STATUTES AMENDMENT (ARTS AGENCIES GOVERNANCE AND OTHER MATTERS) BILL

Second Reading

Adjourned debate on second reading (resumed on motion).

Ms THOMPSON (Reynell) (15:52): At the time that I sought leave to conclude my remarks, I was talking about the most recent edition to our wonderful Museum's collection, being the Biodiversity Gallery which opened earlier this year. It uses more than 12,000 models and specimens to tell the unique story of South Australia's diverse wildlife, with the display divided into four distinct environmental regions: arid, temperate, coastal and marine. It is a comprehensive introduction and a conduit for visitors to South Australia to further explore and appreciate our natural assets.

The gallery features touch screen resource libraries, film clips, electronic labelling, interactive specimen draws containing some of the Museum's extensive collections, and vibrant displays to make the gallery visually and mentally stimulating for visitors of all ages. The ancient Egypt exhibits have been a favourite with many generations of South Australians. This gallery represents a new kingdom tomb and houses and artefacts that give insight into religion, burial practices and everyday life in ancient Egypt.

Rare and unique fossils from the Flinders Ranges area are showcased in the stunning Origin Energy Fossil Gallery, which includes a fossil seafloor displayed as well as a wall preserving hundreds of tiny specimens. It also displays the largest known fossil animal of its time, a doormat-sized specimen of Dickinsonia rex, truly the king of early marine animals—550 million years old—and the world oldest known fossil chordate from the Ediacara biota of the Flinders Ranges. Further, the oldest known sponge and coral reefs displayed as polished slabs are from the Flinders Ranges.

The Origin Energy Fossil Gallery's Opal Fossils of South Australia opened to the public in 2001. It shows the mighty marine reptiles that swam in the icy inland seas of Australia during the polar night in the age of dinosaurs. Highlights include: the partial skeleton of a six metre long plesiosaur found in an opal mine in Andamooka in 1983—I need my young niece to guide me in the pronunciation of some of these things. She was better when she was six than I will ever be—Australia's first cryptoclidid (a type of plesiosaur previously known only from the Jurassic of Europe), and a piece of ancient seabed with several hundred opalised shells and fossils from the moon plain just north of Coober Pedy.

Another family favourite is the remarkable exhibition of the material cultures of the Pacific in the Pacific Cultures Gallery, which had its origin when the north wing of the museum opened in 1895. Artefacts on display come from Papua New Guinea, the Solomon and Santa Cruz islands, Vanuatu, New Caledonia, Fiji and New Zealand.

Approximately 3,000 bows and arrows, spears, shields, utensils, ornaments, masks and ritual objects are displayed in the original wall cases and flat cases. This is the largest exhibition of Pacific material in Australia and second only to Auckland in the southern hemisphere. The Pacific Gallery has been preserved as an example of 19^th century museum display—essentially, visual storage.

The Australian Aboriginal Cultures Gallery is one of the museum's offerings that I particularly value. It offers over 3,000 items on display in a contemporary interactive setting, showcasing the museum's outstanding collection of Australian Aboriginal artefacts and archival material. It is regarded as the most significant collection in the world. For over a century, the South Australian Museum has been deeply involved in, and committed to, the collection, study, display and interpretation of indigenous cultures of Australia. The collection comprises artefacts, film, sound recordings, photographs, field notebooks and manuscripts.

This gallery also provides a function which is not normally associated with museums. In 2002 there was an installation called Dislocation. I am particularly interested in that as my brother, Gavin Malone, was one of the artists. The other artists involved in this cross-cultural collaboration were Georgina Williams (a well-known Kaurna woman) and Nganke Burka, senior woman Kaurna.

The work was subtitled 'A journey through Kaurna dislocation and contemporary cultural and spiritual renewal from two cultural perspectives'. This, as I said, offered an opportunity for today's artists to provide an interpretation of their understanding of what has happened to the Kaurna people, but providing proper work for living artists is not something that is associated generally with the museum. I know that the installation attracted strong interest from Indigenous and non-Indigenous people alike.

Next along the terrace is the Art Gallery of South Australia, which houses the most comprehensive collection of Australian art from the time of European settlement in the early 19^th century to the present day, including one of the most important collections of indigenous art in the world.

The gallery also contains the work of Gladys Reynell, after whose family my electorate is named. The Reynells contributed greatly to the early years of this state, yet it is not a name that abounds in this state. I am very pleased and honoured that I carry the honour of being the member for Reynell and can speak about the contribution of the Reynell family, including the outstanding work of Gladys Reynell which is recognised sufficiently to even appear in postcard form as one of the more popular of the gallery's exhibits.

The gallery's outstanding collection of 38,000 works of art also includes European, North American and Asian paintings, sculptures, prints, drawings, photographs, textiles, furniture, ceramics, metalwork and jewellery. Overall, the Art Gallery of South Australia holds the nation's finest and most balanced collection of Australian 19^th century colonial art—especially strong compared with other collections—in colonial paintings, watercolours, silver and furniture.

There is also a collection of 20^th century Australian art, at least equal to the two best of the state galleries and arguably more balanced than all of them. It has the finest collection of Western Desert dot paintings from Central Australia and the largest and most important early Aboriginal bark painting collection of any art museum.

It contains an excellent contemporary Aboriginal art collection, including a renowned holding of Aboriginal craft. It has the most important public collection of South-East Asian ceramics in the world. It has one of the three largest collections of European art in the southern hemisphere, and it has one of the few comprehensive British collections outside Britain, with a collection of paintings, sculptures, prints and drawings, and of the decorate arts, including the most representative Morris & Co material outside Britain from the 16^th century to the present.

It has the modest but impressive Renaissance collection, a significant Italian and 17^th century baroque collection and many more jewels in the crown of South Australia.

