BAROSSA VALLEY AND MCLAREN VALE

Mr BIGNELL (Mawson) (14:50): My question is to the Minister for Planning. Can the minister inform the house about progress regarding the way the character of McLaren Vale and the Barossa Valley will be protected?

The Hon. J.R. RAU (Enfield—Deputy Premier, Attorney-General, Minister for Planning, Minister for Business Services and Consumers) (14:50): As members would be aware, it was announced last year that there would be legislation brought into the parliament for the purpose of protecting the very valuable areas of McLaren Vale and the Barossa Valley from the incursion of urban sprawl. That process began with the introduction, or the laying on the table, of those pieces of legislation during the last parliament, and that was accompanied by the introduction of an interim DPA to prevent people trying to take advantage of the intervening period between the time of the introduction of the legislation and the time of its passage.

Since that time, obviously, the parliament has been prorogued and, more particularly, there has been a series of discussions between members of parliament and me, and between various local government authorities. I would like to say how vigorous the member for Mawson in particular has been on behalf of his constituents. This is an idea that he has been championing for years. He has done a great deal of work in relation to the people not only in his own region but also people who hail from parts further north, including parts represented by the member for Schubert, who also has taken an interest—

Ms Chapman: What about me? What about Bragg?

The Hon. J.R. RAU: Madam Speaker, I promise not to leave—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. J.R. RAU: —the member for Bragg out of this. I will come to you in a moment. Just hang on. What has happened is this, that the interim DPAs have been the subject of some concern by the local members, such as the member for Mawson and indeed the member for Light, and there has been discussion, as I said, with the various mayors, in particular Brian Hearn from the beautiful Barossa Valley, Lorraine Rosenberg from Onkaparinga council and Mr O'Brien from the Light Regional Council, all of whom have pointed out that there could be improvements in those interim DPAs.

As a result of that, I would like to advise the house, as I have advised all of them, that there will be new interim DPAs on foot, probably within a month. Those new interim DPAs will replace the existing DPAs and I believe considerably assist the local government authorities in the management of their development assessment processes. I think they will set the tone for a more comfortable introduction of the legislation which we will obviously bring back to the parliament very shortly.

I can also advise the parliament that as a result of these discussions there have been some very minor amendments to those two bills. The bit that I promised before, particularly for the member for Bragg—I cannot tell you exactly what has happened, but we have listened to you, we have listened to the member for Bragg, and there may be something special just for her when the bills come in.