Wayne’s world of woes …

… is a lot different to the real one!

This ‘doom & gloom’ article appeared at the top of page 26 in yesterday’s Melbourne Herald Sun, the largest daily newspaper in the country. It quotes the President of the Bright Chamber of Commerce, Wayne Phillips, extensively. According to Wayne, Bright’s tourist trade, shops & businesses are cactus, but what he’s saying is wrong – in so many ways. Here is the full text with Wayne’s words of woes highlighted:

  

Comment:

OK, things are tough (everywhere) but to portray Bright as ‘Struggletown’ and our residents as ‘poor’ is not the way to go. And it’s not exactly right either. I have to wonder why the President of the Chamber of Commerce would talk the town down so much. Does he think this will make Melburnians take pity on us and come up and spend more money? Or maybe they’ll just send some food parcels, it sounds like we need them.

Or, as I suspect, was Wayne wearing his other (conflicting) ’hat’ as the principal officer of the anti-Coles (anti-the world) Save Bright Action Group when he made those comments? Let’s analyse them anyway:

 

“Interest rates & fuel prices are directly to blame”

Well yes, those things don’t help but are they SOLELY to blame for a few business closures and the state of our economy? And is it really that bad? I don’t think so, but that’s what Wayne seems to be saying. The fact is our tourist numbers have been declining for years and, in my opinion, it’s mainly due to two things: (1) Lack of infrastructure improvements to the Bright CBD & surrounds (2) Lack of promotion. What has Wayne done to address those issues? 

 

“Unleaded petrol was $1.80 and diesel $1.90 in Bright last weekend …” 

No, unleaded wasn’t that high, but thanks for discouraging our potential visitors even more than necessary.

 

“Freight companies had put a 25% fuel levy on everything trucked into town”

So does everything here costs 25% more than elsewhere? That’s not the case but that’s how Wayne has said it.

 

“Some businesses have closed and (as for) those that haven’t closed we have a very high rate of businesses on the market …” 

We’ve always had a lot of businesses for sale. That is the nature of a tourist town, people come and people go. Wayne’s only been here 5 years himself after moving from the Geelong area so perhaps he’s not aware of our transient business history. As for the closures, well the town had two butcher shops, which is unusual for a town this size considering meat is also sold at the supermarket, so it’s not really surprising that one has closed. Two restaurants have closed also but (from all reports) one of those seems more due to poor management – it’s also about to re-open under new owners. We’ve still got a lot of restaurants and doesn’t Wayne know that it’s standard throughout the entire world that very few restaurants survive for 5 years? Perhaps he should watch Ramsay. And yes, a small sandwich shop closed but that was a few months ago before the petrol jump and they had been struggling for years and were often not open. I don’t want to make light of the economic problems we face but Wayne is blowing it out of proportion. Geez, and I bet those who are trying to sell are real grateful for Wayne telling potential buyers not to bother coming here. 

 

“… we’re one of the lowest incomes per household in all of regional Victoria.”

Why is Wayne making Bright sound like the Moe of the north east by distorting the facts so much? Those figures are for the shire, not for Bright, and they include Myrtleford, which IS facing genuine problems due to the tobacco closure. They also include Mt Beauty, which has a high proportion of welfare recipients. And here in Bright we have one of the highest rates of retired people in regional Victoria and they are on pensions, which also brings the average income figure down. But people in Bright are not ’skint’ and guess what? We have nearly full employment. What is Wayne trying to do, scare new arrivals off too? I can’t think of any other reason he’d distort the facts so much.

 

“They (a lot of business owners) can’t go back to the banks any more” 

I’m surprised that Wayne seems to know the personal financial details, equity and balance sheets of so many businesses in town. They must trust him a lot to give out that information. So are our four banks going to close too? I don’t think so (yes we’re so poor that our town of about 3,000 people, or 5,000 in the greater area, supports four banks!)

 

“Basically they’re thinking it’s time to close up and move on.”

Maybe Wayne should just speak for himself … well, maybe he is!

 

In my opinion Wayne has been too pre-occupied for the past 18 months with his anti-progress Save Bright group fighting the Coles supermarket proposal. He can be a protester and ’slow town’ promoter if he likes (that’s his prerogative) but quite frankly, I don’t think that sits very well with the role as President of the Chamber of Commerce. In fact I didn’t rejoin the Chamber this year because I have no confidence in its executive … none whatsoever.

I also have to wonder what impact this article might have on Bright’s house prices. Who’d want to buy in Bright after reading that? It doesn’t take a big shift in demand to drastically affect house prices. If only 20 potential buyers are deterred that might equate to a 25% drop in demand … and prices. Negative talk like that can have huge ramifications and it does this town a great disservice.

There’s no point complaining though, about things that are out of our control like petrol prices and interest rates. A wise man once told me “don’t worry about things you cannot control, focus on what you CAN control and do something about it.”

And what we can control is the promotion, marketing and (most importantly) the presentation of the town. We could also put some events on – we have none in winter! What have Wayne and the Chamber done about that? Well, not a lot in my opinion.

I’d like to hear some positive plans because otherwise it’s lay down and die. I think we need an alternative to the Chamber of Commerce – a Bright Tourism Association perhaps – made up of positive people!