Bills

Supply Bill 2017

Second Reading

Debate resumed.

Mr WHETSTONE (Chaffey) (12:46): I rise to speak on the Supply Bill 2017. While we on this side support the bill, it is important to point out some of the areas in which I think the state could be doing much better ahead of the state budget.

The Supply Bill is a mechanism to allow the continued payment of public servants and public services until the Appropriation Bill, or the budget bill, is passed in this place. However, the appropriation for the 2017 Supply Bill is $5.9 billion; in 2016, the appropriation was $3.444 billion, in 2015 the appropriation was $3.291 billion, and in 2014 the appropriation was $3.941 billion. There has been a clear rise in appropriation funds in the past 12 months, and you have to ask: where have these extra funds benefited our economy? Has our economy grown? These are the questions that need to be asked and the questions that need to be answered by the government.

I can assure the house that it has not. If we look at our economy's performance, if we look at our investment performance, productive investment, infrastructure investment, where are we prioritising growing the state? If we look at the state of play in South Australia, we have the highest unemployment rate in the nation. That is a concern, and what are we going to do about it? What economic stimulus are we going to put in place to address the high unemployment? It affects everyone living here in South Australia. I know that impact of unemployment has been stated many times on this side, but what are the impacts on our economy of not addressing the high unemployment rate? That is what the government really needs to look at.

Currently, the government's credit card is maxed out, yet we still have high unemployment. Labor keeps spruiking how good South Australian business conditions are and how this state is the greatest place to live and invest in Australia, but we need to be realistic. The government can pick and choose all the statistics that suit it and suit the argument, but if we do not address the situation in a realistic way we are never going to pull ourselves out of this economic decline. Sadly, at the moment the economic decline is almost at the point where it is in freefall. As shadow minister for trade and investment, I know what we are dealing with—the decline in numbers.

The stats do not lie. I ask the Minister for Investment and Trade, who is not here: what are we actually getting from all these runaway programs and these overseas contingencies that head overseas? The political argument is that it is great to be taking many businesses and many South Australians to overseas destinations, but I can assure you that the numbers do not lie. The ABS stats are showing us, year on year, the predicament we have got ourselves into. That is a real concern.

If we look at exports, the minister told this house in February that our merchandise exports were up to $11.5 billion in 2015-16, yet in a speech to the South Australian Press Club in 2014 the Minister for Trade said, 'We recently reached $12.3 billion in exports, a record total, but we need to do far better than that.' Is he really assessing his performance? Has he actually assessed where South Australia is headed when it comes to building our economy and improving our exports? When it comes to getting rubber to hit the road and those businesses achieving export success for South Australia so that the government of the day can stand up there and spruik the credentials that they long to spruik, sadly it is not happening.

The latest ABS stats show that in the 12 months to March 2017 the value of South Australia's overseas goods exports totalled $10.9 billion. That is down 6.2 per cent, or $716 million, on the previous 12 months in original terms. Nationally, the value of overseas goods and exports was up 13 per cent. That is a clear indication that South Australia is not following the national trend. I would like to think that we could at least match the rest of the country.

We cannot keep blaming resource prices and the lack of resources heading overseas because every other state is being impacted by the price of resources. They are all being impacted by the GFC, they are all being impacted by the price of the dollar and they are all being impacted by their economy that they are actually addressing. They are building an economy. At the moment, our economy has flatlined. In actual fact, our economy is heading south.

That national value shows us that South Australia cannot keep up with the national average. That is a real concern. What are we doing wrong? At the moment, we have headline acts about ministers and the Premier heading over to China. Are they going over there to actually address the economic decline or are they going over there to watch a game of football?

Mr Pengilly: To have a jolly good time.

Mr WHETSTONE: Yes, that's right. What is their priority? We all love to see a South Australian football team going over to China to play another Australian AFL team, but what is it actually doing for our economy? What is it actually doing for the numbers? The minister continues to get up and say, 'Well, it's the naysayers. It's all about the opposition picking numbers,' but I am not just picking numbers. I am using the numbers the national bureau is giving us in relation to the national average. They give us a figure that gives us our performance indicators. It is giving us a very, very clear picture that our economy is in decline.

