Bills

Appropriation Bill 2017

Estimates Committees

Ms BEDFORD (Florey) (12:02): I bring up the report of Estimates Committee A and move:

That the report be received.

Motion carried.

Ms BEDFORD: I bring up the minutes of proceedings of Estimates Committee A and move:

That the minutes of proceedings be incorporated in the Votes and Proceedings.

Motion carried.

Mr ODENWALDER (Little Para) (12:02): I bring up the report of Estimates Committee B and move:

That the report be received.

Motion carried.

Mr ODENWALDER: I bring up the minutes of proceedings of Estimates Committee B and move:

That the minutes of proceedings be incorporated in the Votes and Proceedings.

Motion carried.

The Hon. G.G. BROCK (Frome—Minister for Regional Development, Minister for Local Government) (12:03): I move:

That the proposed expenditures referred to Estimates Committees A and B be agreed to.

Mr WILLIAMS (MacKillop) (12:03): It is with absolute delight that I stand here and inform the house that this will be the very last time that I participate in such a debate—the very last time. How happy am I that I will never have to sit through an estimates committee again. As I look forward to my retirement from this place, I can assure my colleagues in the house that one of the things that I will not miss is estimates.

I think, and have always thought, that the estimates process that is undertaken by this house is one of the most inefficient and ineffective things that this parliament does. In saying that, I by no means would argue that it is not an important process. What I am arguing is that the process is basically not much more than a system of abuse of the rights and privileges of the house by the government of the day.

The process of examining the budget line by line I think is an important function of this house. It is one of the ways in which we as members of this place can represent our constituents and their interest in the running of the state, but the way we go about doing that through the estimates committee process is an absolute joke. It wastes an inordinate amount of time, it costs an inordinate amount of money and it delivers diddly-squat.

If anybody, having been through the process over the last five days of the sitting of committees A and B, can say they now have a good understanding of the most recent budget and where the money that the state extracts from the taxpayers and from other sources of revenue, principally in this case from the commonwealth, is being expended, I would challenge their sanity. The reality is that the process is used to hide, to circumvent accountability and to try to bamboozle members in their genuine quest for an understanding of how the executive government is spending moneys from the Consolidated Account.

I make a serious plea. I fully expect that there will be a change of government in less than 12 months, and I make a plea to my colleagues on this side of the house that, if they are fortunate enough to be able to form government and have a group of their members form the executive, they have a serious look at the whole estimates process as a significant reform of the parliamentary process.

I have argued in this place many a time that a good government will not be worried about scrutiny. A government that makes good decisions, based on good research and good evidence, will always be able to justify those decisions, and as such will never need to shy away from scrutiny. Scrutiny is what the parliament is here for—that is our job. That is what we are here for: to scrutinise the workings of the executive.

It is through that that we actually provide the root of accountability between the electors and the executive government. It is only when the executive are too frightened to share what they are doing with the people of South Australia that they would undertake the sort of exercise that we have all been through over the last week and a half: an estimates process that hides more than it reveals.

The first thing that should be done is a ban placed on ministers making opening statements. They serve no purpose whatsoever. It is simply an avenue of disseminating propaganda from the executive to the media. It should be banned. I would suggest that, in an ideal world, ministers should not even be a part of the estimates process, but that may be a bridge too far.

The reality is that by and large the ministers do not know what is going on to the level of detail about which the members of the house should be inquiring. In my experience over 20 years, ministers who do have a sense of responsibility and a good overview of their brief have some understanding but invariably refer to the public servants who sit around them, the chief financial officers and the executive officers of their departments, to provide the information. Then we go through this torturous process where the people who know the answer to a question posed by the committee whisper it to the minister.

It is probably a system of Chinese whispers because I am sure that, when the minister regurgitates it, it is designed to obfuscate, to confuse and, in many cases, to mislead. I see no reason why ministers should be involved. It should not be a political exercise. It should be an exercise where the minutiae of how the funds of taxpayers are expended are scrutinised and, if need be, exposed. It is through that process that we as members of the parliament and through us the constituents, the electors, the taxpayers of the state, can have some surety that the processes of government are working to their benefit. That is the first point.