Mrs REDMOND (Heysen—Leader of the Opposition) (16:01): I indicate, as I rise to speak, that I am the lead speaker for the opposition on the bill and that the opposition, as may be evident from the speeches already made by those who have addressed the house, will be supporting the bill.

I do not intend to delay the house too long. However, given that the last speaker and a number of other speakers, I think, have spent most of their time delineating the joyous collections—and I take no quarrel with the honourable member in terms of the value of the 38,000, or thereabouts, items held by the art gallery (although a remarkably small percentage of them are on display, and I welcome the efforts being made by our new Director of the Art Gallery to ensure that that occurs)—essentially, a dissertation on that wonderful collection in no way goes to addressing the substance of this bill.

The bill was introduced at the of June, I think, just before we rose, and I thank the minister, his advisers and departmental staff for the briefing which they provided to me and to members of my staff so that we could get our heads around what appears at first glance to be quite a hefty bill. I think that, from memory, it is 205 pages. The reason for that is that it is basically dealing with a whole lot of separate acts, and the fundamental thrust of this legislation is to bring a disparate lot of acts into a substantially uniform management and governance procedure. I will, for the sake of completeness, indicate the acts which are dealt with in the bill and which are therefore included in this revamp of the organisational arrangements.

They are: the Adelaide Festival Centre Trust Act 1971; the Adelaide Festival Corporation Act 1998; the Art Gallery Act 1939 (it is one of the earlier ones, of course); the Carrick Hill Trust Act 1985 (it will be interesting to see tomorrow in the budget what happens to some of these things because, having read the Sustainable Budget Commission's preliminary report, some interesting things are proposed for some of these areas); the South Australian Country Arts Trust Act 1992; the History Trust of South Australia Act 1981; the South Australian Film Corporation Act 1972; the South Australian Museum Act 1976; the Libraries Act 1982; the State Opera of South Australia Act 1976; and, lastly, the State Theatre Company of South Australia Act 1972.

As I say, the government introduced this bill, and the minister gave his second reading explanation on about 30 June. I was able to have a briefing from the minister's office before we rose for the mid-year break. From that briefing, I understand that those acts cover some 13 major arts organisations in the state, two of which are statutory authorities and the rest are public corporations.

The government has been through a consultation process and, indeed, I was provided by the officers of Arts SA with an indication of the process that was gone through, and that included consultation with boards and stakeholders in February and March 2009—and I accept that, so far as I have been able to ascertain, the boards and stakeholders were contacted around about then and they do feel that they have been engaged in this consultation. I will say more about that in a moment, though, when I get to local government.

The list of possible changes to the original process was provided to the minister for cabinet consideration. The draft bill was circulated twice to boards for review (in October last year and February this year). Then, and I do not know why (and maybe the minister when we go into committee can explain), and only then, did consultation with the local government authority take place (in March and October 2009 and then June and July this year). I am a little puzzled as to why there has been that delay in the consultation with local government.

I am not suggesting for a moment that there is any will by the government to do the wrong thing by the Local Government Association, but it seems to me that it was always evident that local government would be involved in the discussions—and, indeed, the government made that fairly clear, I think. However, it has resulted in a situation where, having been through a consultation process and produced a draft bill that has been commented on and adapted, the bill has been introduced and we will now have to go into committee because there are quite a number of amendments proposed by the government which I understand from my discussions with the Local Government Association address some issues raised by that association in response to the bill.

That having been said, essentially, as I have understood my briefing and reading of the legislation, as I intimated earlier, the essential thrust of this bill is to make all of the organisations basically fit into a fairly standard structure in the way they are organised. Whilst we support the bill, I will make what has been become known to Hansard, I think, as the Isobel speech. Once again, this bill introduces provisions that include basically a standard board structure (such as board size and the appointment and removal of members: that is all standardised); board appointment to be limited to a term of three years with nine years' maximum (so three years that you can be renewed on the board twice after your original appointment); but the bit that relates to the Isobel speech is the bit about having a gender balance provision, that is, a minimum of two men and two women on each board.

I raise that simply because I have done so on numerous occasions—in fact, I think nearly every time this government has produced legislation that involves the constructing of any new board it puts in such a provision. Sometimes it is not two men and two women: sometimes it will be at least one man and one woman. Again, I say that we are now in the 21^st century and the job to be done by the people appointed to these boards has nothing to do with gender. We will not have true equality in this state, or any other place, until we get over this need to appoint people according to their gender, because they should be appointed, in my view, upon merit.

Merit should be the only basis for the selection of members of boards, otherwise you end up with a situation where someone of better quality might be overlooked because of not only a wish of the government but also because there is a statutory provision that requires that there be, for these boards at least, at least two members of each gender. I simply say that is an inappropriate thing for us to be legislating. I wonder what they will think in 100 years from now when they are looking back on the debates that we had and whether they will think our thinking is as peculiar now as perhaps—

The Hon. J.D. Hill: I'll be very happy if they are thinking about anything we have said.

Mrs REDMOND: As the minister rightly says, he will be very happy if they are thinking about anything we said. It seems to me, though, in regard to the governance arrangements, whilst I am happy for them to be standardised, there is no need for us in the 21^st century to be saying that we appoint on the basis of anything other than merit for any board appointment. As I said, if we do not, then we get to the point where the people appointed are not necessarily the best people for the job. I am quite confident, by the way, that there are just as many men as there are women who are competent for all these jobs, I just want the best people appointed in each case.

I do want to spend a little bit of time going through and detailing what the Local Government Association has had to say about the issues, and, to that end, I wish to refer to the various letters that are in my possession in relation this matter. Firstly, I have a letter dated 7 July from the Local Government Association to me indicating that they have been aware of the bill at an officer level, but up to this point they say they have not been able to consult with their member councils, and whilst much of the bill has no implications for local government, the proposal to introduce a maximum period of appointment or reappointment for boards will impact on local government nominees on both the Libraries Board and the Country Arts Board and they may identify some other issues. They intended to discuss it at state executive on 22 July and they indicated that they had written to the minister about that.

