NORRIS CARTER: The sky’s the limit today for Hobart Airport, with the opening our newly strengthened runway. We've finished this project safely, on time, on budget and with minimal impact to flight operations. It's a testament to the work of all the crew who have worked on it. It's been over 200,000 hours, laid more than 103,000 tonnes of asphalt, and over 200 truckloads of concrete. 

This means that now we can have wide-body international flights take off from Hobart Airport and land in Hong Kong or Singapore without having to stop on the mainland of the region, saving hours and dollars. This is great news for Tasmanians travelling overseas, great news for tourists visiting Tasmania, great news for our agricultural exporters and great news for our Antarctic gateway. It's also worth real money to the Tasmanian economy, $122 million in additional economic activity per year and over 1,200 new jobs.

I want to particularly acknowledge the support of the Federal Government, who’ve contributed $60 million to the project for our $130 million overall cost. Without them, it wouldn't have been possible.

JULIE COLLINS: It's terrific to be here at Hobart Airport with Norris Carter, CEO of Hobart Airport, but also of course my parliamentary colleagues, my good friend, Minister of Infrastructure and Transport, Catherine King, and my colleague Richard Dowling. We've also got Amy Hills here from Tourism Tasmania.

I think what this shows is just what great news this is for Tasmania today. The fact that this election commitment to upgrade the runway here at Hobart Airport has been completed is great news for Tasmania. As Norris has pointed out, it's great news, not just for Tasmanians who travel, but importantly, it's great news for our Antarctic sector and the fact that we can remain Australia's Antarctic gateway and get those flights to Antarctica coming in and out of Hobart. And it's terrific for our agricultural projects. It's terrific for Tasmania's farmers and producers to ensure that they can get fresh produce off the island faster and direct to some of those lucrative Asian markets, and they can demand a premium price for great Tasmanian produce.

We all know that Tassie has some great produce. We also know that Tasmanian farmers are some of the most productive across the globe and we want to make sure that they are able to access those markets. So this is terrific news and it's terrific news for tourism and importantly for the economy of Tasmania. This $60 million was an election commitment and I'm really pleased it's been delivered on, and I'm happy to hand over to Minister King to talk more about the project.

CATHERINE KING: Thanks very much. It's so lovely to be back here at Hobart Airport, and I thank Norris for his hospitality but also to my parliamentary colleagues, the new Senator for Tasmania, and also my friend and colleague Julie Collins, the Minister for Agriculture. Well, back in 2022 when Hobart Airport came to us in opposition to put the case for why the runway needed to be strengthened it was a no-brainer for us. We felt really clearly that in order to help the Tasmanian economy get produce to market, make sure that the Antarctic flights can absolutely be secured, that investment was needed. So back in opposition, we saw the vision for Hobart Airport. We knew that investment was absolutely critical. And today, this is the Albanese Labor Government delivering on that commitment and delivering on that promise that we made to the Tasmanian people that we would strengthen and build this runway.

Sixty million dollars of federal investment has gone into this $130 million project to strengthen the runway, and of course there are many hours that go into the actual work and construction of the runway, and I want to thank the workforce for doing it so efficiently and with such minimal disruption to the airport and to flights itself.

But of course it's really what the airport– what the runway brings and delivers to the economy of Tasmania. When we made the announcement, Julie and I made the announcement actually in one of the seafood warehouses on the airport, because this is what it's all about, bringing that amazing Tasmanian produce that Australia knows– and bits of the world know how amazing it is, but we want more of the world to experience the fantastic produce of Tasmania, and we want more Tasmanians to be able to fly to the world and we want more people from the world to be able to fly straight into Hobart. Being able to strengthen the runway means more flights– more wide-bodied flights can come in, more passengers can come in and more freight can come in. So it's a great win for Tasmania and I commend Hobart Airway for the way in which they’ve delivered this project and thank them very much for their work.

[Airport announcement]

I’m happy to take questions once the announcement is finished!

JOURNALIST: Can you explain how vital the upgrades are when we do think about Tasmania’s produce and also the gateway to Antarctica?

