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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2025-10-28 Daily Xml
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Cruise Ship Industry

Ms PRATT (Frome) (14:42): My question is to the Minister for Tourism. What improvements can be made to Kangaroo Island berthing infrastructure for large cruise ships and what is the cost in lost trade when they cancel? With your leave, sir, and that of the house, I will explain.

Leave granted.

Ms PRATT: Today the Crown Princess cruise was cancelled due to adverse weather conditions preventing three and a half thousand passengers from disembarking and spending tourist dollars on experiences and with food now spoiled.

The Hon. Z.L. BETTISON (Ramsay—Minister for Tourism, Minister for Multicultural Affairs) (14:42): Just the other week, I was at Outer Harbor welcoming the first cruise ship for the season, which was a Princess cruise ship. Of course, Kangaroo Island is a very big drawcard for those cruise ships. We often have people come into Outer Harbor, KI and then to Port Lincoln.

It was unfortunate that that cruise ship could not stop because of the weather. I don't have the details of how much that loss will be, but we continue to work with cruise ships quite strongly. In fact, I have been quite a champion of the cruise ship industry here in South Australia. When we heard that Carnival made the decision that P&O were pulling out of Australia, I immediately went to Sydney and I talked to Carnival and I talked to Royal Caribbean about what we can do.

We were only given 18 months' notice in Australia, but we know that cruise ships are booked about three years in advance. That is why I formed our Cruise Attraction Working Group. I was so thrilled that Phil Hoffmann, who is very well known in this industry, joined that group, along with the Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA) and the Australian Cruise Association (ACA). We did this just after hosting the Australian Cruise Association for their annual conference. We have been working with them about what we can do.

We do know that nationally we are undergoing some challenges in this event. I have been reaching out to my fellow tourism ministers in Tasmania and WA about how we can build out the southern elements of what we can do, because we know that often there are some challenges with crowding at the Sydney terminal and some increased charges at the Melbourne terminal. We look at this area of Australia and New Zealand as a whole, so this is when we must speak as a nation, along with our cousins in New Zealand, about how we attract cruise ships here.

I am really pleased to say, though, that we have a lot of different cruise lines coming. We have had 16 different cruise lines in this last season. We have had 21 new ships coming here, and that is because people are really attracted to South Australia. We have those very big cruise liners, like the Princess one, which has about 3,000 people on board, and we have our expedition ships, which can have a few hundred. Those expedition ships love what we have in South Australia.

Particularly, we have been working closely with Silversea. Through the Tourism Commission, they have increased how many they have coming in 2025-26. They are really high-end cruise ships with a focus on food and wine, which is ideal for South Australia because that is our number one driver for tourism that we have here. I am really pleased that we have a really strong reputation. It is a challenging time for cruises in our nation. We do have to compete with different weather from time to time, but that does not detract from people being attracted to come to South Australia, and we will continue to build that industry.

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