The second point is the timetable. I sat through a committee where we examined forestry. There are some important questions, and my colleague the member for Mount Gambier asked some very important and pertinent questions. He did not get fantastic answers, to be quite honest. The state sold the forests. It sold in excess of 100 years of production from the forest and pocketed the money. We all know that it was a miserable sale. Selling it was a stupid piece of policy. We see now that the purchasers of those forward rotations are making a profit in excess of $120 million. I think the last reported profit was $125 million. It is a huge profit compared with the up to $40 million that used to be achieved by ForestrySA.

Why is time dedicated to examining the budget lines with regard to forestry when we have sold the forests and when other important areas of government expenditure receive such little scrutiny? In my mind, one of the ways to overcome that anomaly is to remove the time restrictions on the examination of the various budget lines. Maybe we should get away from this notion of committee A and committee B. I think the only reason we have those is that we have two committee rooms, the two chambers of the parliament.

I think that the budgetary examination should be an ongoing work of the parliament, doing away with this notion of having half an hour, an hour or, in some circumstances, an hour and a half to examine and that that is all the time necessary to get a full understanding. This is one of the reasons why some ministers make their opening statements. They have half an hour to be examined. They spend 10 minutes making an opening statement and then spend another 10 minutes of the half hour answering Dorothy Dixers from their own members.

That is something else that should be frowned upon—Dorothy Dixers—where the minister and his staff write the questions for his colleagues on his or her side of the house to ask, to which they read back a prepared statement that goes on and on, and reveals absolutely nothing to the committee. Again, all it does is offer more propaganda on either what a good minister or what a good government we have serving the people.

My argument is that if we had good ministers and we had a good executive, they would not need to hide via this process. I think the model which an incoming government could seriously look at is that which is provided by the Budget and Finance Committee of the other place, where executives from the Public Service are called before that committee to provide evidence on various matters of interest to that committee. I think that provides a good model.

I think the commonwealth government, through its Senate committees, in examination of the budget, again provides some pointers on how the exercise be made to work better. In the commonwealth, from what I understand, there are time limits. There are not ministers sitting in front of the committee putting their spin on things. The examination is of those who know the answers to the questions. The examination is probing and the relevant information is brought forth, and I think the parliament in that case is much better informed than we are. Again, I reiterate that I think it is a vital role of the parliament to have such a process where we have an opportunity not just to ask questions but to get answers.

It is my understanding that the bureaucracy spends many weeks between the handing down of the budget and the estimates committee hearings going through its own agencies and basically trying to work out every question that may be asked of them and preparing written answers that can be given to the minister to regurgitate. That entails a huge amount of work; work which is of no value to anyone, particularly when the answers prepared for ministers are designed specifically to not reveal anything.

We would be much better served if we were able to have a committee where the senior bureaucrats were not under the guardianship of a time limit but were exposed to questions until the questioning was exhausted but, indeed, protected from having to answer political questions—I accept that. This should be about finding information and facts and where the money was spent, not why it was spent there, because that is a political question, but where it was spent.

One of the problems with the estimates process is that there has been this huge crossover from the revelation of where taxpayers' money is spent, and how it is spent, to the political question of why it was spent. I know we are all interested in why it was spent, and that is another function of the parliament, but I do not think it is the function of the estimates committee. That is a function where, rightfully, members of the house should be able to question ministers. There is a whole different discussion I could be having on that because, again, I think the experience in this parliament is that that process, the process of question time, has broken down as well and serves the people of the state very little.

I think that the estimates process has had its day. Its usefulness has long since departed. We need a new government to have a new look at how the executive should be examined. I do not know that this should be an examination of the executive, but it should be an examination of how the dollars are spent, where they are spent and not why they are spent. As I said, that is a different question. As such, my argument suggests that it is the bureaucrats, the chief executive officers and the chief financial officers, who should be questioned. There should not be a system of Chinese whispers, and we should not be subjected to nigh on a fortnight of spin—and that is putting it nicely.

