South Australian Tourism Commission

Mr BELL (Mount Gambier) (15:01): My question is to the Minister for Tourism. Can the minister explain why the CE of SATC authorised reimbursement for an employee's expenditure for three pairs of underwear, and does he think this is an appropriate use of taxpayers' money?

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) (15:01): What have we got left? Three minutes? Jocks-gate!

An honourable member interjecting:

The Hon. L.W.K. BIGNELL: I don’t know. I think if he had been on a trip to India or somewhere, we might be able to look at some reasons why he needed the three pairs of jocks. I am not exactly sure what the reason was.

Mr Hughes: Tell them you'll get a brief on that one.

The Hon. L.W.K. BIGNELL: The member for Giles suggests I get a brief—very good work. This was a trip to Darwin, where I think the food is pretty good, so it couldn't have been the food. That actually wasn't the CE of the Tourism Commission who authorised the spending of money on reimbursement for three pairs of jocks. It was under the old regime where we had a Motor Sport Board which was set up by the opposition when they ran the Clipsal 500 back in 1999.

My thought was, if I am going to cop responsibility for someone getting reimbursed for three pairs of jocks, I don't want to outsource that to someone who doesn't tell me what they are doing. So, what we did was we decided to get rid of this Liberal invention of a Motor Sport Board so that we had more control over what was going on. Of course, the people involved in the Motor Sport Board kept telling me that it would be a disaster, that the Clipsal 500 would be a disaster, without the Clipsal 500 board, the Motor Sport Board, but my thoughts were that if we could run the biggest bike race in the world outside of the Tour de France, then we could probably do a pretty good job of running the motorsport race here, the Clipsal 500. One of the big advantages of taking it away from the Motor Sport Board and getting rid of them was that now that it is under tourism—

Mr MARSHALL: Point of order, sir: I ask that you direct the minister to return to the substance of the question.

The SPEAKER: The minister will return to the content of the question.

The Hon. L.W.K. BIGNELL: The question was wrong in the fact that it asked why the CE of the South Australian Tourism Commission approved it. As I have pointed out, the CE had nothing to do with it because it was done under a Liberal regime set up by the Liberal Party with the Motor Sport Board. We had no sight on this approval.

Mr Bell interjecting:

The Hon. L.W.K. BIGNELL: I thought the member for Mount Gambier might have asked me about the extra $1 million that we are putting into the Mount Gambier Airport, taking our commitment up to $4 million, when the local member down there—the biggest Poindexter in Australian politics—Tony Pasin, hasn't put in a cent.

Mr Bell: What are you talking about? I'm in opposition.

The Hon. L.W.K. BIGNELL: No, you are a good bloke. We like the member for Mount Gambier.

The SPEAKER: Point of order, member for Bragg.

Ms CHAPMAN: Mount Gambier is a long way from the underpants scandal.

The Hon. L.W.K. BIGNELL: Jocks-gate I think sounds better.

The SPEAKER: Can we come back to the underpants?

The Hon. L.W.K. BIGNELL: I reckon we are done.