Kangaroo Island Airport

Mr PENGILLY (Finniss) (15:40): I am delighted to be here this afternoon to announce to the house that Qantas Airways is moving into Kangaroo Island. How would you know that, you may well ask. Last week, Qantas announced on their website that they are commencing a passenger service to Kangaroo Island. This is fantastic news for Kangaroo Island. The website states:

Qantas have announced that they will commence flights year around from Kangaroo Island to Adelaide return and Kangaroo Island to Melbourne return in December and January only. This will present some great opportunities for travellers to easily travel to Kangaroo Island direct from Melbourne in the busiest tourist months of the year and will also give locals more accessibility to transport options on and off the island.

The Federal Liberal coalition government along with the state government and Kangaroo Island Council have all had a part to play in the ongoing redevelopment of the Kangaroo Island Airport. Qantas is a longstanding carrier and a reputable company. The opportunities presented with the additional transport carrier will provide exciting times ahead for the island.

This information was all available on the Qantas website up until late last Friday, and I will come to that. It has now been replaced by a different announcement. However, at this time there are no links available to book future flights.

While I welcome the proposed Qantas service, they must be sustainable and we do not want to see them cease after a short period, as they did some years ago, leaving people in the lurch. In addition, if there are incentives, whether they be council incentives or state government financial incentives (and we will find that out), if they are being offered to Qantas they must also be offered to the current carrier, Regional Express, which has provided a longstanding reliable service to the island. Kangaroo Island is an extremely difficult destination as far as profitability goes, and it is important that the growth in passenger numbers continues so that the desired outcome can be achieved.

It is interesting that it would appear that the government's agent, Wendy Campana, belled the cat at a meeting early last week and let the news out. I am sure that the tourism minister was out there to make a great big announcement when the country cabinet circus goes to the island next weekend; however, the problem is that I have let it out. I can announce it to the world. On top of that, I am sure that he knows and that the Kangaroo Island Council CEO knows. Do the councillors know? No, they do not know. They have not been told, except one who was there when the cat was well and truly belled. It is most interesting. I presume the mayor knows, but I am not sure.

Do not let me be too cynical here because it is a good announcement. Suddenly, there was a rushed Kangaroo Island special meeting last week to give the CEO permission to offer incentives to airlines to come into Kangaroo Island, which included landing fees and such. We will have to dig around a bit further, but it absolutely bewildered me that elected members of the Kangaroo Island Council—and the council owns the airport—were never told and still have not been told. As of 10 o'clock this morning, they still did not know.

I am sure that the bells and whistles, the government, the cabinet and the tourism minister were going to play havoc with this next week and that this was going to be a major announcement while they were on the island. Well, sorry to say, your government agent, Mrs Campana, has let the cat out of the bag. Qantas has changed its website now to say that, yes, you can travel to Kangaroo Island via Adelaide and then travel on Regional Express.

My view would be that someone in Qantas got a very stern rap over the knuckles. The message is out and they have been told to hurriedly pull that off the website and put up this new message. My quotes were directly off the Qantas website of last week. They were up there for three or four days. It makes a complete mockery of the tourism minister and the government that this has got out. It came to me late last week. I had a look at the website on a number of occasions to make sure that what it said was right. It was correct.

Let me say again that I am delighted that Qantas is going to fly to and from the island. It is terrific news, wonderful. It will be interesting to see whether they fly from Sydney to Kangaroo Island, from Melbourne to Kangaroo Island or whatever. At the end of the day, they must have the passengers on the aeroplanes to make it pay, or it will be just another case of good news going bad. I welcome Qantas coming to Kangaroo Island.