South Australia urged to follow Tasmania’s lead and make the Premier the Tourism Minister
South Australia’s tourism industry is missing out on about $1 billion of economic activity. But the industry thinks a shuffling of portfolios in Cabinet could be the answer.
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South Australian tourism operators are being urged to get Premier Steven Marshall into the role of minister for the sector in a bid to help the industry reach its potential.
Last Monday The Advertiser revealed The Tourism Industry Council of South Australia (TiCSA) had economic modelling that showed South Australia was missing out on almost $1 billion a year in economic activity because it was failing to capture market share the sector previously enjoyed.
The suggestion SA’s tourism sector is struggling has been disputed by the Tourism Minister David Ridgway and the South Australian Tourism Commission who this week released figures that showed the outlook for the industry was looking bright.
But TiCSA chief executive Shaun de Bruyn has told The Advertiser, a model adopted by Tasmania, where the Premier Will Hodgman is also the Tourism Minister, has merit.
“TiCSA has advocated for a subcommittee of cabinet to drive the visitor economy, as integrated government co-investment is a critical successful factor for driving growth,” Mr de Bruyn said.
“Tasmania have dealt with this issue by having the Premier as the Minister for Tourism. “Their performance has been very strongly over the last decade gaining market share nationally.
“As an export industry and with over 99.8% of businesses being SME’s, government co-investment needs to be integrated across government departments, this approach will achieve much more for a sector such as ours.”
Tourism Industry Council Tasmania chief executive Luke Martin has briefed members of the TiCSA board.
“Having the Premier as tourism minister has been one of the secrets to Tasmania’s tourism success,” Mr Martin told The Advertiser.
“We’ve had it twice; once under a Labor Premier, Jim Bacon in the early 2000s, and now under a Liberal Premier, Will Hodgman. It’s no coincidence both these periods saw tremendous progress for the industry.
“At a state level tourism extends right across all parts of government, into parks and natural areas, infrastructure, and training.
“That’s why it makes sense to have the premier as minister.”
A State Government spokeswoman said SA is a state that’s growing its visitor economy.
“We will continue to build on our $7.6 billion visitor economy by targeting and attracting high yield visitors to our state.,” she said.
“Tourism is one of our Government’s priority growth sectors, and as part of our Growth State initiative we have been working closely with industry to identify how they need to grow.
“We are responding to industry’s needs by investing more in marketing and infrastructure to make our regions more accessible.”