My colleagues in the chamber may see why I am relishing the thought of not having to go through this torture again. It is with great disappointment that I witnessed what I have over the last 20 years. I cannot say that it was a brilliant system when I first came in here 20 years ago. It was not a hell of a lot better than it is now. I suspect the level of revelation of information has declined, but it was not a very worthwhile process back then. Ministers have said to me that it is a great process because even the ministers get to learn what is going on in their agencies. That is important, but I think this is a very expensive and cumbersome way for it to happen.

In my experience, I have not seen a lot of ministers in whom I have had great confidence that they were totally across their brief and that they were administering the portfolios. In my experience, most ministers are just trying to dodge their way out of serious scrutiny most of the time, and most of the day-to-day decision-making is not undertaken by ministers at all; in many cases, it seems to be taken by the Public Service, and that leads to an incredible breakdown of accountability.

Notwithstanding my delight at not having to go through the process again, I reiterate that it is an important process and that it should be made to work the way it should work. It should be a process that has the potential to reveal every budget line, what it means and where the money is going. In my opinion, that would lead to not only much greater accountability but a much better form of governance of this state. Madam Deputy Speaker, I will do something else that I do not do very regularly: I will stop with a little bit of time left on the clock.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: That would be a first, wouldn't it? A first and last. Member for Goyder.

Mr GRIFFITHS (Goyder) (12:23): Forty-five seconds left, member for MacKillop—disgraceful. I appreciate the feedback from the member for MacKillop and in many cases I concur with the things that he said, but not in all ways. As a person who has flagged his intention to leave this place as of 17 March next year, my contribution today will not be based on my experiences just over the last five days of estimates but over the last 12 years. For 10 of those 12 years, I had a responsibility to actually ask questions, and for two of those 10 years I have had a lesser role.

During the last year, I have supported those who had the responsibility, I have asked some questions about particular areas of interest and I have sought clarification of a response given by a minister or a question posed by the shadow minister. I hope that I bring a perspective that will allow for improvement to occur because I am a true believer in the process of estimates, but I believe that it can be much better.

When I talk to people about what estimates actually is, I tell them in a very simple way that I believe it is when the greatest level of knowledge exists about the state government budget in the previous year and across the forward estimates on one day than at any other time during the year. That is due to the effort that has gone into it from the bureaucratic support provided to the minister and, one would hope, from the ministers themselves about the level of knowledge that they possess, the level of scrutiny applied by the opposition to the budget and a level of understanding from the opposition about the budget, because it is a substantial document.

Does it provide all the information? No, it does not. Its format also appears to change from year to year to make it even more challenging to follow consistent lines of where you might be able to find information or, indeed, to find where the particular question area has come from. My frustration has always been that portfolio areas might be just one page—that is madness to me. Thank goodness for electronic search capacities and the ability to find, through key word searches, where pages or words exist in budget papers now because, other than that, it becomes very difficult to actually find the reference.

Some ministers have great confidence when they walk into the chamber. Kevin Foley and I were not necessarily friends, but I respected the fact that Mr Foley, as treasurer, came in here believing he knew the answer to everything. It was exemplified one day in this very chamber when the honourable member for Waite was the leader of the opposition at the time and the treasurer was sitting there. The treasurer came in with either an Australian Financial Review or The Advertiser, I am not sure. He opened it up at the start of the estimates session and said, 'I don't need to read anything else. I actually have the ability to answer any question that these people are going to put to me.' Confrontational? There is no doubt about that.

I think that was the day that things got rather nasty. There was a suggestion that we were all going to leave this building and get called back in by a special resolution required from the Chair of the committee because it got rather aggressive in some stages, but it showed a minister who had faith. Was that faith repaid in accurate detail? That is a question for others to ask and, indeed, for history to record, but I have some other good examples. I am using Christian surnames here because they are no longer members of parliament.

