The Good Oil by Rod Brown*
Last month in this column I mused about how local communities might attract business and government marbles rolling around the landscape. Well here is a landscape with great potential. Victor Harbor – aka known as ‘Victor’ – is a typical seaside town, quiet in the off season and bustling in the peak season. It is where the pride of South Australia lost their innocence in hot summers long gone. Some have now retired there with a wistful gaze and a rug on their laps. (My in-laws live there!).
Anyway, Graeme Maxwell and his staff at Victor Harbor Council explain that they have the oldest age cohort in Australia (54.1 years), an excellent hospital (albeit a shortage of GPs), and now a priority rollout of the National Broadband Network. We got talking about the potential of these factors to underpin a healthcare precinct.
Giving it further thought, the vision splendid might involve core functions such as research associated with an ageing population (Flinders University has a rural clinical school there), clinical trials for drugs based on elderly patients, and the design and manufacture of gophers, wheelchairs, rehab devices and the like.
Then there might be seachangers involved in tourism-recreation-recuperation, such as alternative medicine, web based businesses, golf courses, walking trails, and adventure tourism similar to Waitpinga Beach on Kangaroo Island.
These new activities would create knowledge based and outdoor jobs for youths, and thus generate a more balanced population age structure.
You don’t need to be that prescriptive because the investors will determine the specific business activity. But there does need to be some strategic thought as to removing any impediments and having the right mix of infrastructure to support these businesses. The bad news is that my vision splendid doesn’t get much encouragement from the South Australian Government’s recently released 30 year plan for Greater Adelaide. This document makes scarce reference to Victor.
I actually rang the folk responsible in the Department of Planning and Local Government to double check that Victor – one hour’s drive from the Adelaide CBD – is inside the geographic scope of this planning exercise. When I was assured that the answer was ‘yes’, I respectfully suggested that they could look a bit more closely at Victor. They obviously thought I was being ‘clever’ because the line went dead. So I went back and had a closer look at the 30 year plan. It certainly talks about health and wellbeing, business clusters and growth corridors.
Is the SA Government leaving it to the invisible hand of the market to fill in the details? From my experience of tracking how entrepreneurial hot spots emerge, there are usually three success factors.
The first is a trigger via a new piece of infrastructure that gels with other economic and social infrastructure to establish a locational advantage that is recognised by external players – the National Broadband Network rollout might be that trigger.
The second factor is local champions to raise awareness and press the buttons – they
need to be capable of connecting to external champions. Coincidentally, the three Federal Ministers relevant to healthcare are women (Macklin, Roxon, Gillard), as are the two State Ministers (Lomax-Smith, Rankine).
I’m not suggesting any sexist plot here, but I am advised that seven of the ten Victor Harbor councillors are also female!
The third factor is a collaborative structure that can connect the dots – the Fleurieu Regional Development Board is in the process of being aligned into a Federal–State agency.
Victor Harbor has a wonderful opportunity to attract the right marbles. But council and local agencies must show the way. Federal and State agencies will support initiatives that sensibly align with local competitive advantage.
Privacy laws create problems
Privacy laws are creating problems for people trying to connect with Federal, State and local agencies. Here in Canberra, bureaucrats rarely give out their names and phone numbers. And the frustration level rises when chasing up enquiries with departments via their switchboards – you generally get diverted to a hotline in Melbourne or Perth.
My suggestion is that if you want regular contact with a department, keep a record of the names and phone numbers of helpful officials. It will save time and deliver better outcomes.
Green Jobs
($94 million) starts January
Have just spent an hour chasing around DEEWR for details. The bottom line is the following draft outline on the DEEWR website:
- program likely to start in
January - 10,000 member National
Green Jobs Corps - long term unemployed youth
undergoing 26 weeks of green job training and work experience - 30,000 apprentices to be
trained with Green Skills - 6,000 local green jobs
with focus on environmental
sustainability.
Contact us if you’d like to access the program.
Dandenong wins Defence Centre
Industry Minister Carr has launched a $21 million Defence Industry Innovation Centre in Dandenong Victoria to assist Australian defence businesses. It offers hands on services for SMEs, including free business reviews and supporting grants to help boost productivity and support the Australian Defence Force.
Our members are asking why Dandenong, given that western Sydney, Townsville and Perth also have a very good claim? The reasons put to me are that 200 defence related companies are located in southeast Melbourne/Dandenong, and two of the four advisers are to assist businesses in other regions. Go to
www.enterpriseconnect.gov.au
Irish blarney
The Irish economy has taken a few hits lately, but you’d be impressed by their persistence and marketing effort. IDA (Industrial Development Agency) Ireland is selling it as a preeminent location.
It has TV ads aimed at the US with images accompanied by the following words, spoken by actor Stanley Townsend:
“Innovation. What it isn’t is something that happens step by predictable step. It doesn’t always stop at the lights. Sometimes it goes backwards to go forwards. It goes up blind alleys. It zigs and it zags. It wiggles. And then…and then it lets rip. Your job is simple. Just give it the right environment. Ireland – where innovation comes naturally.”
*Rod Brown is a Canberra-based consultant specialising in industry/regional development, investment attraction, clusters and accessing Federal grants. He also runs the
Cockatoo Network.
He can be contacted at
apd@orac.net.au or phone (02) 6231 7261.
Go to our blog at
wwwinvestmentinnovation.wordpress.com for 550+ articles on issues relevant to Local Government.