I next heard from them on 20 August in an email from an officer of the LGA to an officer of my Heysen electorate office. I think it is much the same as they said in their later letter. However, they said in their communication by email that, further to their letter of 7 July 2010, the LGA state executive considered the bill following a short period of feedback from councils. They discussed the merits of limiting in legislation the length of time that a person can be appointed or reappointed to a board, and they recognised that, whilst there were some positive impacts, there could also be negative impacts. They resolved that their officer write to the minister's office to outline some options which may not have been considered when the bill was being drafted. I will quote what they say:

In considering this issue it was noted that currently, should an incumbent member be considered as no longer the best person for the role, both the LGA (as the body which nominates representatives to both SA Country Arts Board and the Libraries Board of SA) and you [meaning the minister] (providing advice to Cabinet on such appointments in the process of providing advice to the Governor) have open to them the option of declining to renominate that person.

The committee considered that there were merits in ensuring 'fresh thinking' being brought to a board in the form of new members. It also considered the position in which a member who has served nine years on a board may still be the best person for that role—and that the proposed provision of the Statutes Amendment Bill was somewhat restrictive in this circumstance.

I know what they are getting at. I served for some 28 years on the board of the Stirling hospital, as I may have mentioned in this house previously.

One of the things about that hospital board was that it was a very stable board. Our constitution allowed for the board to have a half turnover so that half the members would be up for renomination each time; and so you could not suddenly have a whole new lot of people and you would lose all your corporate knowledge and all the structural knowledge that goes with a board membership. You could not lose it all at once, even if there was some massive community discontent—not that there ever was—that led to a rush on board positions. I can attest to the fact that, on occasions, there were people wanting to get onto the board, so we did have elections for board positions.

You do need to keep a balance between what they are talking about as 'fresh thinking'—and I think that is not a bad expression. You do need to keep that balance between making sure that you are getting new blood, new thinking, and you are not just becoming a tired, old group of people who are doing the same thing over and over again, but, at the same time, making sure that you have the best people, including perhaps people who have served for some time. Can I say to the house that when I had to resign from the hospital board at the end of last year—

An honourable member interjecting:

Mrs REDMOND: No—and I had only served for 28 years, and I was by no means the longest serving member of that board. The longest serving member of that board had been there for 40 years already.

An honourable member: Gunny!

Mrs REDMOND: It wasn't Gunny; it was a local and well-known name. So, I think there is value, and I think we need to be careful not to be too restrictive in the way we address these issues. Fundamentally, I do not have a great problem with saying that three terms is probably enough, on average. If you look at people who volunteer with various organisations, I think the average across the board is about seven years, so three terms is probably not a bad compromise. I note that the government has now introduced these proposals.

The email that was sent to me goes on to talk about some options that the Local Government Association discussed. It stated:

The primary options discussed were:

1) The provision might be modified to require a term limit for the board, rather than individual positions. This could be constructed legislatively in various ways, such as requiring a maximum average of three terms for a board—in this way, one or two members might exceed the average and others might be less than the average.

2) The provision could incorporate the capacity to exempt positions from the restriction on the total length of terms in certain circumstances. This might require a formal agreement between a nominating organisation such as the LGA, and the minister, a simple waiver by the minister, or it might require the making of a regulation (which would then allow consideration by the Subordinate Legislation Committee of the parliament). However, such a mechanism would at least envisage the possibility of an exception being allowed.

3) Employing both options 1 and 2 above.

It goes on:

In the case of the Libraries Board of SA on which the LGA makes three nominations, while we recognise the merits of having both new nominees and incumbent nominees, the committee was unsure about the challenges which might occur with legislative restrictions on reappointments including existing skill/position requirements overlaid with additional term requirements. I provide these thoughts for your consideration...

They go on to finish their thoughts on the matter. I am looking forward to the committee stage so that I can get a more comprehensive explanation from the government as to what the amendments proposed by them do and what else, perhaps, these proposed amendments might cover.

I note that, according to my notes from the briefing that we had, the changeover was not actually legislated and that the government, according to the people who briefed me, was hoping that the current appointments, which are generally staggered anyway, will be sufficiently staggered to enable this to be brought in without any undue disruption to the activities of the board.

I also asked a question during the briefing about crown property. I was advised that the crown advice is that it is all owned by the Crown on behalf of the people of the state, and that led to a question about if there was a bequest with conditions attached and the minister wanted to interfere with the conditions attached to a bequest of property which was held by one of these organisations and, in particular and more importantly than anything else, the Art Gallery.

The advice was that if there is a bequest with conditions attached and the minister wanted to interfere with that he could not because on page 18 of the bill there is a clause that provides that no ministerial direction can be given to interfere with these things.

I did also ask—and I cannot quite remember now from my notes what the exact answer was—about the issue of these organisations being structured in a way that they will comply with state and national protocols regarding arts funding. At the time I had in my mind—I cannot think of the name of the artist, but Bill whoever it was in Sydney who had the art exhibition that caused so much public contention. I was advised that funding agreements required compliance with the protocols.

I am not planning to keep the house long, but there was also an issue, which is addressed by this act, regarding the Film Corporation. I was a bit puzzled as to a provision in the bill which was to delete the ownership of the copyright for films made in the state. I think the original Film Corporation Act provided that any film produced by any state government department was to be created and owned by the SA Film Corporation. Of course, technology having moved on in the way it has, it was decided to get rid of that particular provision.

From that issue, there was also a question about, if we owned the copyright of all the films, as I recalled, a provision about the parliamentary library having to have ownership and a copy of everything that was published in the state. This is a strange problem that perhaps we will explore in the committee stage, but I gather that the parliamentary library, because it does not want to have the problem of the storage, does have a power to exempt things.

