Penola Bypass Project

Mr MARSHALL (Dunstan—Leader of the Opposition) (14:10): My question is to the Minister for Transport and Infrastructure. Can the minister explain why the South Australian government refused $9 million in federal funding to complete the Penola bypass project?

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN (Lee—Minister for Transport and Infrastructure, Minister for Housing and Urban Development) (14:10): Given he didn't check the figures of his policy yesterday, now we learn that he hasn't checked the Hansard for the response that I gave some 12 to 15 months ago on this very question. There is an excellent reason why: the Penola bypass was always to be delivered in two separate stages, and this state Labor government funded entirely the first stage—entirely.

So when the federal Liberal government says, 'We'd like to fund a part of the second stage,' so that they wouldn't even be funding 50 per cent of this regional road project, understandably we say, 'Well, no, that's not good enough. That's not good enough.' Major regional highways, particularly the National Highway network, is funded on an 80:20 basis. Where does, for example, the federal member for Barker come across by saying, 'Well, we'll ignore the 80:20 rule. We can't even get ourselves to fifty-fifty, and once again I'll sell out the community of the South-East that I purport to represent in the federal parliament and not even offer 50 per cent for this road project'? That's why we didn't accept yet another dud deal from the federal Coalition government.