Wine Grapegrowers

The Hon. N.J. CENTOFANTI (Leader of the Opposition) (15:46): Supplementary arising from the original answer: when can the industry expect a response and some decisions by that working group? Because time is running out, Clare.

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN (Minister for Primary Industries and Regional Development, Minister for Forest Industries) (15:46): As I mentioned in my answer—I think I gave the answer to the question that has been asked—I said that the viticulture and wine sector working group has now met several times, including in the Riverland, Griffith and Mildura, where they heard from grapegrowers, wine businesses, grape and wine industry organisations and other stakeholders, and I said that the working group will report back to agricultural ministers on the situation at the next agricultural ministers' meeting.

The agricultural ministers' meetings comprise the ministers for agriculture or their equivalents, depending on their terminology, from each of the states and territories, as well as the federal minister, the Hon. Senator Murray Watt. It is important that we do have input from all of the grapegrowing regions across the country, and that is what this working group has been established to do.

I am very pleased that it is being led by South Australia because the wine oversupply and the issues that arise from that are being felt acutely here in South Australia and even more acutely, I would suggest, in the Riverland, but they are also being felt elsewhere across our state and elsewhere across the country. There is input from all of the states and territories that are affected, and I look forward to being able to see what the recommendations are that come out of that working group and then provide further updates.