I think I recall seeing in the bill, in fact, a power generally for numerous organisations to be able to not accept gifts, because I know that a lot of people, instead of getting rid of the rubbish when the green bin or whatever is available, or the footpath recycling or anything else, think, 'This is so valuable I am going to give it to the Museum or the Art Gallery or the War Memorial,' or wherever it might be, and in fact there is a problem with those people gifting things. So there is provision in the legislation for those organisations that do not have the provision that they will now have that protection, I think, if my memory serves me well.

I think that just about covers everything that I wanted to say about this bill. As I said, it looks quite daunting because it is 205 pages long, but when you analyse it it is actually 13 lots of virtually the same provisions; it just has to be worded slightly differently because all of the bits of legislation that are being amended are different. I do thank the minister for making available his staff. I think Dr Paula Furby was not there that day because she was not well, but we had Alex Reid and Hannah Schultz, and Michelle Bertossa from the Premier's office, give us the briefing. I thank them and I thank the minister. With those few words, I indicate once again the opposition's support for the Statutes Amendment (Arts Agencies Governances and Other Matters) Bill 2010.

Mr MARSHALL (Norwood) (16:23): It is my great pleasure to also speak today on the Statutes Amendment (Arts Agencies Governances and Other Matters) Bill 2010. Many speakers have already spoken today about the importance of the arts and cultural sector here in South Australia. It has been a fascinating menu presented today of the wonderful organisations that we have here in South Australia, and I too would like to add my comments to this important debate.

The objective of this bill that has been proposed by the government is to introduce a suite of standardised governance arrangements for the major arts bodies in South Australia. Currently, each organisation has its own governing act. Arts SA reviewed the arts portfolio statutes to determine whether there was scope for, and benefit in, standardising sections of the acts. The review concluded that the variation between acts was not surprising, given that many of them were created over an extended period of time, and that there was some opportunity to standardise governance of these bodies.

The proposed bill will not change the operations or objectives of the organisations; rather it will streamline their relationship with government and ensure a consistent clear set of powers and functions for each board or trust. This bill introduces consistent provisions in areas such as board structure, board size and the appointment and removal of members. A board appointment term of three years will be limited to a nine-year maximum. There will be a gender balance provision with a minimum of two women and two men on each board. Board proceedings are to have common guidelines addressing quorum size, meeting procedures, conferencing, delegations and subcommittees consistent with 21^st century business practice.

In order to streamline government monitoring of arts organisations, consistent requirements relating to budgets, annual reporting and ministerial controls are included. The regulation-making powers under each have been reviewed and made consistent across the board.

The opposition is certainly going to support this bill. At this point I would like to read from the second reading explanation, which was inserted into Hansard by the Minister Assisting the Premier in the Arts. It starts:

South Australia's arts companies and cultural institutions make an immeasurable contribution to our state's culture, heritage and identity. In many respects these organisations lead the nation, and indeed the world, in their collections, research and artistic endeavours.

Never a truer word spoken in this house—that is absolutely spot on. But at the very time, of course, that these comments were being crafted for the minister, the Sustainable Budget Commission was beavering away, sharpening its razor, ready to make some cuts to this important area of arts. It is to some of those areas that I would like to bring the house's attention today.

The leader ended by talking about the South Australian Film Corporation and that would be a good spot for me to begin. The Film Corporation is one that I have vexed opinions on, because of the redevelopment of the Glenside campus, although I will not move over to that at the moment.

Mrs Redmond interjecting:

Mr MARSHALL: Exactly. Precisely right. The leader points out that we are a very strong supporter of the Film Corporation, of course; we just do not want it in any way impinging upon our primary acute mental health facility at Glenside. The South Australian Film Corporation has indeed propelled South Australia onto the national and international stage with feature films such as Hey Hey It's Esther Blueburger—I am sure everybody has seen that and it's a great film—December Boys, Wolf Creek and Rabbit Proof Fence, just to name a few, as well as a myriad of documentary short films, television programs and digital media productions. We are very proud in South Australia—I am sure everybody is very proud—that the South Australian Film Corporation-funded film, Time of Day, won The Best International Short at the 2010 Manhattan Film Festival earlier this year.

When we actually turn to the now infamous leaked Sustainable Budget Commission proposals regarding the South Australian Film Corporation, we note that there is a very strong proposal for the government to significantly reduce funding for this organisation, and that will of course significantly impinge upon the work done by the South Australian Film Corporation.

The recommendation does point out that the decision about where savings would be sourced rests with the board of the South Australian Film Corporation, who, of course, are all appointed by the Minister for the Arts, the Premier. Their proposal points out that savings would likely come from reductions in funding for the Revolving Film Fund, the Producer Equity Scheme, the Enterprise Development Program and the South Australian Film Lab Initiative, all of which would result in a significant reduction in filmmaking in South Australia, a loss of experienced film practitioners who would have no choice but to go interstate to find ongoing work and a reduction in South Australian Film Corporation support for the South Australian screen industry.

In the first year, the Sustainable Budget Commission is proposing to reduce funding by $1.5 million, increasing to $2.2 million in the financial year 2013-14. So, we have a government, which is espousing the importance of the South Australian Film Corporation and the industry, talking about the importance of taking up valuable land on the Glenside campus to move our film hub there, but at the very same time the Sustainable Budget Commission is beavering away, getting ready to swing the axe.

I would like to also talk about the State Library. I noticed in the gallery earlier today that Ian Smith was present here. The State Library is a real favourite of mine. I understand that—

An honourable member: Allan Smith.

Mr MARSHALL: Yes, Alan Smith, sorry—but Ian Smith, of course, is a very strong supporter of the State Library as well!

