Tourism

The Hon. J.M. RANKINE (Wright) (15:17): My question is to the Minister for Tourism. How is the state government promoting South Australia to international markets?

Mr Pisoni interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Unley is warned for the second and final time.

The Hon. L.W.K. BIGNELL (Mawson—Minister for Agriculture, Food and Fisheries, Minister for Forests, Minister for Tourism, Minister for Recreation and Sport, Minister for Racing) (15:17): You don't sell the place sitting at home.

Mr Pisoni interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Unley can leave for the next 45 minutes.

The honourable member for Unley having withdrawn from the chamber:

The Hon. L.W.K. BIGNELL: I thank the member for Wright for the question. The visitor economy is worth $5.4 billion to South Australia and there are 32,000 jobs across South Australia. It is not all in the city; tourism is one of those great industries that employs people and engages small business right across South Australia. We have $35 million in this latest state budget for the tourism sector. That is additional money that we are using on marketing, both interstate and overseas, and in creating new events and conferences to bring more people to South Australia from interstate and overseas.

Last week we had the South Australian Tourism Exchange here in Adelaide where we had tourism agents from Malaysia, India and Singapore and they were shown around—

Mr Knoll interjecting:

The Hon. L.W.K. BIGNELL: The member for Schubert keeps talking and making inane comments. We actually took these people up to his electorate, up to the Barossa Valley. If he doesn't want to take the tourism industry seriously, we do. It is worth $5.4 billion. In estimates, he didn't ask a single question about tourism and he was on for an hour.

Mr Whetstone interjecting:

The Hon. L.W.K. BIGNELL: Well, you spend money to make money and I think people know that. You don't sell stuff by sitting at home. So we had nine buyers from Singapore, we had nine from the—

Mr Speirs interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Bright is called to order. I hope he would do more to uphold standards of civility.

The Hon. L.W.K. BIGNELL: We had nine buyers from Singapore, nine from Malaysia and four from India. We had 24 South Australian tourism operators who engaged in the tourism exchange. In the Barossa among the places the delegates visited were the Lyndoch Lavender Farm, Maggie Beer's Farm Shop and Seppeltsfield Wine. Closer to Adelaide the delegates were able to take part in a dolphin swim with Temptation Sailing and visited Cleland Wildlife Park and Beerenberg Farm. On Kangaroo Island the delegates visited Clifford's Honey Farm, Island Pure Sheep Dairy, the Flinders Chase National Park, the Raptor Domain—that is a terrific tourism operation—and Seal Bay, to name a few. Down in my neck of the woods, the delegates had the opportunity to visit Red Poles Gallery and D'Arenberg Wines.

Last Friday the delegates were given the unique opportunity to explore Adelaide's CBD by participating in an Adelaide Amazing Race Challenge and also visited and experienced a number of our hotels in Adelaide during their stay. We must point out that we have had four extra hotels come online in the CBD in the last two years. That is 660 extra rooms that we have available to all the extra tourists who are coming to South Australia. We have 1,700 more hotel rooms in the pipeline with seven new developments to be opened between now and March 2018. The visitor economy is going well and, by conducting things like this tourism exchange with three very important markets for South Australia, we will continue to grow that. We have set an ambitious target of $8 billion by 2020, we currently sit at $5.4 billion, so we have a lot of hard work to do but we are not going to leave any stone unturned as we chase that figure of $8 billion and 41,000 jobs.

The SPEAKER: The motion before the house—

Mr VAN HOLST PELLEKAAN: We have 15 seconds.

The SPEAKER: No, it is quite usual for the minister to act as a night watchman and to use all his allotted time but, on this occasion, he left 10 seconds spare. The motion before the house is that the house note grievances.