Council Rate Concessions

Mr GRIFFITHS (Goyder) (14:40): My question is to the Minister for Local Government. Can the minister confirm the dollar impact for the 2015-16 financial year and the future years estimates on local government providing the mandatory 75 per cent remission on council rates for public housing properties transferred from Housing SA to community housing associations from 1 July 2015? Local governments have reported that minister Brock committed in early 2015 to legislative amendments to clause 161 of the act—rebates of rates, community services—yet these changes were removed from the draft bill provided to me in a briefing by the minister and not part of the legislation debated last year.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The leader is on two warnings.

The Hon. J.R. RAU (Enfield—Deputy Premier, Attorney-General, Minister for Justice Reform, Minister for Planning, Minister for Industrial Relations, Minister for Child Protection Reform, Minister for the Public Sector, Minister for Consumer and Business Services, Minister for the City of Adelaide) (14:41): This question has been asked virtually in the same terms several times before and has been answered several times before, but I am happy to do it again. The situation is this: around the country there are differing ways in which council rates levied on public housing and community housing properties are treated.

In some jurisdictions, there is no possibility of rating, as I recall; in some, there is some sort of maximum amount which is less than the full amount. I think, from memory, in Victoria it might be 50 per cent or something of that nature. But certainly, as I understand it, the only place in the commonwealth where a public housing property which has been transferred to a community housing provider could be the subject of full rate payment is potentially here.

The situation that we have embraced—and the evidence is there for all to see because we have had a transfer of some thousand or more trust properties across to the not-for-profit sector. In every instance what happened was the government sat down and negotiated with the affected councils and discussed those things on a council-by-council basis, and I think the record will demonstrate that so far what has happened is that those councils have been given the opportunity of receiving rates from those properties.

Mr Marshall interjecting:

The Hon. J.R. RAU: It is a matter—I am saying this—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Goyder is warned.

The Hon. J.R. RAU: If I can just finish answering the question. It is my view that there may well be some local government areas where it is entirely appropriate for the government to negotiate with that local government entity and for the full rates to be paid by not-for-profit housing providers, but equally there may be areas where the converse is true and where it is entirely reasonable that those providers do not have to pay rates.

As the situation presently stands, if the councils wish to negotiate an agreement whereby rates are to be paid, they have to come to the table, they have to speak to the government, they have to explain why they think that is appropriate, and the government has to listen to their proposal and make a determination. As I have said, in the instance of the last 1,000 or so public housing properties that were transferred, the determination of the government was that those rates would be paid. We want to be in a position where we can continue to negotiate on an as-needs basis as each individual tranche of those public housing properties moves over to the not-for-profit sector.

The government has made no secret of this, that there will be an increasing volume of the government's public housing stock which over the years to come will be put into the not-for-profit sector. That offers opportunities for greater services to be provided to those tenants, and it also provides for the South Australian public housing sector not to be discriminated by the commonwealth funding arrangements because South Australia has an historically—

The SPEAKER: The minister's time has expired.

The Hon. J.R. RAU: What a shame.