Mrs Redmond interjecting:

Mr MARSHALL: Indeed, he's got many skills. The State Library is indeed a favourite of mine. It is a little known fact that the establishment of the State Library of South Australia occurred in England and proceeded the proclamation in South Australia. This year, I think, they celebrate the 176^th anniversary of its establishment. It is incredulous; I cannot believe that the Sustainable Budget Commission would go anywhere near this important and august 176-year-old South Australian institution. They will swing the Occam's razor at anything, just to use a cultural reference to the razor, seeing we are dealing with all things cultural today.

The Sustainable Budget Commission recommends the axing of 10 people next financial year, an additional 20 people in 2012-13, and 30 people in 2013-14. I think everybody would appreciate just what an effect that would have on this incredible library, this incredible state icon that we have on North Terrace.

We heard the member for Reynell also speak very passionately about her love for the South Australian Museum, the incredible Indigenous collection, the Biodiversity Gallery and the great investment over many generations that South Australians have made to this fine institution. But, again, has this escaped the Sustainable Budget Commission's glance? No. In 2011-12 its proposal is to reduce staff by eight people in 2012-13, by 10 people, and in 2013-14 by an additional 18 people. It is most unfortunate.

Then, of course, we move to the Art Gallery of South Australia. As our leader pointed out earlier, this is an incredible institution, one of the finest in the country, housing 38,000 objects, valued in excess of $600 million. We have just attracted a new director of the Art Gallery in South Australia, Nick Mitzevich, who comes with much enthusiasm to take over the role from the disgruntled former director, who resigned in protest at the lack of funding that the government was providing to this fine institution. Christopher Menz resigned in disgust, so we have appointed a new director, Nick Mitzevich. The very first thing that he is going to be confronted with, of course, when he arrives, is a proposed reduction by the Sustainable Budget Commission—not an increase, but a decrease. Again, five people cut in the first financial year, eight in the second financial year and an additional 15 in the third. How can we treat our premier arts organisations like this?

There are, of course, many other examples that are contained in the Sustainable Budget Commission proposal to government. In fact, there are 42 proposals that will be directly affecting the arts organisations—42 separate proposals in the Sustainable Budget Commission report here. I would just like to perhaps touch on a few other important ones.

The proposals here for the Adelaide Festival Centre Trust are that the decisions about what will be cut or reduced will rest with the Adelaide Festival Centre Trust trustees. However, the government money, which would be provided to those trustees to allocate for their important work, would be reduced by over $1 million in the first year, over $2 million in the second year and $2.2 million in the year 2013-14.

Of course, there is a massive reduction proposed for Country Arts SA, which is extremely disappointing, especially to many people on this side of the house who represent electorates in the country. We have had them make very strong representations of the importance of taking arts to our regional and rural centres. It is disappointing that the government has set a scope for the Sustainable Budget Commission which includes cutting funding to these important organisations.

Mr Gardner: What is that going to do for the Goolwa Arts Show?

Mr MARSHALL: That is going to decimate, if not completely obliterate, the Goolwa Arts Show. I also see that there is a proposal here to cease complete funding for Vitalstatistix. I was previously a board member of Theatre SA and Vitalstatistix was one of the great organisations which was a member of Theatre SA. Theatre SA is another organisation which decided to sort of pack up its kitbag and head off because of a lack of state government funding.

I see that there is a proposal here to cease all funding for the Leigh Warren dancers, effective 1 January 2012. Again, it is extraordinarily disappointing to learn that this is the scope that has been set by the Sustainable Budget Commission.

I would also like to talk about proposal number 36 here, of 42, which is the proposal for the sale of Carrick Hill. I am a great lover of Carrick Hill. I spent plenty of time there with former chairperson Naomi Williams and her incredibly hardworking board. She did a lot of work there over a long period of time and it is very disappointing to see that the government would not only cease funding for this organisation but would also seek to sell this important property which was bequeathed to the South Australian government by the Haywood family. Arts SA has actually advised that the original bequest requires the agreement of both houses of parliament to sell that property. We would certainly, I am sure, be looking to stifle any move to sell that important South Australian icon. Other proposals included in this leaked document are of course, ceasing of all funding for Windmill. There is a proposal for the amalgamation—

Mrs Redmond: The sale of Carclew.

Mr MARSHALL: The sale of Carclew, the leader informs me. There is also a proposal for the amalgamation of the administration for the State Opera of South Australia and the State Theatre Company of South Australia and, in fact, it just goes on and on. It is very disappointing that this is being put forward. I have always felt heartened that the Premier of this state decided to be the Minister for the Arts, but this decision—and the setting of the scope by the Treasurer for Mr Carmody and the Sustainable Budget Commission to flesh out 42 separate proposals for reducing, and in some cases eliminating, arts funding—really shows the true mettle of this Premier and of this government and their ongoing interest in this important arts sector.

The Hon. J.D. HILL (Kaurna—Minister for Health, Minister for Mental Health and Substance Abuse, Minister for the Southern Suburbs, Minister Assisting the Premier in the Arts) (16:39): I thank all members for their contribution to this debate. It is good to see that there is bipartisan support for the legislation, even though the content of the debates was somewhat argumentative. Nonetheless, I appreciate the support of the opposition for this legislation. As the leader said, this is a very long piece of legislation, but, really, at a fundamental level, it is a rats and mice piece of legislation. It really tries—

Mrs Redmond interjecting:

The Hon. J.D. HILL: Exactly right. As has been mentioned by a number of members, the various pieces of legislation which manage the arts portfolio were introduced at various times when different standards applied, different views were held, different ideological positions were held and different cultural issues were to the fore, I guess, and, as a result, we have got disconnection between the various arts organisations.

That, of course, creates confusion at times amongst those who have to manage the arts organisations, and it means that it makes life a little difficult for Arts SA because it has to apply different standards to different organisations. Some of the organisations—particularly, I think, the Art Gallery and one or two of the others which were introduced a long time ago—have very unmodern provisions in the legislation.

