Fiji tourists shouldn't pay extra fee: Seeto
A proposal to hit tourists in Fiji with a service fee has been criticised by the tourism industry.
Transcript
A proposal to hit tourists in Fiji with a service fee has been criticised by the tourism industry.
Fiji's Shadow Tourism Minister, Viliame Gavoka, says it's a way to supplement the income of tourism workers.
But the President of the Fiji Hotel and Tourism Association, Dixon Seeto, says workers are paid well and a fee could cause a backfire.
He says good relationships between tourists and outlets in Fiji means more money and rewards will come back to the industry.
He spoke to Alex Perrottet.
DIXON SEETO: We feel that a service charge will not assist the industry in any shape or form. We think that the current system where a tourist, contributing to a fund that would benefit everyone, would be a better way to go and in fact we feel that this might even reap a greater benefit and be of an ever greater quantum than if they were to pay whatever the fee is. We also favour the system that we are now negotiating with the hotel union, and this is practised in some of the hotels already, where there is a merit-pay increase, where if someone performs exceptionally well, they actually get an increase on their rate. And I don't subscribe to the idea that the workers in Fiji are poorly paid and we have to supplement their income. On the contrary, all the workers in Fiji are paid.. the Government sets the levels for the minimum wage, and within the hotel industry many of our members are in fact unionised and are paid well above the minimum rate, and on top of that, in many of our hotels and resorts, mainly because there's a need for this, we also supply the employees with meals, accommodation, transport, and in some cases medical efforts, and the like.
ALEX PERROTTET: You talked earlier on about a fund that would be contributed to and then be shared equally in the industry, what kind of mechanism would you be proposing for that?
DS: Well what many hotels do, and certainly all the hotels who are our members do this, is if you come to Fiji, you could contribute to what we call a Christmas fund, and this is shared at the end of the year among the employees. If you have a service tax, all this goodwill and all these schemes in place, that really help, I think would go by the wayside.
AP: This is being proposed by the shadow tourism minister, Viliame Gavoka, what do you think might be the Government's approach to this?
DS: Tourism is by far the largest industry in Fiji, especially in terms of employment, foreign exchange earnings, we are now about 36 percent of the GDP so, we're not small. And I think anything that is done to the tourism industry to destabilise it, I think the Government will take it into account all considerations before making a decision. And I would certainly like to see that the status quo remain and keep the industry on its current track. I mean you've got a winning situation here and if it ain't broke why do you need to fix it?
To embed this content on your own webpage, cut and paste the following:
See terms of use.