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Tune into this Radio National Report on Sunday! Nation-wide, many are questioning the need for this mega-development. Casinos are not a substitute for real economic development policies!
This article represents part of a larger Background Briefing investigation. Listen to Cathy Van Extel's full report on Sunday at 8.05 am or use the podcast links above after broadcast.
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The Aquis casino resort planned for Cairns would dwarf its competitors, including James Packer’s Barangaroo casino, and turn a patch of flood-prone sugarcane country into an Asian gambling hotspot. So do the numbers add up, and what are the downsides? Cathy Van Extel investigates.
The Queensland government has plans to turn the state into an Asian gambling hotspot.
The Newman government has three new casino licences up for offer in Brisbane, the Gold Coast and Cairns.
In Queensland’s far north, Hong Kong investor Tony Fung, 61, has a vision to transform a sugarcane-covered flood plain into a six star glitzy gambling resort.
The Aquis Great Barrier Reef Resort is the most ambitious tourism development in Australia’s history.
This is a different project, it's a game changer.
JUSTIN FUNG, AQUIS CHIEF EXECUTIVE.
With an $8.15 billion price tag, it is also one of the nation’s biggest non-resource developments.
The proposed casino has divided the Cairns community. Supporters believe it will bring a new era of prosperity but others wonder at what cost.
Community opposition is being spearheaded by the Aquis Aware Coalition of Concerned Citizens. President Pam Bigelow says it is like Las Vegas coming to Cairns.
‘It’s a massive, massive development,’ she says.
‘People are confused, they’re a little bit afraid and those that really, really want it are quite aggressive about that line and don’t want any discussion about the pros and cons.’
With a Dubai-like design, the resort will cater for up to 12,000 guests a day—a million visitors a year.
To be built on 342 hectares of farmland, the resort would be the size of 184 Sydney cricket grounds.
It will include eight 20- storey hotel towers, two casinos, theatres, a convention centre and a championship golf course.
US educated lawyer, Justin Fung, 29, has responsibility for delivering his father’s dream, and the Aquis Chief Executive says the casino will be like no other in Australia.
‘I think that most of the sceptics have probably never seen a real Integrated Resort that exists in Macau or Las Vegas or Singapore,’ he says.
‘This is a completely different project than what you're thinking about when you think about a city centre casino that might exist somewhere else in Australia.’
‘This is a different project. It's a game changer.’
The resort will be built at Yorkeys Knob, 15 kilometres north of Cairns, on the Barron River delta, which floods each summer.
James Cook University professor of geosciences Jon Nott says it is a dangerous location for a resort.
‘It’s on the flood plain of the Barron River and it’s in an exceptionally storm surge-prone area.’
‘We’ve got tropical cyclones and storm surge and river flooding in a wet tropical environment and you couldn’t put it in a more dangerous or vulnerable location than where they are putting it.’
Justin Fung, however, says the resort has been specifically designed to mitigate the flood risks.
‘We came up with a very creative solution along with architects and engineers,’ he says.
‘We’re actually going to have a positive effect on the flooding issues on the surrounding areas.’
Aquis Aware president Pam Bigelow predicts there will be costly infrastructure problems for the Cairns community.
‘Housing, water, sewerage, waste transfer, road access and traffic are all issues that haven’t been dealt with adequately in the Aquis environmental impact statement,’ she says.
‘We have no idea of who is going to pay for those.’
Cairns has the nation’s 10th highest unemployment rate at eight per cent. The youth jobless rate is 20 per cent.
In its EIS, Aquis has forecast 3,750 construction jobs and 20,000 ongoing resort jobs.
Centacare Cairns Executive Director Helga Biru, however, fears the casino resort could be a double- edged sword.
‘I’m not sure the economic benefit is going to outweigh the potential social disadvantage that a casino could bring,’ she says.
Aquis intends to generate most its revenue from international high rolling gamblers and cashed-up Asian tourists.
Australian Churches Gambling Taskforce chairman Tim Costello says no Australian casino has ever been able to survive on foreign gamblers.
Mr Costello says 60 to 80 per cent of casino profits in Australia come from local residents.
‘The truth is people who are locals, particularly those within a 25 kilometre radius, are the ones who play at the casino and they play pokies much more than the tables.’
‘The dressing up, which is a very familiar chorus now for those of us who follow this, that “oh no, this is different, this is going to be overseas people and it's not going to touch the locals” has been proved wrong every time.’
Aquis is seeking permission for 750 gaming tables and 1,500 poker machines.
Clubs Queensland Chief Executive Doug Flockhart is worried about the impact on the pokie revenues of Cairns' clubs.
Mr Flockhart says Asian gamblers are primarily interested in table games like baccarat, and are not interested in poker machines
‘If you're attracting an international Asian market that's interested in gambling, why do you need 15 hundred poker machines?’ he asks.
Mr Flockhart believes Aquis is targeting Cairns residents and other Australians who visit the region on holiday.
‘The consequence of that will be a cannibalisation in some form of existing poker machine offers in the Cairns and immediate region,’ he says.
Gambling researcher Francis Markham from the Australian National University has forecast a big increase in poker machine losses and problem gambling in Cairns.
He has modelled Queensland’s gambling data together with a Productivity Commission formula for problem gambling.
In a submission to the State Coordinator General, Markham warned that 1,500 extra poker machines will result in Cairns locals losing an additional $56 million a year by 2021.
That would equate to each adult resident in Cairns spending an extra $240 per year on pokies.
He says 60 per cent of those new pokie losses would come from around 4,000 new problem gamblers.
The modelling forecasts $22 million lost to poker machines by just 950 high risk problem gamblers.
A further $12 million dollars would be lost each year by around 3,000 so-called ‘moderate risk’ problem gamblers.
Based on this modelling, Markham says the financial viability of the Aquis casino is likely to be propped up by just 4,000 people who are each spending between $3000 and $23,000 a year.
His research also shows that about 70,000 new recreational gamblers in Cairns would lose, on average, $16 million a year on pokies.
The Aquis EIS classifies the gambling risks to the local population as low.
Tony Fung has promised to act if his casino creates local gambling problems—something he acknowledges can't be ruled out.
‘Gaming addiction is an issue. We will be working with the community and working with the government to see how we can mitigate it,’ he says.
‘If we encounter issues and problems, we'll join hands with the community to work together to fight against it.’
The Newman government declared Aquis a coordinated project, which means only one environmental impact statement is needed for both state and commonwealth approval.
All of the social, environmental and economic issues around the Aquis mega casino project are currently being assessed by the state coordinator general.
The Queensland government is due to make a final decision on issuing all three new casino licences next year.
Background Briefing is investigative journalism at its finest, exploring the issues of the day and examining society in a lively on-the-road documentary style.
