Tuesday, 12 November 2024

Ministers statements: Melbourne Cup Carnival

Anthony CARBINES (Ivanhoe – Minister for Police, Minister for Crime Prevention, Minister for Racing) (14:45): I rise to update the house on Australia’s original major event, and of course I am talking about the biggest Melbourne Cup Carnival since 2018, a carnival that directly employed 14,000 Victorians across the carnival week. My friend the Minister for Tourism, Sport and Major Events said that Melbourne is clearly the events capital of the nation, and nowhere was that more obvious than at Flemington last week. It was a privilege to join some 285,000 people that flocked to headquarters for one of the world’s truly great events, a crowd increase of more than 8 per cent on last year. Over 91,000 people attended the Melbourne Cup on the Tuesday, including the Premier, international guests such as Elizabeth Hurley and Sir Bob Geldof, some past tennis stars as well and a number of colleagues in this place. Indeed the federal Leader of the Nationals I do not think is a great national promoter of Victoria, but even Mr Littleproud was moved to say that Victoria does it better than anywhere else. It was great to see the number of young people out having a super day – 45 per cent of general admission tickets sold to people under 35 – and Cup Day general admissions sold out.

But it was not all racing, with the park precinct hosting international acts such as Anastacia and Ronan Keating. The cup carnival crowd raised some $660,000 for the Poppy Appeal and also for the Good Friday Appeal. Catering served some 60,000 sandwiches, 55,000 pies –

Peter Walsh: On a point of order, Speaker, the minister has given us a long guest list of those who were at the races. I was just wondering if Wayne Gatt was there.

The SPEAKER: There is no point of order.

Anthony CARBINES: 15,000 tonnes of hot chips. Nearly 2 million people tuned in to Nine’s free-to-air coverage, a 12 per cent increase on last year, year on year. Pictures were beamed to 228 international markets – 750 million people. It is why our Major Racing Events Fund of $15 million is backing racing jobs. Victorian racing is worth $4.7 billion in this state. It provides 35,000 jobs. The Allan Labor government backs racing jobs in Victoria, the major events capital of the world.