The Baillie Family

Hayley Baillie, the daughter of well-known Australian centi-millionaire Dick Smith, runs a luxury hotel business with her husband, James Baillie. Established in 2003, Baillie Lodges owns property in Australia’s most pristine natural environments, including Lord Howe Island, the Daintree and Uluru, and has also expanded to New Zealand, Canada and Chile. Many environmental concerns have been continuously raised about such luxury developments. Marketed as high-end, environmentally conscious “barefoot luxury”, the Baillie business is becoming a major global player in tourism and real estate. Although it is difficult to estimate the total value of their commercial portfolio, the Baillies’ residential property alone is allegedly worth around $25 million, which includes waterfront properties in some of Sydney’s most prime real estate.

In Australia, luxury developments in ecologically sensitive areas have been criticised for the increasing threats they pose to the environment, and the Baillies have faced community backlash in the areas in which their businesses operate. The initial development of the Baillies’ Southern Ocean Lodge on Kangaroo Island, for instance, was opposed by locals and the Kangaroo Island Council. According to a 2011 report, the Native Vegetation Act 1991 would have prevented the lodge’s construction in the first place. However, allegedly due to pressure from Tourism SA lobbyists, the South Australian government used the SA Development Act 1993 to allow the lodge’s construction. The report stated that there were “alternative sites available to developers” but the site in question was chosen because it was “the most pristine and had the biggest views”. Locals again protested plans for the rebuilding of the Southern Ocean Lodge following Kangaroo Island’s catastrophic bushfires in 2020, which resulted in a Supreme Court dispute. The Kangaroo Island Eco-Action group stated that they opposed the lodge for its “impact on the wilderness and the fire risk”, but the $55 million dollar rebuild went ahead, and the lodge reopened in 2023. The Baillies commissioned a documentary of its reconstruction in which they emphasised they were “not going to give up just like that”, describing the fire-affected area as a “blank canvas”.

In 2022, the Baillies acquired the Tierra Hotel in Torres del Paine National Park in the Chilean region of Patagonia. Patagonia has seen a significant increase in tourism, specifically luxury and “last chance” tourism, due to melting glaciers in the area. Tourism and the privatisation of land have not only accelerated environmental degradation but have also contributed to the dispossession of Chile’s indigenous Mapuche people. Despite legal reform designed to protect indigenous land rights and national parks, the Chilean government continues to sell land to wealthy investors in the region of Patagonia, with reports that foreign investment reached its highest levels in nine years in 2023. Baillie Lodges “plans to expand the Tierra hotel platform in the years to come through acquisitions and new greenfield developments”.

According to Baillie Lodges Executive Chairman Michael Moret-Lalli, its aim is to establish a “global luxury lodge platform”, and according to Hayley Baillie, the business is “on track to be the most significant player in the luxury experiential space in Australia”. Hayley Baillie, who describes herself as a “champion of First Nations art and culture”, has been a board director of Tourism Australia since 2015. The Baillies support the Australian String Quartet, the Australian Ballet, and the National Portrait Gallery.