What are we doing about it? Let's have a look around. In annual terms averaged over 12 months, South Australia's 4 per cent share of national exports is down on the 4.8 achieved in March 2016. Nationally, over the past 12 months, the value of merchandise exports has risen by 12.6 per cent compared with the preceding 12 months, to $274 billion nationally. In 2002, South Australia had 7.4 per cent of the national footprint for exports. Today, we have just 4 per cent of the national footprint. That is a pretty clear indicator that things have gone backwards and are continuing to go backwards.

I plead with the government to get their priorities right. Put some focus on what we need to be doing to build our economy and not on jetsetting around the world, taking large numbers of people. It is all the fanfare, all the ganbei and all the fantastic headline acts, but taking a large number of people into a room, swapping business cards and having some niceties is not going to address the situation.

We need to strategically target businesses in South Australia with importers or exporters in export destinations. It is not just about putting all our export eggs into one basket, into China, or putting our export eggs into the emerging economies of India. We have to look at what our businesses are doing well, what goods and services of ours countries are wanting, such as our fantastic foods and beverages. We have to look at how South Australia can build reputations, how South Australia can better represent itself and how it can put itself on the world map.

How are we going to sell goods and services to the rest of the world? We have to sell ourselves. We have to show the world where we are. If you go to a lot of overseas destinations—as I have and as I used to in a previous life—many people do not know where South Australia is. They say, 'South Australia? Adelaide? It's in Australia. We know Sydney, we know Melbourne, we know the Gold Coast.' They do not know where South Australia is. They say, 'Southern Australia?' I say, 'You're getting close.'

We have to have these one-on-one businesses being able to go and present themselves and tell a story, gain trust, continue that trust and continue the ongoing dialogue. Once our overseas partners have that trust, they will then engage in parting with the cash, because that is what it is about. It is about our customers investing, but that is usually gained through trust. It is a bit like going into a car yard. You are going to buy from someone that you trust. You are not going to go into some dodgy car yard that is not known for its worthiness or its quality vehicles. You have to gain trust before you can gain the money. When you gain the money, that is when the exports start to grow.

South Australian export markets that experienced a decline in the year to March—the US was down 24 per cent, the Middle East was down 30 per cent and Canada was down 30 per cent. The ASEAN region, one of our most critical regions, was down $74 million. The total EU was down $56 million. These markets are some of the strongest prospects that we have for growing our exports and our economy.

We did see an increase in some of our export destinations and export partners, which is great, but we have to diversify our targeted markets so that we can do a better job of growing our economy. We can send value-added products to these destinations. It is not about filling up ships with raw commodity. It is not about filling up containers with big bladders of wine or filling up ships with wheat. It is about value-adding to that wine and putting it in bottles. It is about value-adding to our wheat, putting it into starch content, putting it into pastas, putting it into those value-added products that we can send away.

When we value-add, we are creating jobs. When we create jobs, we create wealth. When we create wealth, we create employment. When we create employment, we build our economy. It is a pretty simple dynamic. It is a circle that goes round and round. These statistics show what we can and what we should be achieving. In regard to interstate migration, in his 2009 book, Wool to Weta, late New Zealand psychiatrist Paul Sir Callahan wrote:

Our children go to London or Sydney or New York, and they like the lifestyle, they like the high salaries and they have plenty of Kiwi mates on hand. There are plenty of countries on the planet less prosperous than our own. But when our grandchildren are growing up on the other side of the world, when we have to Skype to read a bedtime story, we feel a pang of grief.

We feel the pain. We feel the grief that our young have left the country. They have left our shores because we did not have anything to offer them. We did not offer them prosperity. There is the issue of population growth here in South Australia. In mainland Australia, we are at the bottom of the pack. It hurts to know that my son has just moved interstate. It hurts that my daughter, who is now studying at university, is saying to me, 'Dad, if I can't find a job, I will have to do what my brother Nick is doing. I'll have to go to interstate, too.' They are already programming themselves that, if there are no jobs here in South Australia, they are going to move. I seek leave to continue my remarks.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.

Sitting suspended from 12:59 to 14:00.