Motions

Regional Schools, Asset Disposal

Debate resumed.

Mr VAN HOLST PELLEKAAN (Stuart) (12:36): It is my pleasure to rise to support the member for Chaffey on this motion. I just want to clarify my earlier question. I certainly was not having a go at the member for Reynell in any way; I was genuinely questioning. If I hear an amendment that says, 'Replace everything after "that this house"' I think it is fair to wonder. That is what I was doing.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: You do not need to recap.

Mr Gardner: It’s cogent to the motion at hand.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: It is not. We have heard this go on with your contribution.

Mr VAN HOLST PELLEKAAN: The reason it is important for me to mention that is that I am comfortable with the amendment and I am comfortable with the change to the motion, because what it really does is highlight the fact that the member for Chaffey has said to the government, ‘Please review this process which is so important to regional towns,’ and the government has come back and said, ‘Yes, member for Chaffey, we will.’ I think that is outstanding. I think the member for Chaffey is to be commended for the hard work he is doing on behalf of his electorate and also the rest of country South Australia, which of course is very important to me.

It is a tragedy when any school in the country closes. It is a great tragedy because it is often a reflection of a diminishing population. It is certainly a reflection of diminishing service, diminishing flexibility and diminishing educational opportunities for kids. Very importantly, it also flows on to the local economy. If you lose your local school, you lose one of the most important focal points in a country town and you lose the requirement for children and their families to come into that town every day, or every weekday at least, so that they can have their children in school. It is incredibly important. You lose that traffic flow and that connection to the town. Of course, if the kids are not going to school in town A, by default they will be going to school in town B. If you lose the connection with that town, one town shrinks and one town grows.

I understand all of the realities of competition that exist in the world. There are some things you just cannot get away from, but for me it is a great tragedy any time a school in a country town closes. It is the start of further diminishment of that town because, following the school closing, it is very likely that the service station or the hotel or the general store, or any of the other businesses, will close because you do not have people going into that town every day, and that is a great sadness. That goes straight to the heart of regional South Australia. Small regional towns are critical to regional South Australia and to our economy. Agriculture is the strongest, biggest, by far the most vital industry in South Australia.

Many others are very important, but it will be decades before any other industry contributes to our state's wealth what agriculture does. If you do not have people living and working in small country towns, you cannot sustain an agricultural industry, and you will not be able to sustain our state's economy. So, it is very important.

It breaks my heart when a small school closes. When it does, we need to do something with that school ground, the buildings and all the other assets that go with it as quickly as possible, and that is what the member for Chaffey has successfully encouraged the government to do more efficiently, more thoroughly and more quickly. There are certainly other opportunities. It is difficult, really hard, because if the school has closed then obviously the business opportunities are going with it, as I outlined before, but it does not mean it is impossible for somebody else to come up with a good idea that does not exist in that town already.

I would want anybody who was inclined to do so to have the opportunity to gain access, whether through a lease, a purchase or any other format, to the closed school buildings to use them for child care, a retail outlet, a bed and breakfast, a cafe, a restaurant or a hotel, potentially, or even a private residence. It is very difficult because, if the school has closed, the customers are not flowing in that direction, but if you happen to have a niche business, a really smart, really good opportunity, you deserve the right to give it a go as quickly as possible, and the government is obliged to allow that to happen because, if it does not, it is not helping or contributing, it is just being a blocker.

If government contributes and says yes, as the member for Chaffey has asked, we will do everything within our power to as speedily and efficiently as possible put that publicly-owned asset (remember, it does not belong to the government, it belongs to the public and, in the context of a small country school, it belongs to that town and to that surrounding community) to its very best purpose and to do so speedily, as quickly as possible after the school has closed.

I wholeheartedly support the member for Chaffey in his motion, and I thank the government for acknowledging that they will address that process, as he has asked them to do.

Mr WHETSTONE (Chaffey) (12:42): This has been a concern to my communities for quite some time. The reason I have brought this motion to the house is that, as the members for Stuart and Schubert have so eloquently put it, along with the member for Reynell: these schools are not just a building, and once they are closed they are gone. They are part of a small regional community, and potentially they are there to create another opportunity. Yes, it is sad when a school closes because, as the member for Stuart said, it is generally due to a declining population and a declining student base. It is about giving that site, that piece of real estate, another life, another opportunity, so that we can keep some fabric going in some of those small communities.

Those schools are not just being closed down; the government is walking away from them. They are still costing the government to maintain them: it is still paying rates, and in some instances still supporting some form of maintenance program. I know that at Lyrup there are still irrigation systems working, community members are still going in there and mowing the lawns, keeping the place alive, keeping the trees and gardens there, albeit that the school building has been stripped. The opportunity was there, when that school was closed, for it to be part of a community. If the government had put it out to the community for tender immediately, it could still be there as a solid piece of real estate, a community asset, and that goes for all schools in regional South Australia. Again, I am calling on the government to speed up the process of bringing the public tender with a view to making the process faster, more efficient, and keeping those schools that have been closed viable.

Amendment carried; motion as amended carried.