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Tim Bull slams Labor backflips on free camping after criticism over regional tourism, low occupancy and booking failures

The Allan Labor government has scrapped its flawed free camping policy after criticism over low occupancy, booking abuse, and damage to regional tourism. Half-price fees will now apply instead.

By news@gippsland - 26th May 2025 - Back to News

The Allan Labor government has finally agreed to scrap its shambolic free camping. Gippsland East Nationals MP, Tim Bull, who has been calling for this since before Christmas, said it was one backflip he was pleased with.

Tim Bull said the Minister admitted fault, with half-price camping reinstated to encourage outdoor access and reduce no-shows

Warnings went unheeded

Mr Bull said, "The Shadow Minister for Public Land Management, Melina Bath, and I warned in November and December last year that free camping would result in people booking multiple sites across different locations then picking one and not cancelling the others. We also said people will book and not bother to attend if the weather turned bad, or there was a change of plans, again without cancelling."

"The reason we knew this would occur, is it is exactly what happened in other States where they made this change and had to alter the approach. However, rather than take notice of what occurred elsewhere and fix it, the Minister for Environment, Steve Dimopoulos, decided to attack myself and Melina, then sat back while over Christmas we had 60% occupancy rates in a period when our camping areas are always full," said Mr Bull.

Backflip brings relief

Mr Bull also said, "Following the Christmas holiday debacle, we warned him again, saying we did not want a repeat over Easter, but nothing was changed and the same thing happened again." Mr Bull said this week the Minister finally ate some humble pie with Parks releasing a statement that read "the return to half-price camping ensures more Victorians can get out into the great outdoors."

"Half price camping was one of the solutions we suggested would fix the problem in November. It will stop people booking and not turning up. It is the one piece of good news to come out of the Budget, a backflip to cancel a bad program," he said.

Ms Bath said free camping in national parks was intended to encourage more Victorians to holiday in the regions, yet it did the opposite. "We warned from the outset that this policy was fundamentally flawed. We made it abundantly clear to the Minister this scheme would damage small businesses and the regional economy which relies on the peak tourism season for survival, and that's exactly what happened," Ms Bath said.

Pictures from Tim Bull MP Facebook page.

Source: www.gippsland.com

Published by: news@gippsland.com