Unsolicited Bid Process

Ms VLAHOS (Taylor) (14:17): My question is to the Premier. Can the Premier inform the house about the government's unsolicited bid process and what responses the state business community has made to this process?

The Hon. J.W. WEATHERILL (Cheltenham—Premier) (14:17): One of the potentially unfortunate effects of the criticism of the Gillman transaction is that it could have put off companies from coming forward to government and making unsolicited bids about other transactions. We were very anxious to avoid that, so at an early time what we did was establish a new process for dealing with unsolicited bids—a new process, I might add, that was cited with approval by Commissioner Lander in his report.

We know that innovation will play a key role in our economy in moving from the old economy to the new economy, and so we do need people to come up with innovative ideas and promote them to government. Obviously, government doesn't have all the ideas and they will emerge from other quarters, but some people who have new ideas are reluctant to share them with government if they think that those ideas are not going to be respected in terms of their intellectual property.

So, in common practice with other states for some time, we have established a proposal mechanism for dealing with unsolicited bids. We want to send the message that we are prepared to consider innovative proposals and ones that challenge the status quo. We want to encourage that by giving a framework which is easily navigable and one which allows people to come forward with ideas, like the sorts of ideas that the young entrepreneurs who came forward with the Gillman proposal put to us.

So far, Jim Hallion, former chief executive of DPC, is in that role. The feedback we are getting about the way in which he is performing that role is excellent. So far, 84 proposals have been brought to the government for consideration, and a number of them have actually proceeded to the second stage of the unsolicited bid process. A number of them, of course, have been sent through the ordinary process, which is the process of tendering, which is, generally speaking, the common place in which we deal with these sorts of things. They are proposals like:

Bickford's proposal to build a craft distillery and microbrewery in the former Kingscote police station nearby land in the Kingscote wharf precinct on Kangaroo Island;

Martindale Hall, with the luxury resort and wellness retreat to attract tourists to the Clare Valley and Mid North; and

the Victor Harbor proposal for a new tourism venture for Granite Island, featuring opportunities to swim with marine life.

There is no doubt that some of these proposals will be controversial, but we are determined to actually give proposals like this a chance to succeed. It does need to meet certain thresholds. Obviously, there needs to be a good basis to depart from the usual process of going out to tender, and we certainly take that seriously.

Our committee of chief executives looks at this. The first step is a prelodgement meeting and, if the proposal progresses to the further stage, it's then referred to other government agencies. The initial proposal is then considered by a cabinet.

Mr KNOLL: Point of order, Mr Speaker. The process which the Premier is now detailing out is outlined in sa.gov.au—Business, industry and trade, as per what's in your inbox.

The SPEAKER: That may well be so, but this is in the context, I think, of the ICAC report on Gillman. It has a whole new relevance because of that and, therefore, I think—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Yes, I understand the member for Schubert's point and I have upheld it many times before, but I am not going to uphold it in this context.

The Hon. J.W. WEATHERILL: Thank you, Mr Speaker. I will leave aside the process. We can read online the process, but we are committed to continue to move all barriers that we possibly can to business growth. You only need to look at the challenges we have in terms of employment in South Australia to know that we cannot afford to turn our backs on innovative ideas that will grow jobs here in South Australia. That has been the motivation, and the sole motivation, for any of the decisions that we have taken in relation to these matters, and we are not going to be deflected from our course.