By Luke Reilly

“It all comes down to this. Australian jobs. 21st Century jobs. High-tech, cutting-edge jobs.”

That was Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull earlier this week. In case you’ve entered this article in an optimistic mood let me qualify straight away that he was not talking about Australia’s video game Industry. He was talking to the media about Australia’s newly-announced Defence Export Strategy and the government’s plan to grow Australia’s defence industry to become a top 10 global defence exporter by 2028.

It’s a big, bold plan supported by a big pile of cash and all outlined in this big, juicy PDF packed with actionable items and brimming with buzzwords.

Concluding that the Australian defence industry won’t be able to sustain itself on the needs of the Australian Defence Force alone, the government has committed to giving it a very industry specific backrub and an equally industry specific boost.

Loans will be made available to Australian defence companies via a new $3.8 billion fund, and the government has also committed to injecting the sector with a further $20 million per year. This includes $4.1 million for grants to help build the capabilities of small and medium companies, and $6.3 million to implement “strategic multi-year campaigns for priority markets and capabilities, including expanded trade shows and targeted trade missions.”

The Australian Games Industry also got some news this week. This morning the Turnbull Government was chuffed to announce it would be providing support to showcase the Aussie games industry at the 2018 Game Developers Conference in San Francisco in March. The GDC is the largest games industry event in the world, so to help put Australia back on the map the government is sending the Game Developers’ Association of Australia (GDAA) a fat cheque for… $17,000.

$17,000. There aren’t any zeroes missing from that.

It’s certainly odd this token gesture arrived on the same day the government finally handed down its response to the April 2016 Senate Environment and Communications References Committee report on the future of Australia’s video game development industry, 642 days since the original report was issued. Is it just an incredible coincidence, or did someone think springing for a handful of plane tickets to San Francisco would make up for making the Australian games industry wait almost two years for what was essentially a 14-page shrug? Only a single recommendation was supported by the government, but it quickly distanced itself from actually taking care of it and dismissed it as something the industry should handle. All remaining recommendations from the cross-party Senate committee were either brushed with government doublespeak or outright ignored. No funding was allocated or reinstated. No other incentives were implemented, or even entertained. Forget the kind of support and tax offsets the frankly lucrative games industry receives in various other countries, like Canada; the government doesn’t believe in an “industry specific” tax offset in this instance.

Industry specific only applies to specific industries, it seems.

The response from the GDAA was diplomatic, noting it is glad to see a response from Fifield and that the $17,000 GDC grant is “a key commitment from the Turnbull government, and hopefully the first of more support to come.”

The response from Australia’s Interactive Game and Entertainment Association (IGEA) was more pointed.

“To say we are disappointed with the government’s response to the Senate Inquiry would be to understate things,” reads the IGEA statement. “We are incredibly disappointed for the industry, but sadly not surprised, by this short-sighted approach by the Federal government. The lack of engagement and long overdue reply spoke volumes even before we saw the ‘all of government’ response. The industry deserves much better than this.”

That this belated and flaccid response to the Australian games industry comes in the same week the government has committed to making Australia a top 10 defence exporter really just adds insult to injury. If high-tech, 21st Century jobs is really what gets Turnbull tingling, why ignore the video games industry? Why put billions on the line in a quest to be a top 10 arms exporter when we could invest in emulating Canada’s success in games development?

Australia and Canada: both independent former colonies of Britain, each with a vast interior wilderness and a general love of contact sports.

Australia: according to a recent IGEA industry snapshot there are 928 full-time employees working in Australian studios. The Australian games development industry earned $118.7m during the 2016/2017 financial year, with 80% of their income coming from overseas.

Canada: according to the Entertainment Software Association of Canada there are 596 active studios in the country, directly employing 21,700 people. 75% of industry revenue comes from export sales and the video game industry there is worth CAD $3.7 billion to the economy. It’s not slowing down. Revenue is up 24% since 2015.

Video game development is very literally a multi-billion dollar opportunity that the current Australian government is failing to capitalise on. In terms of job creation and revenue, Canada is the perfect example of what a bit of government support can do. In its response today the government claims there are “many” initiatives under the existing National Innovation and Science Agenda which are relevant to the video game development industry before naming just three. According to the government one of these “may be suitable for supporting start-ups in the video games sector.” May. I guess they don’t know for sure.

Not surprising, though. The Innovation and Science Australia Board (an independent board created as part of the NISA) has just released a 125-page report called ‘Australia 2030: Prosperity through Innovation – a plan for Australia to thrive in the global innovation race.’

It doesn’t mention the word ‘game’ a single time.

Contrast this with Canada, which has many programs and incentives – available at both provincial level and national level – that foster game development. Canada wholeheartedly supports its industry. Per capita it’s the largest producer of video games in the world (based on number of employees) and they’re raking in billions.

Why can’t Australia seek to turn millions into billions? More jobs, more taxable revenue, and more games. There’s literally something in it for everybody.

And yet the situation down under is still aptly summed up by Brisbane-based 100 Stones Interactive’s Ben Droste.

The Australian Greens reaction to the government’s phoned-in response today was unsurprisingly scathing. It was the Greens that secured this inquiry into the video game industry back in June 2015. The Senate fully supported the call for an inquiry, which was moved by then-Senator Scott Ludlam.

“The Government just doesn’t get it,” said Senator Jordon Steele-John, Greens Spokesperson for Digital Rights and IT, in a statement published this evening. “It took them over 600 days, and this is the best they have got!”

“They clearly do not understand the creative, economic, and cultural value of this important industry and seem to have logged off. Defaulting to tired lines about their National Innovation and Science Agenda just does not cut it.

“The Government is rejecting the recommendations of its own members and Minister Fifield is robbing all Australians of the right to benefit from the significant cultural and economic contribution that a thriving Australian games industry would provide.

“The funding that the Government mentions is not targeted to supporting the games industry and is not sufficient. This is a creative industry that requires the same supports that film and television firms can access.

“It is hilarious that they have noted the majority of recommendations without any commitment to follow through with them. In response, we note their lack of support for the games industry.”

Funny. With the government fast approaching 30 consecutive negative two-party preferred Newspolls in a row you’d think they’d know a thing or two about a lack of support.

Luke is Games Editor at IGN’s Sydney office. You can find him on Twitter every few days @MrLukeReilly.