John Hill acted at one stage on behalf of Michael Wright, who was ill. John had previously been the minister responsible for that area before Michael was ill. John came in and, even though he had not had portfolio responsibility for two years, he did have the support of staff around him and he was able to give a good range of answers. That demonstrated to me that he was a person who actually had a good memory about details of particular portfolio areas and the confidence to express it, so I commended him on that, and I was asking questions at that stage.

Another example is the member for Newland when he was a minister. There was a belief of others within the building that the member for Newland, as a new minister, would take up the opportunity for an opening statement of probably up to 10 minutes and then, across that two-hour question time, actually have questions from his own side. The member for Newland—and I commend him on this—came in and did not have an introductory statement and said at the very start that there would be no questions from his own side.

As a person who was asking questions on behalf of the shadow minister from another place at the time, I can assure you that the questions provided to me were not necessarily going to fit in with the time frame given to me to ask the questions. However, through the capacity of not just me but the others who were part of the opposition and questioning that day, we managed to get through it all.

The opposition shadow minister from the other place was rather grateful that we managed to fill that in, but it shows that, no matter what the portfolio area is, when you look at the budget papers question opportunities actually abound, and I am a believer in that. No matter how short the reference is, you can find information, a highlight area, a target or a report in a previous year that gives you the opportunity to ask questions, because it is all about detail. It is important that that exists.

For me, it has been detail based. There are some members who ask rather pointed political opportunity questions, mixed in with the detail questions that are required, but that is where it creates the confrontational attitude that exists a lot in the chamber. I understand that is what the place is for. I am not naive enough to assume that at all times we are going to sit here quietly and accept every answer given, but it is the point where clarification needs to be sought, it is the point where there needs to be an opportunity for the question to exist and the responsiveness of the answers to be provided not just from the minister but from the staff who support the minister.

I am a bit like the member for MacKillop in this situation: I do not expect the minister to know everything, but I do expect them to have an overview of all matters. It would be rather challenging, across the wide variety of portfolio areas for which ministers have responsibility to possess every level of detail, particularly as some questions relate to historical aspects of budgets and others relate to the forward impact of budgets. It is impossible for one human mind to possess that level of information, and I understand that.

The necessity exists for ministers to respect that and, instead of referring questions to the staff who support them, they should provide them with that opportunity because it allows for the flow of more information. You could argue that by doing so, it gives an opportunity for a minister to be criticised and therefore attacked more at a political level. I actually think it makes for a better working environment and provides assurance to South Australians who are influenced by the matters that are discussed. It is an expenditure that relates to 1.6 million people, and it needs to exist. I think an attitudinal change is required.

It is impossible for all ministers to have all the detail, just as it is impossible for all shadow ministers, who have fewer staff to support them in the activities they undertake in that shadow perspective, to understand every detail, but it is a chance for the two to sit down and to flesh things out, and that is what I like to see. I recollect another occasion when I was asking questions of a minister from the other place on behalf of the shadow minister from the other place. For a two-hour session, I was given quite a few questions, probably about 50.

The questions were in order of priority, but the minister who was responding to them, though, being relatively early in their political ministerial life, had prepared responses to everything. It was a matter of asking a question and then listening for up to 10 minutes to a response being read into the record. After that, you attempt to seek clarification on particular issues because, no matter what amount of time is provided in a detailed written response to a question that is likely to come from the opposition, it does not cover every little detail that might be required.

Then they seemed to launch into another response opportunity, often repeating information provided in the first response, even though it was not in the fulsome detail that was necessary. That was a rather challenging day for me. I appreciated the chance to ask questions on behalf of the shadow minister. The other shadow minister and I spoke about it at length, and I had a good background on it. The minister, instead of being personally accountable for the level of information to be provided, chose to read out responses all the time.

In some cases, that is necessary; I completely understand that, and it comes back to the level of detail that is required. Indeed, it demonstrates where the bureaucracy supports a minister who has considered the potentials and developed responses based on that, but it should be a matter of reviewing the briefing papers that are provided—and this is work required to be done by the minister—and expanding upon those answers based on their knowledge after reading it, and I felt a level of frustration. I think it can definitely improve in future years, and it is an example of where we are getting it partially right but not fully right.