The Art Gallery board, from memory, does not have to have an annual report or does not produce bank statements or things of that order, because they were not contemplated at the time. This bill brings all these organisations into a modern and consistent setting—

Mrs Redmond interjecting:

The Hon. J.D. HILL: Yes, governance arrangements, and I think that everyone understands that, and I appreciate their support for it. One or two issues were raised which I will just address in terms of the amendments that the government has put. We have put our own amendments: one set following consultation with local government, which I will get to in a minute; and another set relating to—

Mrs Redmond interjecting:

The Hon. J.D. HILL: I beg your pardon?

Mrs Redmond interjecting:

The Hon. J.D. HILL: The other set relates to the issue raised by the Leader of the Opposition. Interestingly, the Leader of the Opposition understood the importance of these amendments. I think that the advice originally from parliamentary counsel was that it was kind of accepted that the organisations had the rights to do this, anyway; however, some of our organisations still have in the existing acts (I think the History Trust and one or two other organisations) provisions along these lines now.

They did not want to lose that, because sometimes it is important for them to be able to point to the law when they are presented with individuals who may wish to gift granny's old dress collection to that organisation to be able to say, 'Well, we do have a discretion.'

Mrs Redmond: Are you telling me that I cannot bequeath my mother's wedding dress to the gallery?

The Hon. J.D. HILL: I am sure that anything the Leader of the Opposition wished to bequeath to any of our organisations would be given due consideration and judged according to the issues and the interests of those collecting organisations. There are real problems about being given things and not being able to get rid of them for various practical reasons.

For example, a collecting organisation might have something that it really wants, but then it is given a duplicate which is in better condition and then it does not necessarily need to keep two copies. The copy that it does not want to keep is the first one, and they may be able to swap it with another organisation or sell it to buy something else. So, they need to have the discretion to be able to dispose of it. They have the discretion, which the minister cannot interfere with, to work out what they obtain, and equally they should not be limited in what they can dispose of. That is what they are good at, so I think that is entirely appropriate.

We have a formal arrangement with local government, and we have to consult with it in a particular way which, I think, explains why we came to it at the time that we did. If the leader wants to ask questions during committee, I can get some further advice on that, but I understand that that is the basis of it: once we have reached a decision, we have to go through a formal process. They then consulted and came back with the recommendations that the leader has read to the house. I came back to them with an alternative, which was that we would amalgamate the various positions on the library board so that they did not have subcategories they had to fill. They have advised my officers that that satisfies their concerns, so I think the amendments that I am putting will help the library board.

In relation to the issue of whether or not appointments should be limited in time, it was something I did consider. Some of the existing legislation sets time limits. For example, I think Country Arts has a term limit of six years, and other organisations have no term limits. So it was really: do we get rid of them altogether or do we have a reasonable fair set? I thought nine years (three times three) was a reasonable amount of time. If you are not going to make a major contribution in nine years, you are probably not going to make one at all. I thought that was a reasonable position and that is what cabinet adopted. It could have been 10 years or 12 years, but nine seems reasonable. Of course, somebody could serve nine years and go off for a year or two and still come back on, so it does not say they cannot come back on in the future.

I think it is important that we do have a term limit, even though local government points out (and it is a reasonable point) that the government does not have to appoint someone beyond nine years. Particularly from the point of view of an organisation that nominates positions, if the people in that field know that there is a person on there who wants to be on there, they are less inclined to nominate against them and therefore you do not necessarily get a strong field being represented. But, if everybody knows it is up in nine years, that allows others to put their hand up and express interest, and I think that is healthy.

The final issue is Isobel's speech on affirmative action. I understand that there are differing views on that issue. The government obviously has a policy position in relation to that, and we consistently introduce these provisions into legislation and the honourable leader gives the speech in opposition. In the future, another government might remove all these amendments by way of a statutes amendment bill, and it will be interesting to see how the house handles that. The point I would make about it is a bit similar to the point I made that if someone has been on a board for a long time people do not tend to nominate against them. If you have a situation where most members of a board are male, there is a tendency to just keep reappointing either the same people or similar kinds of people.

As a matter of policy, we moved to 50-50 appointments on boards, but the fact that we do have to consider the other gender does mean that we start looking more broadly, and I think that is what it is about. It is not saying we are going to have token women or token men on a board. It means that we are encouraged, and we have to have a discipline, to look more broadly and, by looking more broadly, we will find people of both genders who have the skills and qualities we want, not just people from one gender. I think that is really what it is about.

In conclusion, I once again thank all members for their support. I also take this opportunity to thank a number of public servants and others who have helped with the legislation, particularly Janet Worth. She is the director of strategic projects. She has been working on this for five or six years now. The idea for this piece of legislation came out of a discussion she and I had after a budget meeting about six or seven years ago, so it has taken a long time.

It was a horrendously difficult job because there were so many different bits of legislation. No-one had looked at them properly before, and they had to be put into some sort of framework to think it through. Janet was very ably assisted, and eventually the job was taken over by Hannah Schultz, who is the director of cultural heritage and assets. I congratulate Hannah for the outstanding job she did—and Janet, too—in consulting with all the organisations and building up a consensus for this across the arts organisations. I think, in the end, everyone agreed this is a sensible way to go, and I want to thank them very much.

I also thank Greg Mackie and Alex Reid, the former and current executive directors of Arts SA, for their assistance; and our parliamentary counsel, of course, Annette Lever and Shirley Fisher, who have worked on this, and my own staff and the various arts organisations that have been consulted.

So I think this is good legislation. It is not earth-shattering legislation, but it does create a very positive set of governance arrangements so that our arts institutions can continue to grow and develop, and I commend the legislation to the house.

Bill read a second time.

Committee Stage

In committee.

Clauses 1 to 9 passed.

Clause 10.

