Shanghai Trade Office

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER (14:28): Why is the minister happy to condone his agency paying the rent on an office for seven staff when at the moment it's only employing one, and his ambition is only to increase it to a staff of two?

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY (Minister for Trade, Tourism and Investment) (14:28): I find it strange, and that's why I am interested in the source of the honourable member's information for her question because I don't recall ever seeing a departmental brief with three staff from the SATC—from the three staff from the SATC. So I am interested in that.

The office—we have negotiated with Austrade a particularly good deal. There is room to expand. It won't hold seven people. I honestly don't know where the honourable member has got that information; I don't recall seeing it. It may have been in early discussions, but I certainly have no recollection, and I will be asking my department as to where—if that is a South Australian Department for Trade and Investment internal brief, I will be interested to know its source.

So we don't have an office for seven with one person. That's a ridiculous statement from the member opposite who seems to have, in the last few days, decided not to wear a tie anymore. I don't know whether he has had another accident with his soup or whether that is a new approach to the dress standards in this wonderful chamber.