Like the member for MacKillop, I would love to see an opportunity where the parliament will sit beyond the traditional five days to consider the budget papers and do it over a greater expanse of time that is not restricted by time itself. From that, comes an increased level of availability of information that can therefore not only flow to the community but be possessed within the parliament. It is important that all who take part in the estimates session are engaged in it.

I know that it is the responsibility of government and opposition to appoint people who support the minister and the shadow minister when questions come in. It has frustrated me from an opposition perspective in previous years, though not this year, that a question is asked that has already been responded to or the information provided as part of an introductory comment made by the minister, and I think that is a lack of attention to detail. It is an example of an improvement from an opposition perspective.

This year, while not having the same level of personal involvement in the preparation of the questions, I have seen a significant improvement in the way the opposition has conducted itself, so I congratulate all shadow ministers on that. Confrontation has still existed; in some cases, that is more of a reflection upon the personality clashes occurring between the minister and shadow minister. But it is also about the minister standing up for what they believe, for the budget priorities they determine and for the priorities of the government they represent versus the opposition's perspective, and I respect that. It is part of how this place works.

As an expansion on the opportunity for increased questioning, I reflect upon the level of time provided across all portfolio areas. Classic examples of where I think there should be a lot more opportunity for questions, and therefore for accountability to exist, are education and health. I have never had direct shadow responsibility for these areas, but over time I have observed the questions posed by others and the responses from ministers. If we look at the fact that, in round figures, each of those portfolio areas accounts for potentially one-third of the total state budget and has such a significant impact on all South Australians in the education of our young people and on the care of all of us across all age spectrums, they are key to the measurement of the success or failure of the government.

If we look at education from reception to year 12, on Friday last week the allocation for the Minister for Education and Child Development was an hour and a half. Given the number of campuses that exist—and I am trying to remember, but I think I have been told in the past that something like 700 schools exist across South Australia—it is a level of detail that is impossible for a minister to make an accurate response to everything. The collective of that creates a need for a larger amount of time to be allocated for the questions posed, which are all important—and that is just it: it is really hard to prioritise the education issues associated with our children and additional time is required.

You could say that it should be half a day at least, five or six hours; I have no doubt about that. That is where there could be a different practice of allowing an expansive list of questions to continue on and on—not being frivolous and repetitive and all that sort of stuff, but asking relevant and pertinent questions where an answer is required—to ensure that not only are the people informed about the decisions made by the government but also the opposition is better informed on the basis of holding the government to account, and its own perspective of being an alternative government is also important.

The other area I noted in this year's estimates session was health, which was two hours and 15 minutes. Given the significant infrastructure development that has taken place, and the accountability associated with 5 September, I think, the opening day of the new RAH, and the wideranging questions posed from a regional and a metropolitan hospital situation, I think more time should have been devoted to that, too—and these examples are not from just this year but from over my 12 years of viewing estimates sessions. From an accountability perspective, this is where the parliament can ensure that change opportunities are brought about.

Member for Little Para, I noted that yesterday you called one of my questions out of order, a follow-up question to the member for Frome. In my defence, I said that I thought that I did not ask questions out of order because I only ask questions that are relevant and to the point. I referenced my question back to part of the response given by the minister at the time. I respect the Chair for saying that, but I was a bit frustrated by it. The Chair was engaged, he was listening to the questions and the answers and so on, so it did not come out of left field completely, but it is an example of the need from an opposition perspective to ensure that questions are relevant.

In other sessions the member chaired, I looked at the questions being asked and I thought, 'I'm not sure if I would do that because I am not sure if they are relevant.' But they continued, and in some cases they went for some time, but they had a bit of a different focus from the one I would have had. However, that shadow minister believed that it was important background information for what the shadow minister wants to do over the next nine months, so he posed that.

