The release of the annual Australian Accommodation Monitor (AAM) for the Financial year, highlights key challenges across the regulated tourism accommodation sector with a softening of performance across all capital cities.
These results mirror the recently released International Visitor Survey and National Visitor Survey demonstrating the continued leakage into unregulated accommodation. “Private accommodation and rented house/apartment’ represented the biggest growth sector for international travellers of 7.6% and the second biggest growth sector for domestic travellers of 22.3%.
“The Accommodation Association supports a consistent national response to short-term rental accommodation. We have advocated strongly for the regulation of short-term rental accommodation that recognizes the significant investment and contribution made by commercial tourism accommodation”, said Dean Long, CEO. “This can only occur if there is greater transparency of the unregulated sector and a fair playing field for us to compete and employ Australians.”
“We congratulate the government and the ATO on the data matching program which according to media reports is already producing dividends, with ‘Rorts and errors by short-term rental property owners a “key driver” of a $9 billion income tax shortfall under investigation by the Australian Taxation Office’”, Mr Long said.
“However, there must be action at a state level that recognizes the significant impact of short-term rental accommodation. States have an important role to play in ensuring appropriate planning controls are in place that governs not only commercial tourism accommodation but short-term rental accommodation.
We seek a strong Code of Conduct that protects visitor safety and amenity, planning controls that prevent the growth of ‘quasi hotels’ and a registration system that assists in monitoring compliance.”
The commercial tourism accommodation sector is a major contributor to the economy, indirectly and directly employing close to 200,000 and providing facilities such as restaurants, bars, spas, meeting rooms and more that contribute to the vibrancy of destinations. A level playing field is important in sustaining continued growth in investment and employment.
