their failure to achieve growth and increase yields in what was once our biggest earner of foreign exchange.
This throws the spot-light on the quality of advice and support that minsters are getting from their staff. If Ministers sit at the head of incompetent teams, they will have great difficulty achieving their goals.
There is no greater illustration of the staff failure to understand growth than MBIE’s Innovation Program for Tourism Recovery which handed out grants for innovation projects. The administration costs for this programme totalled $1.4 million but only succeeded in handing out $515,000 in grants. The programme was so bad that it was cancelled mid-way through. It was a clear illustration that the staff do not understand innovation and growth in this industry.
Of note, when the program was presented to the public, the staff began with a karakia which they clearly believed would be beneficial to the business-people listening. These bureaucrats are totally out of touch with industry and lack the expertise to complete the tasks they are charged with.
One of the criticisms of Stuart Nash when he was minister was that he was inaccessible. This is a remarkable criticism as he needed to keep in touch with industry problems but, also, an open office is necessary to hear new ideas and generate innovation. It is clear is that the bureaucrats were acting as gate-keepers and limiting the information that the ministers had access to.
Of course, Ministers receive more requests for interviews than they can possibly meet and some filtering is necessary. The decision who to meet is first made by the staff, and the Minister can choose to accept or disregard their advice. Nash accepted the advice of his staff to keep his door shut.
When Minister Doocey took office, I asked for an interview at his electorate office but was told that because it was a tourism issue, it had to be approved by the Wellington staff. I filled out the required form and stated that I wanted to discuss solutions to yield and seasonality with a “focus on how tourism can contribute to the government’s economic goals”.
I also advised that my expertise was in economic growth. With a PhD and four books published internationally on the topic, it is my core area of expertise. I had also spent 20 years researching alpine tourism.
Like the industry officials with Nash, the staff in Wellington blocked my visit. Local electorate staff confirmed that the decision not to see me came from Wellington bureaucrats and Doocey would not over-rule them.
What is particularly concerning about this decision is that this government had prioritised economic growth and that is exactly what I wanted to talk to him about. Given this government’s goals, one must ask, why would officers block a minster from speaking to an expert in economic growth?
It seems that the government’s economic goals were not a priority for them. Or maybe they believed they had the matter in hand and did not need external input. However, when one looks at their record, it is obvious they did not have the mater in hand.
Further illustrating the limiting nature of these staff is the fact I provided the Minister’s office with a 120 page strategy for growth in alpine tourism which I had been working on for many years. Some months later, under an Official Information Act request, I asked for any review, analysis or advice that had been given to the Minister about my growth strategy. They responded there was none. They had done no analysis or review of the paper and had not advised the minister on its potential as a growth strategy.
If they had reviewed the strategy and advised the Minister to ignore it, I would have accepted the rejection, but it seems they did not even read it, let alone discuss it, and this raises serious concerns about their commitment to growth in this industry. In fact, I started to wonder if they had any interest in tourism.
Chris Luxon was right to dump Minister Doocey. However, the new minister will be reliant on the same support-staff and advisors as previous ministers. If an office fails to deliver despite changes in leadership, we must look at the quality of their staff and it is clear that these staff are the reason this job has become a poison challis.
In a previous article on this website, I identified several problems with university training in tourism policy/management. I provided the example of an ex-Otago professor whose research expertise is the negative link between tourism and climate change. This emphasis on the environment is very common among tourism educators so that students, our future bureaucrats, are taught environment protection to a degree that they become anti-development.
Environment protection is a good thing, not just for conservation purposes but also for economic ones. New Zealand’s pristine environment is our core competitive advantage. However, it is being taught to an extreme so that bureaucrats tasked with growing the industry show no interest in development.
At one university where I worked, the tourism management program was also full of papers in sociology but very few in business. They certainly did not study business strategy so it should be no surprise that the bureaucrats cannot come up with a growth strategy for the industry.
If this government is to achieve growth in this industry, there needs to be a complete clear out of staff in both the minister’s office and the Ministry. Any new staff should have business training and a growth mind-set.
Dr Greg Clydesdale is an economics lecturer at Lincoln University. The ideas expressed in this article are his personal opinion - not those of the university.
3 comments:
"Poisoned Challis" or perhaps Poisoned Chalice?
Hear hear!!
Nearly nobody outside nz cares about nz’s eco credentials. (Actually nobody cares but I stopped short of discounting the entire world.)
Alpine tourism is a massive industry year round in countries with far less spectacular alpine regions than both nz’s main islands yet nz does next to nothing in the summer months and the north islands ski spots are going broke.
Nz is also competing against the likes of Australia, USA, south east Asia, and….the rest of the world for tourism dollars. It’s expensive and time consuming to get here by plane, cruise ship guests are greeted by idiot protestors, and when people do get here the tourism hot spots are pretty run down (thanks Jacinda).
Clear out the bureaucrats.
Make NZ great again!
More than likely it has had a lot of ministers becase it is a nothing portfolio. A great place to put second-tier ministers where they can't do a lot of damage.
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