Hundreds of millions of dollars awarded to an Australian world heritage site has been left sitting in the bank as tourism operators scream out for new facilities.
UNESCO World Heritage Centre Kakadu National Park was awarded $216 million in the 2019 budget, in person – and just ahead of the election – by Prime Minister Scott Morrison.
Another $60 million was promised in 2020 from a national parks infrastructure deal.
But since then less than $17 million has been spent on the park, and the tired mining town of Jabiru, which tourism operators say are both crying out for upgrades.
Former NT Senator Nigel Scullion promised $150m would be spent by next year.
"This is real money, it's on the table, it will be spent in this set of forward estimates," he said in 2019.
Tourism operators unhappy
Charter North 4WD Safari owner Greig Taylor said some of the spending so far could be regarded as normal maintenance.
"We've not seen any tangible improvements to visitor infrastructure through the park for many years," he told ABC Radio Darwin Late Breakfast.
"It's been in a state of disrepair for many, many years. And it's in desperate need of this visitor infrastructure to be improved.
"The failure is at the Canberra level, they are simply inadequate [with] following through with these promises and getting that money to the ground."
Sewerage and roads
Tourism Top End chief executive Glen Hingley said he was unable to point out any major changes in the park since the funding announcement.
"All the money that's been spent so far is very much sewerage and roads and roofing of buildings — it's all maintenance, it's all stuff that has gone by the wayside over the last decade," he told ABC Radio Darwin.
Show me the money
A Parks Australia spokesman said the $276 million would be fully spent by 2028 to support infrastructure upgrades and growing tourism in Kakadu National Park and remediation activities in Jabiru.
Road improvements will get a $70m slice.
"As at 28 February 2022, $16.95 million of the $276 million has been spent, with a further $31 million forecast to be spent by December 2022," the spokesman said.
"A significant body of planning, design and procurement work is underway on remaining elements of the package and we expect the funding will be fully spent by the end of the measure in 2028.
"The Commonwealth's $35 million investment in the Jabiru township is supporting a range of activities, including housing remediation, remediation of Jabiru's landfill site, capital works on Jabiru's road network and adjacent stormwater infrastructure, weed and tree management, and the development of contamination management plans.
"To date, $3.7 million of the $35 million has been spent, delivering 18 urgent roof replacements and 13 houses remediated in coordination with DAWE.
"A further $24 million (included in the $31 million above) is contracted to be spent by end 2022 and will deliver remediation of a further 55 houses and 108 roofs."
— Additional reporting by Jo Laverty and Adam Steer.