The member for Frome is in the chamber, and I do not want to reflect on his personal capacity for the ministerial role because he has been doing it for 3½ years now and it is an extremely challenging position; there is no doubt about that. I asked some questions seeking clarification on the Regional Development Fund process and the opposition asked questions on it. The minister provided, as part of his opening statement and as part of responses to the questions, the fact that there had been no call since round 3 in December 2015.

I had some concerns about a later response that was provided that talked about an opportunity existing for businesses and individuals, in the absolute majority of cases no doubt, via their Regional Development Australia boards that operate in their areas, to submit applications to be considered on a basis. I used the term 'ad hoc' and that was my choice of words, because to me there was no structure in place ensuring they all had an equal opportunity to put in applications and have them considered, based on the priority and the competing needs that existed at that time. That is the basis of the concern that I raised.

I respect the fact that the minister, not having had a call since round 3 in December 2015, further expanded on the significant level of applications that were lodged as part of that round and the decision that the minister made—and we were not able to get final clarification on that—presumably from a recommendation from the minister who had gone to cabinet about funds from future years being brought forward. That is an example of where need exists. The minister did his best to provide a solution and to make funds available. I understand that also.

The dilemma—and the member for Mount Gambier and I asked questions about this—is where does it provide an opportunity for those, who were not of a timing in their business or in their future operations to put an application in as part of round 3, and who are now without this knowledge of the capacity to lodge a one-off application and for it to be considered, to be part of a process to get support that is needed also?

In essence, it really requires more resources to be available. The great challenge for any minister is to get Treasury support for the dollars to be available to make that happen. I understand the reasoning behind it, but accept that it presented challenges. It was a good announcement at the time, but then it creates challenges further down.

The minister was good enough to give projections via his staff (on this occasion I believe it was Steve, the chief financial officer) of what future allocation commitments will be in the 2017-18 year outwards across the forward estimates, with the minimum of that being $15.3 million or thereabouts in the last year, down from $26 million. These are all good dollar spends, minister—absolutely all good dollar spends. I believe from the level of travel and the level of contact that the minister has had, he understands that there are many worthwhile causes out there and many will choose to do it with a level of government support or, in many cases, also through the opportunity that they see to pursue it in their own financial capacity, if that exists.

It is not a direct criticism of the member for Frome, but it is an example of where I think there could be questions asked about the structure. There is good intent from the outcome, but I see that creating potential problems, only because not all know about that opportunity it represents.

Given that this will be my last time that I speak about the estimates process, I have enjoyed that 12 years, I must say. I have enjoyed the dialogue I have had with ministers. I hope, upon reflection by the ministers I have asked questions of, they will respect the fact that I have asked questions to try to get information flow and, therefore, outcomes for people. In some cases I made suggestions for improvements, but at all times I was only trying to ensure that, through the estimates process, they make the best decisions possible.

I know that parliament represents a confrontational system, but there are many members of this chamber who believe, importantly, that collectively we make better decisions. I think the estimates process can be improved, but it is part of ensuring that the outcomes are positive.

Mr BELL (Mount Gambier) (12:43): I rise to make comment about the Appropriation Bill. I echo the sentiments of the member for MacKillop. Unlike the member for MacKillop and the member for Goyder, I am hoping this is not my last appropriation or estimates process, but you never know. Hopefully, we will be doing it from the other side.

I think there are some improvements that can be made and, in fact, need to be made. If we are serious about running the state as best we can and in the most efficient manner that we can, the number of hours that must be put in by departmental officers and senior bureaucrats would be absolutely staggering, yet the results that we get are full of political spin and ways of dodging the question.

It is quite interesting. I see very good ministers who are across their brief who do not take any Dorothy Dixers no matter how rough-and-tumble it gets in there, then you have others who have their Chief of Staff sitting up in the back corridors of the gallery. As soon as it gets a bit heated, you can see them on their phone and all of a sudden one on the government side asks a Dorothy Dixer and takes the focus away from the line of questioning.

If that is the real aim of it, I would say that the estimates process is a failure. There are better ways of doing it, and I think we should explore those ways. I am of the opinion that ministers do not need to be in the room. It is an opportunity for the parliament to interrogate departments and tease out information. I will just give an example of one that I found quite interesting.