CATHERINE KING: Well, we know two things. I mean, the gateway to Antarctica is really important, not just for the economy but also for our environment, our engagement with– actually the protection of one the most important parts of the world. But in terms of being able to actually grow the economy of Tasmania, this is really one of the most critical pieces of infrastructure that we could have invested in. This was a commitment, as I said, we made from opposition in 2022. When Norris came to me with that proposition backed by now-Minister Collins, it didn't take me very long to make this decision. This decision, really, it was a no brainer. You could see that if you didn't invest in a runway, if you didn't make that investment, then there was a whole lot of economic activity that would be denied. So getting that freight out– getting those wide-bottom planes in, which means you could get more freight in and out, is really, really critical for the Tasmanian economy.

JOURNALIST: Would you like to see international flights start to kind of, I guess, make it worth it?

CATHERINE KING: Well, I think it's already going to show that it's worth it. We'll start to see passenger numbers increase, and I'd certainly– I know Julie, Minister Collins, has been a long, strong advocate for getting international flights here into Hobart. We're seeing demand is there. Australians are flying everywhere at the moment. That demand in international aviation is coming up. We are starting to see more inbound passengers as well, and Hobart and Tasmania absolutely should be part of that path.

JOURNALIST: Have you crunched the numbers with how much we're projected to benefit from an upgrade like this?

CATHERINE KING: Certainly, obviously, there's the immediate benefits to the economy of construction and then obviously much of the material comes locally as well and I’ll pause for the announcement…

[Airport announcement]

CATHERINE KING: That’s the challenge of media conferences in airports.

So, of course, there's the immediate construction jobs and other small businesses that benefit from the work that's done to actually undertake this work. But it's the long-term benefits you’ve heard Norris talk about. Over 120 million dollars of additional economic activity on annual basis that can come from the services. But I might also ask the Tasmanian [inaudible] to have a bit of a chat about what it means for tourism for the Tasmanian people.

AMY HILLS: Well, thank you Minister and thank you to our strong partners of Hobart Airport. On behalf of the entire Tasmanian tourism industry, we're really excited to welcome the finishing up of the works on the runway strengthening and associated works. For the tourism industry, this really does signify a step change for our industry, and for our industry, we're all about taking our experience to the very next level. And for us, our access gateway being the Hobart Airport right here is so critically important to future proofing our visitor economy. So for us to have the collaboration between the Hobart Airport, which supports our visitor economy, and the Australian Government really seeing the future and the vibrancy in our visitor economy is really welcomed by our industry. The reality is that we employ one in six Tasmanians. That's one in six Tasmanians that are being supported by the visitors that are coming through this gateway. So, investing in intergenerational infrastructure such as this and future-proofing our visitor economy is completely vital.

CATHERINE KING: Other questions?

JOURNALIST: When would you like to see international flights?

AMY HILLS: Of course, on behalf of our operators and as a tourism industry, we'd love to see them coming as soon as possible. We also understand that it's a journey to go on and it's about relationship-building. But the important thing is that the markets that are being looked at really do have an interest and demand in Tasmania. We know we have an incredibly strong brand and the types of visitors that will be coming from some of these destinations will be really eager to come travel around our state, spend time in our state, and spend money, and that's important because it's supporting those Tasmanian jobs and travelling regionally as well. So as an industry, we'll do everything possible to support Hobart Airport and the government to get those international flights here as soon as possible. But importantly, it's also future-proofing our airport for Tasmanians as well because we know when tourism benefits, Tasmania benefits.

JOURNALIST: Can I ask Julie about produce and freight? How much of a boost is this for your sector?

JULIE COLLINS: Well, this is terrific for Tasmanian farmers and Tasmanian producers because it means that they can get fresh produce faster, particularly to the Asian markets where they're receiving premium prices for some of their products. This means that they'll be able to get the product here sooner and it will be in a fresh condition allowing for premium prices. But particularly, for our seafood and some of our berries and some of our fruit, that will benefit particularly from this, being able to go straight to Asia directly from Hobart.

