The upcoming ‘review’ of the controversial world rally held last September through Tweed and Kyogle shires, to determine whether the event should return, threatens to be nothing but a whitewash, given that those conducting the review of the secretly-funded event are answerable to the very minister who rammed through special legislation to wipe out community input from the start.
It’s another rub of salt into the wound, the fact that the state-government appointed Homebush Motor Racing Authority (HMRA), which was set up to hold the outrageous V8 race at the showpiece Olympic Park in Homebush last year, is the body gathering and collating the information from the current community consultation meetings taking place in the shires.

And from early accounts, no cost-benefit analysis will be done by the HMRA, just the local information gathered from business, tourism and other groups passed onto the controversial NSW state development minister Ian Macdonald, who was sacked after a public outcry over his expense account and then reinstated last year after the right-wing coup which felled Nathan Rees. The minister is due to report to parliament on the review by year’s end.
The choice of location for the event was wrong from the start and it had more to do with lining the pockets of mostly overseas TV and sport industry operators than bringing the area into the global spotlight and boosting its economy. In Western Australia, where the rally was kicked out after years of subsidies from the public purse, it was found not to have made any great mark on the economies where it was held.

Why run it past people’s homes who didn’t want it and through world-heritage national parks meant to be protected and showcased as natural wonders? Did anyone bother to ask the locals what they thought back then? How can it possibly change now? Do they think we’re stupid? Even the top driver in last year’s rally agreed with locals that the government should be held to account for running the event where it wasn’t wanted. One can only assume the world governing body of motor sport was also not happy with the way it was run, attracting all that negative media about rocks thrown at the rally cars. The rock throwing turned out to be a myth but it was handily used by organisers and supporters to discredit and demonise rally opponents. Those very organisers had their jobs terminated recently, so not all is rosy in the rally world.

We can safely bet this minister and his government, well past their use-by date, will try to tell us the event made millions for the local, regional and state economies, but they can only guess at that, as so many in-kind resources were diverted to it. The way Events NSW was set up to run such events, with the premier the only shareholder in the company which doles out millions to event organisers yet the amounts are not disclosed to the public, is an outrage. How can we realistically measure what it all cost if we don’t have outlays in the first place? Millions in taxpayers money was believed to have been given to the elite motor sport company which organised it, $120,000 in ratepayer funds per event and all that in-kind support in police, emergency and medical services at local and state government level.

The whole process is a sham. When junior sport relies so much on volunteers, sponsorship and meagre government handouts it’s scandalous to see taxpayer money secretly given to elite petrol-head sports ahead of our children. These same children are now given mixed messages about speeding, when on one hand motor racing through parks and past homes is promoted yet on the other hand, millions are spent to tell youngsters that speed kills.
An alternative business survey recently taken by a community watchdog group found that almost three quarters of businesses surveyed said their takings were normal or lower during the running of the rally, so it will be interesting to see what the expensive review exercise comes up with.