I was the lead speaker in Forestry. There was obviously a bit of toing and froing about OneFortyOne and noncompliance of the forward sale. It got back to me that a report was being compiled, but it took me five questions to tease out from the minister that in actual fact a report was being compiled. I pick up my local paper this morning and find that, as of today, a new board member has been appointed to ForestrySA.

Of course, it is just quite convenient that this is after the estimates and I cannot ask questions like, 'Was Mr McEwen a Labor Senator? What was the process for that board appointment?' There is a whole range of issues.

The Hon. S.W. Key: It was in the paper Saturday.

Mr BELL: It was in my local paper today. That is what I am talking about.

Members interjecting:

Mr BELL: Thank you. I think that should receive a call to order at least. The dodging and weaving that goes on with some is quite remarkable, yet it is not aiming to achieve the objective for which the estimates process was originally set up. We have some major issues in South Australia, particularly regional South Australia. There are declining population numbers in our regions. TAFEs are closing in regional areas. There is a backlog of road maintenance in the order of $1 billion. Education, as we saw in today's Advertiser, is failing students in South Australia.

These are quite serious issues. I sat in on the education estimates committee. The member for Morialta was asking questions about money directed towards literacy. The minister at the time could not give a straight answer, yet three or four days later, came out with a major announcement on the back of some very bad news about NAPLAN.

On a whole range of levels, the process is being corrupted in a political fashion, and I do not think that was the original intent of it. The time taken, the dodging of questions and not getting to the point of what it was originally intended for leads me to believe that perhaps the estimates process has run its course and may need to be either disbanded or modified in a pretty significant way.

Obviously, with power being a major issue, observing the answers given in that estimates committee was like watching an extended series of question times. I have major concerns with the community grants and the application process for the $40 million. To me, it looks like $40 million of pork-barrelling, which will go into marginal seats. I see the member for Fisher, who might be a beneficiary of some of these if it is a marginal seat going forward.

The Hon. T.R. Kenyon: She's got 90 per cent, she's not marginal, don't be mean to her. Minus 0.1 is marginal.

Mr BELL: People from the other side, if you want to look at how some of this plays out, I recommend you grab a book by Michael McGuire, entitled Never a True Word. Obviously, Michael McGuire worked for Kevin Foley—not that this is a direct recount of his time with Mr Foley—but there certainly is some interesting information in the book, obviously not pertaining to anybody at all. When I was reading it, and then going through estimates, I saw the sentiment of what Michael McGuire was getting at. I will quote a couple of pages from it in the time that I have remaining:

I hate going to parliament. [Bugger]—

and I have changed that word—

all your talk about democracy and the idea of the people's representatives thrashing out the big issues of the day. It's all a facade. The truth is nothing of any real note is ever accomplished during sitting weeks. All the hard work, the negotiating, and the preparation are done when parliament is in recess. What parliament boils down to is theatre for bad actors. It's a stage for the pollies to convince themselves of the importance of the work. Where they attack the other side of politics with hysteria and hyperbole, or stand for hours on end debating some minor point that no-one cares about to obstruct [or delay] a bill. The questions are inane, the answers incomprehensible. If you want to lose faith in democracy spend an hour watching Question Time or spend a day reading Hansard. It will cure you of any high ideals you might have felt towards the democratic process.

…In the old days, when politicians were more familiar with words such as dignity and responsibility, the punishment for misleading parliament—

this is the point I wanted to get to—

was to either resign or be sacked. These days you would have to be caught out in an outrageous lie, the Opposition would need to have photographic and audio evidence that you knew you were sprouting porkies, and there would need to be a dozen eyewitnesses before anyone would even think of doing the right thing.

It goes on and on, and I recommend it as something that people can perhaps look at for a bit of light reading. I take that point, because in the agriculture portfolio it had been brought to my attention in many, many meetings about the difficulty that dairy farmers were having with allocated water; the state government will not allocate water or stock as an asset to go towards the viability of a dairy farmer's farm. That was brought to me three or four times. I know DairySA had convened meetings and conveyed that to the government.