JOURNALIST: We've seen some of those flights in recent years straight to Hong Kong. Is that an initiative you'd like to see expanded?

JULIE COLLINS: Of course, I would like to see a lot more flights– international flights from Hobart Airport. We need to be realistic about what the market is and how we test that. But certainly talking to Tasmanian producers and some of the peak industry bodies in Tasmania, there is great demand, particularly for that freight to go under the bellies of the aircraft, and I'm sure there's plenty of demand from Tasmanians that want to fly into Asia as well.

JOURNALIST: And what sectors are you expecting to benefit the most here?

JULIE COLLINS: As I said, the fresh produce, particularly seafood, and particularly some of our fruit, being able to get to Asia faster and be in a premium condition will allow them to get a premium price for some of their product.

JOURNALIST: I might just chat to Norris to ask some questions. How many extra flights will this open up, Norris, and how many extra people can we see coming into Tasmania?

NORRIS CARTER: The potential is huge. We see about 2.8 million passengers through the airport at the moment. We're expecting that to increase to 3.5 million by 2030, and a lot of that growth can be international. So, huge potential there. And the number of flights depends on the size of the market.

JOURNALIST: [Inaudible]… can you talk us through your efforts to secure a service from an Asian hub?

NORRIS CARTER: Yeah, so we’ve been talking to airlines for a number of years now around the potential to fly to Hobart. They have been limited by the runway, and that's why we invested in this project. Now that we've built the runway, we've got that proof of concept that we actually are serious and can do it. So we're hopeful that we'll see those new flights within the next few years.

JOURNALIST: You've got a new runway. You've got a new terminal being built as well. [Indistinct]…

NORRIS CARTER: That's quite a lot to bite off at the moment, so we're very excited about our $130 million runway. We're partway through our $200 million terminal upgrade, which will double the space of the terminal, provide more space, more food and retail options, and more jobs for Tasmanians. It's a very exciting time for Hobart Airport.

JOURNALIST: Can you just give us an update on when that's expected to finish? And what's that building just straight outside?

NORRIS CARTER: So the building you can see outside is the new terminal, so we will expand into that space. We're pretty excited the first part of that, which is the new security screening area, will open in early September. So, we're only weeks away from that. And we think Tasmanians are going to like what they see when we open it. The whole project itself will take us through until late 2027.

JOURNALIST: And how vital is the upgrade to the runway in terms of our defence aircrafts too? 

NORRIS CARTER: It's great for that. It's one of the things that provides additional capability for the defence aircraft. The first thing is the flights to Antarctica. They support our bases in Antarctica, but for any Southern Ocean activity, it gives them a good access point.

UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Are there other issues?

JOURNALIST: The administrators in charge of Rex have been in place for a while now. Are you hoping that a long-term solution will be found for that airline?

CATHERINE KING: Yeah, well, obviously, we've stepped in fairly heavily to support the continuation and guarantee so that people keep booking on Rex. The Government's been working with the administrators pretty closely. The administration has now been extended until December. The Federal Court did that recently, and we're obviously hopeful for a commercial solution to ensure that Rex keeps flying and continues to be a really significant part of the regional airspace.

JOURNALIST: What was the need for it to be extended?

CATHERINE KING: Obviously, the administrators requested more time at the federal court to reach that conclusion.

JOURNALIST: Do you know what the hold-up is, why a buyer hasn't been locked in yet?

CATHERINE KING: That would be a question for the administrators. The company is in administration and they are undertaking the sale process.

JOURNALIST: What's your goal when it comes to finding a permanent home for Rex?

CATHERINE KING: Well, we want a viable regional airline, and that's basically what the Australian Government has said really clearly. We know that Rex has been an important player in the delivery of regional services across the country. It is too important to fail. It is why when it went into administration, we said very clearly we'd like to see, in the first instance, a commercial outcome, and we've worked to support that. But if that is not the case, then we stand willing to step in. We’re still hopeful that there is obviously a commercial buyer for Rex.

Thanks everyone.