Masters Swimming SA

Mr WHETSTONE (Chaffey) (15:00): My question is to the Minister for Recreation, Sport and Racing. Did the state government provide advice to Masters Swimming SA on whether the 2025-26 Open Water Swim Series should proceed and, if so, what was that advice?

The Hon. R.K. PEARCE (King—Minister for Emergency Services and Correctional Services, Minister for Recreation, Sport and Racing) (15:01): I thank the member for his question. I did touch a little bit on this yesterday. I have been meeting with different sport and recreation groups that are involved in beach sports. When I heard that Masters Swimming had concerns I did offer a meeting with them and the department, and Surf Life Saving as well, to better understand the concerns that they had with regard to hosting their event. I appreciate a lot of those concerns were around any financial impacts they may have. We went further into those discussions about what that would mean and what they would need to help make the beach events a success.

I would certainly advise them that we are willing to provide assistance where we can, and we have backed that up this week with the announcement of our Active Club grants that will help support organisations like them, and others as well, which can also help go towards facilities, such as wash-down facilities, asthma kits and any other components that they think will help make that safe.

We certainly had a discussion around the health advice, what is available. Obviously, a lot of that is available online through our algal bloom website as well, as it is on our hotline for people who are interested in asking questions and getting to know the information further. My message to Masters Swimming is that we are certainly here to assist them. The feedback that we received from them is that they are certainly still intending to host events at the beach over the summer. I am more than happy to continue working with them so we can help make those events a success.

Mr WHETSTONE: Supplementary, sir.

The SPEAKER: We will see if it is a supplementary. The member for Chaffey.