Yet, when I asked that question in estimates, the answer came back—and it is on Hansard—that no such communication had occurred. Of course, when I pushed the minister on this, the answer then came back, 'You were not being specific enough,' and, 'Yes, of course, we knew that that was an issue, but stock and water were not precluders to anybody not receiving a grant,' if that makes sense. It makes a mockery of the entire estimates process. If you are looking for another way of examining departmental budget lines, the Budget and Finance Committee is a good way because a lot of the information that comes out of that is really detailing what people might be looking for and how that department is actually being run.

With those words, I will conclude my remarks on the estimates process and just finish up by saying that I think we need to find a much better way in the future.

Mr PEDERICK (Hammond) (12:54): I rise to speak to the estimates process here in 2017. Some people may be shocked, but I actually found it the best of a bad innings of estimates that I have had. I am not sure why I say that, but perhaps I am just getting used to the process. Hopefully, it is the last one.

Members interjecting:

Mr PEDERICK: I must be drinking the Kool-Aid.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: So you think it's Kool-Aid do you?

Mr PEDERICK: Yes. It is very hard to get direct answers to very direct questions and I guess what upsets me, and this has been mentioned by other members in this place, is when good old Dorothy the Dinosaur gets wheeled out to ask questions. We do not see the courage that has been the case with some ministers in the past, and I reflect on the former member for Port Adelaide, who would sit down for Treasury estimates, reading the paper and looking very calm, and he would just say, 'Well, give it to me.' I do not give much to the former member for Port Adelaide, but I will give him that. He had a lot more courage than other ministers in this place.

It is the time that opposition members and Independents can ask those questions, if they are in the lower house. I certainly do not believe it is a time for government questions to be asked; we have a limited time and we have time lines we need to deal with. However, I guess it is what it is and you try to get what you can out of it.

Because I was interested, the other day I was sitting in on the estimates to do with corrections, police and the emergency services. As far as the corrections sector is concerned, obviously I have the medium-security Mobilong Prison in my electorate. It was originally built decades ago to house 160 prisoners, and it has just been expanded with the Eyre Wing—

An honourable member interjecting:

Mr PEDERICK: It might be better than the original rooms, but it now has beds and cells for 460 inmates, so it is certainly squeezing out of the sides. I think the only place it now has left to build any accommodation is the oval, and I do not think anyone would like to see that, as far as not filling it up like a city block is concerned. So there is an issue with Corrections. There is an issue of hundreds of millions of dollars having to be spent in my electorate, at Mount Gambier, at Port Augusta, at Port Lincoln, and Cadell in the Riverland as well, in regard to these expansions.

I reflect on what happened in 2006 when it was announced on budget day—and budget day that year was my first year in; it was in September, delayed because of the election—on the front page of the paper that, 'We're going to build a new prison at Mobilong.' Whether or not you contacted the local member—which would have been helpful—it would have been helpful if you had let the mayor and the people of Murray Bridge and surrounding areas know. That did not happen.

Essentially, what happened in the end was it did not happen. The land is still there, and if it ever does happen in the future there will need to be long discussions about what other benefits can be brought to Murray Bridge so that they will accept a high security prison—because this was going to be the Yatala replacement and the women's prison replacement—being built in the vicinity. You can only do that by taking the community with you. You cannot do it by just imposing it on a community, notwithstanding the fact that there are opportunities for an electorate with prisons, as far as employment goes. However, there are many negative views in communities about having prisons in their community.

In regard to emergency services, I am a member of the CFS and I did ask some questions around the suitability of some of our fire truck equipment. I have been following up on that, after I asked my questions about some of our fire trucks where the exhaust systems get too hot and they are actually firelighters. The minister had not had that raised with him, but I will be sending correspondence to Mr Malinauskas in the other place when I have all the information together on that query about whether there is an issue with some of the trucks in regard to lighting fires. I seek leave to continue my remarks.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.

Sitting suspended from 12:59 to 14:01.