Regional Tourism

The Hon. T.J. STEPHENS (14:41): My question is to the Minister for Trade, Tourism and Investment. Could the minister please update the chamber on his engagement over the past three months with the regional tourism industry as part of the Marshall Liberal government's commitment to building strong regions, to growing jobs and to working with a passionate tourism industry to deliver its $8 billion target?

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY (Minister for Trade, Tourism and Investment) (14:42): I thank the honourable member for his ongoing and enduring interest in the tourism industry. As members would be aware, today is the first day back from our parliamentary winter break and it rounded out three months of regional visits, with visits to the Barossa, Clare, Yorke Peninsula and the Limestone Coast. Throughout these six regional trips, 17 regional tourism workshops—one at the town hall, one at Glenelg and 17 in regional South Australia—at three hours at a time, which is some 57 hours of meetings. We think between 800 and 1,000 tourism and community stakeholders were at those meetings.

It has been a bit of a rigorous task but very worthwhile. It is something that without the involvement of SATIC (the South Australian Tourism Industry Council) we wouldn't have had such an extensive tour. I made it clear at a number of these workshops that I had always made a commitment, my staff and I, that if we were fortunate enough to win the election, after the regional visitor strategy had been released we would do some regional visits.

SATIC, under Shaun de Bruyn's leadership, said, 'We'll organise them for you.' I suspect I would have done half a dozen or so strategic ones across the state but they organised 19 of them and I do thank them for that because we committed to it and it has been a wonderful opportunity to engage with the tourism industry, regional development people, local government and interested community people right across the state. We have travelled some 5,500 kilometres and met some of the state's most energetic tourism people, people like Trevor Wright in Marree with Wrightsair, who is passionate about a new opportunity he has with the Painted Hills of Anna Creek Station, which has only become available since the Williams family bought Anna Creek Station.

He said to me, 'It is better than Ayers Rock and better than the Bungle Bungles.' I was a bit doubtful. We landed at the Painted Hills and it was spectacular, absolutely spectacular, so maybe he is right and I am wrong. We met with Geoff Morgan, the very talented and passionate artist in Hawker. We met with Brendan Bevan from Arkaba Station and he immersed me—and I have said this to a number of people—I have seen, I suspect, maybe not a million but hundreds of thousands of kangaroos and probably millions of galahs in my time, and I won't make any reference to anybody in this chamber when I am talking about galahs, but Brendan Bevan has brought his South African tour guiding and hosting expertise to Arkaba Station and immersed us in this experience that was absolutely world class.

It was absolutely world class to the point where we went into a little hide to take some photographs of the birds as they came to drink in the evening. The only problem with that was that I coughed at the wrong time and they all flew off and nobody got any photographs—but they were all there. I couldn't help myself, I had a little frog in the throat—obviously not a nice native frog—that had jumped in there and made me cough.

The Ceduna Aboriginal Arts and Culture Centre had a spectacular array of beautiful Indigenous art, some of the best I've ever seen, and Tony Sharley, with his River Murray walks, is a really passionate man who has enlivened the River Murray. One issue I thought was rather strange—and again this is an issue I need to take up with my federal colleagues—is that you can have a local footy club hire a houseboat on a weekend and cruise down the river, but if you are a tour operator like Mr Tony Sharley, with high-end paying guests, you have to be a Certificate III Master, I think. That means you are actually qualified to sail out in the ocean before you're able to take paying guests on a houseboat.

That is an issue we are going to take up with the federal government because there are some great tourism operators, there are some great success stories, and we want to make sure that one of the big takeaways from this is that we need a whole-of-government approach. So as a priority, moving forward I will be working much closer with minister Speirs on all the issues that overlap with nature-based tourism, our wonderful natural beauty and tourism. That is clearly something the industry is passionate about and that visitors are also passionate about.

Some of the issues raised included getting visitors to stay another day, as well as more events and more diversification around tourism offerings. I think that is why there was a lot of interest in our Adelaide-Melbourne bike path; again, that is an opportunity to get people out into the regions.

Another issue is skills in this particular sector. We should look at tourism and hospitality as a lifelong career, not just something you do while you are at university or between jobs but something you do as a young person where we can train you and you can work your way through the differing levels of management in the tourism and hospitality sector. It is a really good opportunity, and I think we have some opportunities in and around that as we move forward.

Tourism infrastructure was of particular interest, and last week we announced the Port Wakefield Road intersection upgrade. When that is completed the people of Yorke Peninsula—and I know the Hon. Ms Burke—will find, when they are going back to see family for holidays, that they won't have to plan to leave early or stay on for extra time, they won't have to plan how they manage it. They will actually be able to spend more time enjoying family time on Yorke Peninsula.

The trips were a real success, and we now have an opportunity to really grow regional visitors in South Australia. They now account for 41 per cent of visitor expenditure, so in our move towards a target of $8 billion by 2020 regional South Australia's share of 41 per cent will be $3.28 billion if it continues at that level. There are some great opportunities.

The PRESIDENT: Are we coming to a conclusion?

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: I will just add that one of the things—

The PRESIDENT: I hope it's short because we are close to, if not over, the four-minute mark.

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: I know; I am trying to keep it short. You can tell I'm very passionate about tourism.

The PRESIDENT: I understand your passion.

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: I think one thing we have to understand—and it is good for all members to understand this—is that there are very few labour-intensive industries left in regional South Australia. Agriculture, manufacturing and, even though the Hon. Mark Parnell is not fond of it, mining all use more technology and fewer people in regional South Australia. There is only one industry left that is labour-intensive, and that is tourism and hospitality.

So if we are to grow our regional population—and last year our regional population declined by 12 people, it went backwards—we have to make sure we keep supporting our regional tourism operators. They have an opportunity to grow the state's population. I will give two quick statistics: if Rawnsley Park were still running sheep, albeit quite profitably with the wool prices, they would be employing one and a half extra jackaroos or station hands or jillaroos or whatever, but as tourism operators they employ 21 staff; if Arkaba Station were still running sheep they would have three full-time staff, but they have 24 full-time staff as a tourism operation. So members can see how they underpin regional—

The Hon. K.J. MAHER: Point of order, Mr President.

The PRESIDENT: The Leader of the Opposition is questioning your passion, minister, and I take the point of order.

The Hon. K.J. MAHER: This has been an extraordinarily long answer.

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: I have just about finished, Mr President.

The PRESIDENT: I am going to allow you to finish that statistic and then you can sit down, minister.

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: What those two—

The Hon. J.S.L. Dawkins interjecting:

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: Yes. What those two businesses—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Get the statistic out, Hon. Mr Ridgway.

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: What those two businesses—Rawnsley Park and Arkaba Station—do means that the town of Hawker has more kids at school, shops that are open and is more vibrant because of the investment in tourism.