River Revival Voucher Program

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER (Morialta—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (15:00): My question is to the Minister for Tourism. How many River Revival tourism vouchers have been used by South Australian tourists since the summer flooding?

The Hon. Z.L. BETTISON (Ramsay—Minister for Tourism, Minister for Multicultural Affairs) (15:00): Thank you so much. Obviously, we had a commitment, the largest commitment ever to two single regions of the tourism campaign for $4.6 million. As a government, we knew that we had to support when the river was rising, as we feed back and recover and we get back on our feet. We have made an incredible commitment from tourism with a $1.1 million campaign and more than $3 million, of course, in tourism vouchers.

The vast majority of round 1 vouchers, which is more than 4,000, are used by South Australians. People in those neighbouring areas—Mildura—were invited to be part of the ballot, but they received a very small amount. I am pleased to say that $1.8 million has been booked already. Of course, this booking had to be made by the end of April and the experience taken by the end of June.

Can I thank those South Australians who entered the ballot. We saw more than 130,000 people put forward their desire to win one of the vouchers. More importantly, this is about us not taking our eyes off the river regions. They need our help; they need our support. Our next vouchers will focus on a $750 voucher on houseboats, as well as experiences and accommodation.

We on this side of the house are supporting the build back of our river regions. We have committed to doing so. We know that tourism is one of the ways that we can continue to give back. We have recently had some workshops down there and some surveys, also, of those people who didn't use the vouchers to understand why that didn't happen, and that will inform us when we do those next rounds.

We have never done it just focused on two regions—very different from the Great State Voucher, which was the whole of metro Adelaide and the whole of South Australia. We are very concentrated. What this means is that we are tightly engaged with the industry. We are being led by the industry about what they need to recover and build back.