Regional South Australia

Mr KNOLL (Schubert) (15:05): My question is again to the Minister for Regional Development. In light of the minister no longer holding the balance of power in parliament, what steps has the minister put in place to ensure that regional South Australia is not ignored?

The Hon. J.W. WEATHERILL (Cheltenham—Premier) (15:05): Our commitment to the regions is undiminished by the joining of our cabinet by the member for Waite. Our commitment to the regions is as a direct result of the framework that I laid out from the very first day where we were faced with the election result. From day one I said that the imperative for the government the Labor Party was seeking to form is that we had to ensure that our behaviour, our conduct, the decisions that we took were consistent with and tried to give effect to the election result.

That is why we reached out to both the member for Fisher and the member for Frome, and ultimately we were successful in reaching an arrangement with the member for Frome, but at the same time we made sure that we had addressed in our arrangement with the member for Frome some of the issues that were raised by the member for Fisher, including demands around electoral reform which have now found their expression in a bill that the Attorney will bring to the parliament and also in terms of a charter for small business.

It was consistent with that that we also reached out to the member for Waite, seeking to build the broadest possible coalition to ensure that we had an even more secure majority on the floor of the house, but, more importantly, that we built a coalition with a broader set of constituencies that were available than with the seats that we were able to represent on this side of the chamber. Can I just say that that approach of seeking to actually reflect the election result in our conduct is completely inconsistent with the approach taken by those on the other side of the chamber who are seeking to blame everybody except themselves for the election result.

We are seeking to get in sync with the election result, whereas those opposite are seeking to put their head in the sand and have everybody believe that the election did not deliver the result that it did. So we respect that result and have been striving to reflect it. Those opposite content themselves with attacks on elected officials, with the electoral system itself, with the member for Frome, the member for Waite and anybody else, except looking in the mirror and taking responsibility for the outcome.

The Hon. A. Koutsantonis interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The Treasurer is warned for the first time.

An honourable member interjecting:

The SPEAKER: No, it is actually the first time. The member for Hammond, the member for MacKillop and the member for Morphett are called to order, and the member for Morialta is warned for the second and final time and I know that he keeps a meticulous tally of these things.