South Australian Tourism Commission

The Hon. J.E. HANSON (15:17): A further supplementary: is the minister willing to rule out any applicants being either members of the Liberal Party or having attended Liberal Party fundraisers?

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY (Minister for Trade, Tourism and Investment) (15:17): We will be appointing the best possible applicant for the job. As I said, a range of applicants will be canvassed and I will take that to cabinet and we will make a decision. We won't be running a microscope across the potential candidates that the honourable member has talked about. They will be quality people who will actually add value to the South Australian tourism industry.

As we know, we are on track to achieve our goal of $8 billion by 2020. We will have a further target for 2030, I suspect, and the new chairman and the new board will be tasked with, if you like, chaperoning and escorting the Tourism Commission through the journey from 2020 to 2030 to grow our tourism sector and support the thousands of South Australian small businesses. As I said earlier in my contribution, tourism is now the only industry left in regional South Australia that is labour-intensive, so it is a really important industry for the future of our regional economies. We will be choosing candidates—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Through me, just answer the question, the Hon. Mr Ridgway.

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: We will be choosing candidates who understand how to grow the sector and deliver more jobs and more prosperity to hardworking South Australians.