RAIL ELECTRIFICATION PROJECT

Mrs REDMOND (Heysen—Leader of the Opposition) (14:14): My question is again to the Minister for Transport and Infrastructure. How much has the government already spent on the electrification of the Gawler line that has now been indefinitely postponed?

The Hon. P.F. CONLON (Elder—Minister for Transport and Infrastructure, Minister for Housing and Urban Development) (14:14): Indefinitely postponed. Can I make it clear—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. P.F. CONLON: Oh, sharply done! Can I make it clear—

Mr Pisoni: Get someone else to fix it up.

The Hon. P.F. CONLON: You were opposed to the electrification, can I tell the member for Unley. They were opposed to it.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! You've asked the question—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! Minister.

The Hon. P.F. CONLON: They were dedicated to having the most underinvested rail system in Australia. That is the truth.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. P.F. CONLON: I will be happy, I can tell the Deputy Leader of the Opposition, to answer the question as soon as he and his ill-behaved friends stop interjecting. The amount of money spent on the electrification so far can be obtained from the budget papers. My understanding is that the actual infrastructure that you might call purely electrification would be about $50 million. That infrastructure will be used in the future when revenues recover and we bring back on the investment; it will be. It is—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! The member for Hammond, order!

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

Members interjecting:

The Hon. P.F. CONLON: It's your dime. When you're done, it's your dime. The simple truth is this: during this term of government, we were faced with the circumstance of having a rail system that had been massively underinvested in a—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. P.F. CONLON: Madam Speaker, I am not going to try and speak over them as they interject.

Members interjecting:

The Hon. P.F. CONLON: I have an answer if you would have the courtesy to wait for it.

Mr Williams: Get on with it.

The Hon. P.F. CONLON: Thank you. Madam Speaker, I will do exactly as he says. We inherited a rail system that had been massively underinvested for many decades. We had timber sleepers in a rail system that had a 20-year lifetime that were some 40 years old. I have to say that the only purchase of new rolling stock in all of that period of time had been initiated by the previous Bannon Labor government. We inherited a system that was so underinvested that we looked at it and said, 'Do we invest to bring it back up to scratch or do we close it down?' That is how bad it had become.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. P.F. CONLON: Oh, and now we're back to the State Bank.

Mr Williams interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. P.F. CONLON: So we set out on the single greatest investment on public transport this state has ever seen—more than $2 billion. We were able to have the commonwealth—

An honourable member: Great results!

The Hon. P.F. CONLON: Yes, it is actually a very good result. We were able to have the commonwealth put something like $600 million into public transport for the first time since Federation. We set out to do it. We replaced the wooden sleepers with concrete sleepers. As a result, anyone who rides the trains will tell you—and I note that the Leader of the Opposition is happy to ride a bus as long as it does not get her up too early in the morning. That is my understanding.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

An honourable member interjecting:

The Hon. P.F. CONLON: Yes, we know the story.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. P.F. CONLON: I'm sorry to respond to interjections.

The SPEAKER: Minister, you will go back to the substance of the question.

The Hon. P.F. CONLON: The truth is that that massive investment has been interrupted by the greatest collapse in revenues we have ever had, but it remains that the investment that has been rolled out is the single greatest investment the public transport system has seen. This government stepped up to the mark: it did not close it down; it did not set out to do a bit; it set out to do all of it. That has proven difficult in the current economic times, but I assure the house that we will be returning to that electrification because South Australia—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! Minister, your time has expired. I will give you some leeway because of the interruptions.

The Hon. P.F. CONLON: All I would say is that this is our priority as soon as revenues recover.

Mr WILLIAMS: Point of order. On what basis are you giving him leeway? He is not even attempting to answer the question.

The SPEAKER: Thank you. You've made your point of order.

Mr WILLIAMS: The opposition would not mind giving the minister extra time if he would answer the question.

The SPEAKER: Order! The member will sit down. The minister has concluded his answer.