SA Tourism, Social Media

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER (Morialta—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (14:45): My question is to the Minister for Tourism. Can the minister advise the house how much her agencies have spent on events held for social media influencers since the election of the Malinauskas Labor government? With your leave, sir, and that of the house, I will explain.

Leave granted.

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: The Budget and Finance Committee last week heard that, in addition to the Sam Smith event, SA Tourism also spent an undisclosed sum on an influencers' camp that brought east coast social media influencers to South Australia at taxpayers' expense. The number of social media influencer events quantum has not been provided to the South Australian taxpayers at all.

The Hon. S.C. Mullighan interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! The Treasurer is called to order. Minister.

The Hon. Z.L. BETTISON (Ramsay—Minister for Tourism, Minister for Multicultural Affairs) (14:46): Thank you very much for the question. We all know that tourism commissions around Australia are accessing this new way of engaging with people, the new marketing tools—TikTok, Instagram and YouTube—because we want to gain traction with the younger audience. We are all trying new things; it's not to everyone's taste, and of course it's not for every audience. When we think about these things, it's about getting out there and building back our tourism economy. We have done a fantastic job at building back; at $8.3 billion we are ahead of our pre-COVID visitor economy. Can I just say that I am sick of this constant negativity. Just like the Treasurer said—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. Z.L. BETTISON: —when you were in government just a moment ago—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. Z.L. BETTISON: —all you did was cut, cut, cut.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order, member for Chaffey! The minister has the call.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order, member for Newland!

The Hon. Z.L. BETTISON: When it was the Adelaide 500, a much-loved event, what a misjudgement you made there. The Motorsport Festival: cut, cut, cut. All you do is criticise what have been the best events we have had. What we have is criticism about a very—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. Z.L. BETTISON: —minor spend out of the marketing budget, but what we don't have is support for South Australia.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Member for Morialta! Member for Florey! Member for Newland! The minister has the call.

The Hon. Z.L. BETTISON: What we have is people saying, 'We don't want to challenge those perceptions. We don't want to build back South Australian tourism. What we want to do is knock, knock, knock.' It's all you ever do.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! The member for Morialta is called to order.

The Hon. J.A.W. Gardner interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Morialta is warned, and the member for Chaffey is on three warnings. The Treasurer is called to order, and the member for Florey joins the list of warnings.

The Hon. Z.L. BETTISON: What we know is that business confidence is up. Business SA: we have the highest confidence in the nation on the back of major events. I was just up at ATE (Australian Tourism Exchange) two weeks ago. Everyone was talking about South Australia.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! The member for Florey is warned for a second time. The member for Colton is warned. Member for Mawson, order! Member for Morialta on a point of order.

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: Thank you, sir. The question was very straightforward: how much was the campaign involving influencers?

The SPEAKER: Very well.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! I understand by implication that the standing order raised with me is 98: debate. There is some force in the member's submission. I will listen carefully. The minister has the call.

The Hon. Z.L. BETTISON: I have answered that question: a very minor part of the marketing campaign. But what do we see? What do we see out there? Everyone talks to me about how great the AFL Gather Round was. Whatever we were doing—we were out on the doors and in street-corner meetings—people were coming to us.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! The minister has the call.

The Hon. Z.L. BETTISON: But let's talk about the Tourism Exchange.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. Z.L. BETTISON: More than 50 operators were in Brisbane, and I got to catch up with the tourism minister of Queensland. The first thing he said to me: 'Fantastic job you're doing there.' We are seeing the Premier, we are seeing South Australia. We are out there. We are building that. People are talking about us—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. Z.L. BETTISON: —in a way they never talked about us before.

Mr Whetstone interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Member for Chaffey!

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. Z.L. BETTISON: This is an exceptional time for tourism—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! The minister has the call.

The Hon. Z.L. BETTISON: —with more to go.

The Hon. J.A.W. Gardner interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Member for Morialta!

The Hon. Z.L. BETTISON: This government is looking at the future. We see a great opportunity for us to continue to grow tourism, and with tourism comes investment. We see the hotel sector. They were here at a major conference just last week, 1,400 delegates. This is where the hotel deals are done, and they are excited about South Australia, so excited they are coming back for a fourth year next year.