The Hon. J.D. HILL: I move:

Page 22, after line 6 [clause 10, inserted section 20A]—After subsection (3) insert:

(3a) The Trust is not obliged to accept or keep material that is not, in its opinion, of sufficient artistic, historical, cultural or other interest to justify its collection or preservation under this Act.

As I have already indicated, amendment Nos 1 to 5 restore to the legislation a power that has been in existence in relation to some of the boards hitherto.

Amendment carried; clause as amended passed.

Clauses 11 to 16 passed.

Clause 17.

The Hon. J.D. HILL: I move:

Page 33, after line 12—After subclause (1) insert:

(1a) Section 6—after subsection (3) insert:

(3a) The Corporation is not obliged to accept or keep material that is not, in its opinion, of sufficient artistic, historical, cultural or other interest to justify its collection or preservation under this Act.

Amendment carried; clause as amended passed.

Clauses 18 to 35 passed.

Clause 36.

The Hon. J.D. HILL: I move:

Page 52, after line 30 [clause 36, inserted section 17]—After subsection (3) insert:

(3a) The board is not obliged to accept or keep material that is not, in its opinion, of sufficient artistic, historical, cultural or other interest to justify its collection or preservation under this Act.

Amendment carried; clause as amended passed.

Clauses 37 and 38 passed.

Clause 39.

The Hon. J.D. HILL: I move:

Page 68, after line 34 [clause 39, inserted section 15]—After subsection (3) insert:

(3a) The Trust is not obliged to accept or keep material that is not, in its opinion, of sufficient artistic, historical, cultural or other interest to justify its collection or preservation under this Act.

Amendment carried; clause as amended passed.

Clauses 40 to 42 passed.

Clause 43.

The Hon. J.D. HILL: I move:

Page 84, after line 39 [clause 43, inserted section 14]—After subsection (3) insert:

(3a) The trust is not obliged to accept or keep material that is not, in its opinion, of sufficient historical, cultural or other interest to justify its collection or preservation under this act.

Amendment carried; clause as amended passed.

Clauses 44 to 53 passed.

Clause 54.

The Hon. J.D. HILL: I move:

Page 95, lines 25 to 31 [clause 54, inserted section 9(1)]—Delete paragraphs (a) and (b) and substitute:

(a) 3 will be persons, nominated by the LGA, who may comprise, in any combination—

(i) council members; or

(ii) librarians employed in a public library; or

(iii) community information officers employed by a council; or

(iv) any other officers or employees of a council; or

(v) any other persons with experience in local government; and

Page 96, after line 11 [clause 57, inserted section 10]—After subsection (2)—insert:

(2a) A member whose term of office expires may nevertheless continue to act as a member, for a period of up to three months, until he or she is reappointed or a successor is appointed (as the case may be).

This responds to the concerns expressed by the Local Government Association about the difficulties they might have finding three people who comprise the various skill sets that the current legislation requires. They have to have a council member, a librarian and an employee of local government. What we have said is that we will group those all together. So, as long as they come up with three—they would tend not to be up at the same time (by history) so there would be one every now and then—we felt that that would give them enough flexibility.

There are 60-odd councils, they all have a number of elected representatives, they all have librarians and they all have other staff, so there is probably a pool of some hundreds of people that they need to find three from, and I think it is not unreasonable that they would be able to do that. I am advised that the executive officer of the Local Government Association has spoken with the chief executive officer of Arts SA and said that they were happy, comfortable, or whatever language was used, with this proposal.

The second proposal is more broadly based but it is particularly aimed at local government so that, for example, if they did a call and they did not get enough people nominating or they were not suitable, it would allow the existing person to spend an extra three months on the board while they went through the process of trying to find somebody to fill the position, and that was to deal with that carryover. Sometimes, for various reasons, if there is a local government election on or something there can be that hiatus, so that allows us to cover that particular problem.

I should also say that we are obliged to give them three months notice of any vacancy, so that would mean they would have up to six months to find somebody. That makes a reasonable attempt to satisfy local government and, as I say, I understand that they are comfortable with that.

Mrs REDMOND: I have a couple of short questions, and the minister has partly answered the second of those questions, anyway. From what the minister has said and from my reading of the existing bill paragraphs (a) and (b) and the now proposed (a), which will be substituted for (a) and (b), the essential difference is that under the originally proposed provisions one of the three people nominated by local government had to be a librarian employed in a public library or a community information officer employed by a council.

I am just a little concerned that the appointments could now be all from any one of those categories. So, for instance, they could all be council members, and that would mean that local government was thereby excluding from its representation, potentially, someone who actually knows something about libraries. I just wondered if that issue had reared its ugly head in discussions between the minister and the LGA?

The Hon. J.D. HILL: I thank the member for that question; she makes a valuable point. It is often the case that government would want a certain set of skills on a board and local government, or whoever. It is not just the case with local government; I will not pick on those. Often we have people from other organisations who have a right to put somebody on the board. What we do is we ask for local government to give us three names for every position, which allows us then to create balance. Often geographic, gender or skills balances can be created if three names are put forward, and local government complies with that. So, that is one way we have of trying to ensure the balance.

I guess it gets back to the original point made by the member about who is the best person for the job. If local government thinks three councillors are best suited for the job, then what we are saying with this legislation is that is really their call. One would hope that they would take into account that a broad range of skill sets are referenced there and that they would choose in a broad way. However, if they chose three librarians or three councillors and that is what they wanted, is it really up to us to second-guess their representation? It is really a matter for them.

As I say, we were happy with the way it was written. They had some concerns about the difficulties of trying to fill every one of those categories, so we have amended it in a way to give them flexibility. I would expect, however, that local government would still provide a range of skills; they are not silly.

Mrs REDMOND: Can I clarify with the minister what he was saying then. I just want to be sure that the appointments are not at the discretion of the minister; that whoever the LGA nominates are the people who will be appointed. So it is not as though, for each of these three vacancies, the LGA puts up three options and you choose one of them—although that was the impression I got from the first part of what you were saying—but the legislation specifically states they will be three people nominated by the LGA.

