INDUSTRY PARTICIPATION ADVOCATE

Mr SIBBONS (Mitchell) (15:20): Thank you, Madam Speaker.

Members interjecting:

Mr SIBBONS: Sorry, Mr Speaker!

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Mitchell has the call.

Mr SIBBONS: My question is to the Minister for Manufacturing, Innovation and Trade. Can the Minister for Manufacturing, Innovation and Trade inform the house of the establishment of an Industry Participation Advocate?

The SPEAKER: Minister for Manufacturing.

The Hon. T.R. KENYON (Newland—Minister for Manufacturing, Innovation and Trade, Minister for Small Business) (15:21): Thank you sir, and may I add my congratulations to your elevation to the speakership. I am sure you will do a very good job.

The Hon. I.F. Evans interjecting:

The SPEAKER: I interrupt your congratulations to warn the member for Davenport for the second time.

The Hon. T.R. KENYON: Congratulations, sir; it is a well-deserved elevation and I am sure you will do a very good job. I thank the member for Mitchell for his question and I can tell the house that yesterday the Premier and I announced the establishment of the Industry Participation Advocate. The advocate's job will be to ensure local businesses reap the maximum economic rewards from major government projects. This is a response to an increase in the value of contracts being awarded to interstate companies at the expense of local companies.

Investing in good, well paid, secure jobs for South Australians is at the heart of our economic policy. We want to ensure that South Australia achieves the maximum economic benefit from the $3.8 billion of contracts let annually by the state government and that local companies are given every opportunity to win those contracts. Since 2001-02 the value of contracts awarded interstate has risen from about 40 per cent to almost 60 per cent and contracts awarded within South Australia have fallen from almost 60 per cent to about 40 per cent.

The Industry Participation Advocate will review the impediments local companies face and work with local business and industry associations to increase the number of companies able to meet tender requirements. The advocate will work with the procurement board to ensure that its policies and practices are not disadvantaging local businesses. The role will also involve liaising with the commonwealth and other state governments to investigate changes to national and state procurement procedures that reduce impediments local businesses face in winning tenders interstate.

The establishment of the Industry Participation Advocate builds on the Industry Participation Policy implemented in July last year, which is aimed at strengthening requirements for proponents of major projects to provide full, fair and reasonable opportunities for local suppliers to compete for work. Primary Industries and Regions SA chief executive Ian Nightingale has been appointed to the new position. Mr Nightingale brings a wealth of experience to this key position through his senior position with PIRSA and as inaugural chief executive of the Department of Planning and Local Government where he led the reforms of the state's planning system.

This new role demonstrates the government's continued support for business through the policy which particularly targets small to medium enterprises—the vast majority of local suppliers of goods and services. We are seeing a period of unprecedented opportunity in South Australia with the state government investing more than $9 billion in capital projects over the next four years. We want local businesses to be placed in the best possible position to compete equally and competitively for tender contracts so they can share in the economic benefits of this investment.

We are looking to the flow-on effects of this appointment and the Industry Participation Policy to result in more jobs linked to our major projects and a strengthened economy. The advocate will work closely and consult closely with business, industry, government departments, employer representative groups and unions as part of his ongoing review of our procurement processes. I congratulate Mr Nightingale and wish him all the best in his new role.