South Australian Tourism Commission

The Hon. J.E. HANSON (14:31): Outside of Indian weddings, what KPIs are actually used by the department, or is the minister is aware of, that were used when they decided to no longer continue with India as a key market?

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY (Minister for Trade, Tourism and Investment) (14:31): It was a decision made during the budget bilaterals as to where we needed to come up with some efficiencies. I am keen to point out there are lots of opportunities. As I said, we have the Indian trade mission and I am going to go back to the topic of Indian weddings. They are massive. They sometimes have—

The Hon. K.J. MAHER: Point of order—

The PRESIDENT: I don't need to hear the point of order. I can anticipate the point of order.

The Hon. J.E. Hanson interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Are you up on a point of order, the Hon. Mr Hanson? Please sit.

The Hon. J.E. HANSON: No, I was going for a further supplementary, Mr President.

The PRESIDENT: The Hon. Mr Ridgway, show some courtesy to the Hon. Mr Hanson. That is testing my patience with Indian weddings. He asked you about KPIs. Stick to KPIs.

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: Tourism numbers are a KPI, Mr President. We have a visitor spend of $8 billion by 2020. We are on target to get to that $8 billion by 2020. When we looked at the budget, there is a mess we inherited, as my colleague mentioned earlier. We have to look at how we can cut our cloth to fit the budget. The decision has been made to do away with the position in Singapore that was India and South Asia. We still believe we will get to our $8 billion by 2020. That is the KPI. So everybody who walks through my door, whether it is for an Indian wedding or any other thing they might be proposing, the advice I seek from tourism is: is this going to get to our $8 billion target at the same rate we are going or quicker? If it gets us the same rate, let's consider it. If it gets us there quicker, let's consider it.

We made a decision. I am sure that India will still continue to be a focus. Tourism Australia does some work. We have some trade activities happening in India, and we will continue to pursue the very lucrative opportunity of hosting Indian weddings here in Adelaide as well.