Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Climate Change and Water) Share this | Hansard source

I was saying that we have closed one tender and reopened another. I assume from the question about finalisation that the good senator refers to the actual finalisation of contracts and transfer arrangements. He asked these questions in estimates and I think he will recall that that can often take some time. My view was that we needed to progress the purchases in both the northern and the southern basin. It is not necessary to await all of the contracts being finalised and all of the trades being registered. As the good senator knows, that can take some time. In fact, our experience of the initial purchase round held last year—the $50 million—was that it did—