The Hon. J.D. HILL: I am happy to. Unfortunately, 'three' is used twice and it has a different meaning in each case. Well, it means the same thing, but it is in a different context. When bodies external to government are asked to nominate, they are asked to put up three names and then the government chooses. For example, when I used to look after the Medical Board—it is now a national body—the AMA was asked to put up three names, I think, from memory, to supply that position. Usually they put them in some sort of order of preference and generally we would go ahead with whatever their order of preference was.

The fact that they put up three names is to give, I guess, the minister of the day some discretion so that, if we have five people on a board who came from North Adelaide and local government or some other organisation were to nominate three people and one came from North Adelaide and two came from somewhere else, you would choose somebody who came not from North Adelaide so you could get some balance. It is to give some flexibility and create some balance on the board. That is why the government has that kind of right.

So, yes, it is true that there would be three vacancies on it, but generally they would not come up at the same because the appointments tend to be staggered. So one vacancy would come up and, historically, that might be for somebody who was a librarian who worked in local government. The Local Government Association would then put forward three names of three librarians and we would choose one of those librarians. If we had somebody on who was a librarian from the country and there were three nominations, we might choose one from the city or vice versa. When the next nomination came up, it might be for a councillor; they would come up with three councillors, and that is the way it would work. That would still be the case; they would come up with three names.

Yet this time, instead of having to come up with three councillors or three librarians, they just have to come up with three nominations. One could be a councillor, one could be a librarian, one could be some other—a community information officer—and then the minister of the day would be able to choose from that menu, to use a term somebody else used before, and choose the one which best fitted the current mix of the board. We might be looking for somebody who has library skills, we might be looking for somebody who has communication skills or we might be looking for somebody who has practical experience of being on council. Generally, these things kind of get worked out pretty well, and my experience is that it has not been too problematic. That is how it would work.

Amendments carried; clause as amended passed.

Clauses 55 and 56 passed.

Clause 57.

The Hon. J.D. HILL: I move:

Page 102, after line 4 [clause 57, inserted section 15]—After subsection (3) insert:

(3a) The Board is not obliged to accept or keep material that is not, in its opinion, of sufficient educational, historical or other interest to justify its collection or preservation under this Act.

Amendment carried; clause as amended passed.

Clauses 58 to 67 passed.

Clause 68.

The Hon. J.D. HILL: I move:

Page 119, after line 38 [clause 68, inserted section 12C]—After subsection (3) insert:

(3a) The Trust is not obliged to accept or keep material that is not, in its opinion, of sufficient artistic, historical, cultural or other interest to justify its collection or preservation under this Act.

Amendment carried; clause as amended passed.

Clauses 69 to 77 passed.

Clause 78.

The Hon. J.D. HILL: I move:

Page 136, after line 10 [clause 78, inserted section 11]—After subsection (3) insert:

(3a) The Corporation is not obliged to accept or keep material that is not, in its opinion, of sufficient artistic, historical, cultural or other interest to justify its collection or preservation under this Act.

Amendment carried; clause as amended passed.

Clauses 79 to 83 passed.

Clause 84.

The Hon. J.D. HILL: I move:

Page 151, after line 35 [clause 84, inserted section 13]—After subsection (3) insert:

(3a) The Board is not obliged to accept or keep material that is not, in its opinion, of sufficient scientific, historical, cultural, educational or other interest to justify its collection or preservation under this Act.

Amendment carried; clause as amended passed.

Clause 85 passed.

Clause 86.

The Hon. J.D. HILL: I move:

Page 164, after line 37 [clause 86, inserted section 5]—After subsection (3) insert:

(3a) The State Opera is not obliged to accept or keep material that is not, in its opinion, of sufficient artistic, historical, cultural or other interest to justify its collection or preservation under this Act.

Amendment carried; clause as amended passed.

Clauses 87 to 90 passed.

Clause 91.

The Hon. J.D. HILL: I move:

Page 181, after line 38 [clause 91, inserted section 5]—After subsection (3) insert:

(3a) The Company is not obliged to accept or keep material that is not, in its opinion, of sufficient artistic, historical, cultural or other interest to justify its collection or preservation under this Act.

Amendment carried; clause as amended passed.

Remaining clauses (92 to 94) passed.

Schedule 1.

The Hon. J.D. HILL: I move:

Part 9, clause 12(2), page 203, line 14—Delete ', continue in office'

Part 9, clause 12(2), page 203, lines 15 to 19 (inclusive)—Delete paragraphs (a) and (b) and substitute:

(a) in the case of a member who was elected by subscribers—cease to hold office; and

(b) in the case of a member who was elected by employees—cease to hold office; and

(c) in the case of any other member, continue in office—

(i) for the balance of that term of office; and

(ii) on such other conditions as if the principal Act as amended by Part 12 of this Act had been in force when he or she was appointed or last re-appointed a member of the Board and that appointment had been made under the principal Act as so amended.

Part 9, clause 12(3), page 203, line 20—Delete 'subclause (2)' and substitute:

subclause (2)(c)

The third of these amendments is I think the one the member wished to ask me a question about. The leader mentioned something about transition. I am advised that there is a transition schedule. It is in Schedule 1, Part 9, and they are transitional provisions. I gather when finalising the legislation an anomaly was picked up, and if we did not include amendment No. 15 then the subscriber and employee rep on the State Theatre Company, on the coming into effect of this legislation, not only would not lose their positions on the board but they would hold office indefinitely, and that was not what was intended, so this fixes that particular issue.

Mrs REDMOND: Can I thank the minister, because that is precisely the question I was going to ask.

Amendments carried; schedule as amended passed.

Long title passed.

Bill reported with amendment.

Third Reading

Bill read a third time and passed.