Coastal Sport

Ms THOMPSON (Davenport) (15:30): My question is to the Minister for Recreation, Sport and Racing. Can the minister advise the house of any plans to support coastal sport and recreation activities over summer?

The Hon. R.K. PEARCE (King—Minister for Emergency Services and Correctional Services, Minister for Recreation, Sport and Racing) (15:30): Thank you to the member for Davenport for her question. As the Minister for Environment has already highlighted, this member is particularly passionate about the environment and equally passionate about healthy, connected and active communities.

I am really proud to share with the house that, since becoming minister, I have actively engaged with organisations to ensure that they feel empowered and supported to host their events throughout the summer season. I have even taken up Surf Life Saving SA's offer to join the little nippers over at Semaphore South with the Minister for Education. It is safe to say that we are both terrible, terrible surfers, but it was a lot of fun and it was an amazing opportunity to get out there and engage with young people and their families about what the summer season looks like and how much little nippers means to them as well.

The government has been actively engaging with aquatic sport and recreation organisations on this matter, and I really would like to thank the previous minister, Minister Bourke, for all of her work that she has done in this space as well. Just yesterday, I hosted the most recent roundtable meeting for aquatic sport and recreation organisations. There were 17 organisations represented. Attendees included everything from water-based sports, such as Masters swimming and sailing, to coastal-adjacent activities, like Walking SA and also Reclink, who do amazing work in terms of activating people in the community through the power of sport.

We have heard loud and clear from these organisations that they want to continue to hold events over the summer at the beach, and they are listening to the health advice that the beach is safe. We are here to assist them in any way that we can. In fact, we have already provided support to Australian Sailing so that they could launch their Australian Sailing 2025 Youth Sail Championships, which was hosted on 27 to 30 September. We helped provide asthma kits and water-down facilities, and we also helped coordinate, with DEW, a clean-up of the beach prior to the event.

I have seen Kylie a couple of times since this event, and it was really pleasing to hear her feedback about that. It went off without a hitch. There were low winds, unfortunately, but that did not stop the kids from having a good time. In fact, it gave them an excuse to jump into the water and have a bit of a swim as well. It is what we want to hear, and it is nice knowing that empowering them through these supports made them feel all the more confident to host their Women's Keelboat Regatta over the long weekend as well.

This is what we want to support, which is why under the summer plan we launched today we have announced a specific round of active club grants for aquatic-based organisations to be able to assist them in hosting events and encouraging South Australians to continue to enjoy the beach. It is not the only way that we are assisting: we have also established a dedicated algal bloom email address for sport and active recreation stakeholders to be able to contact ORSR directly and efficiently so that we can manage as quickly as possible any concerns or inquiries that we may have.

We have collaborated with Surf Life Saving SA to provide collateral and information so that they can engage with their members and feel equipped to host events. We are helping to coordinate beach clean-ups. We are installing cameras at beaches to monitor conditions, which is also really helpful in terms of other water safety incidents that surf lifesavers look into to ensure that we are safe at the beach. We are also supporting measures such as assessment of water quality and identification of contaminants in the water through the Surf Life Saving Australia operations app, which they are equipping other aquatic sports with. They are providing training to those organisations tomorrow and also next Monday so they feel safe and equipped to make informed decisions.