Local Government Accountability

The Hon. A. PICCOLO (Light) (15:14): Today, I would like to just briefly touch on an issue that is dear to my heart but also, I am sure, dear to the heart of every member in this chamber. It is about transparency and accountability in government. Today, I wish to talk about not so much transparency and accountability in the state government, because I will leave that up to my colleagues, but certainly transparency and accountability in local government.

In my view the government would best serve the interests of the community by actually improving the transparency and accountability of council decisions, because those things are the things that most irritate and annoy the community. I would think that any move to improve provisions in the Local Government Act to improve transparency and accountability would be well received by the community. I would just like to provide a few examples from one of the councils in my electorate, which actually just highlights how local government could be improved and how we could put our resources, time and effort into improving those sorts of things and how those sorts of reforms would actually deliver much more effective local government for the people of South Australia.

One of the areas I would like to touch upon is community engagement. I would like to give three examples of community engagement undertaken by one of my local councils, that is, the Town of Gawler. The first one I would like to refer to is the community engagement the Town of Gawler undertook to respond to the government's initiative to build the Gawler Eastern Link Road. It is interesting to note that the council, after its extensive community engagement process, picked the alignment that very few people in the community wanted. It also picked the alignment that is most expensive. And it also ended up picking the alignment which actually was unaffordable.

After two years of spending hundreds of thousands of dollars of ratepayers' money to get other independent consultants' views, the council ended up picking the original route which was suggested by the Department of Transport. During that consultation time, one of the things I received the most from people in the electorate was that they just did not understand what the council was doing and why they were doing it. Clearly, it was not supported by the community; clearly, it was the most expensive option, yet they did it; clearly, the community do not understand what this council has done in that decision.

The next decision relates to a proposal by the Gawler Landowners Group. The Gawler Landowners Group represents landowners in the areas of Kudla—I declare I live in Kudla myself—Hillier and also Evanston South; basically the southern rural area parts of the Town of Gawler. This group has over a number of years tried to engage with the council to develop a planning development to rezone that area and to explore what is possible.

Despite this group's willingness to actually negotiate with the council and engage the council, the Gawler council has not done so. In fact, the Gawler council, I understand, has actually made a number of decisions regarding this whole process in secret. In fact, the council has refused to release to the community one of the reports prepared by an independent consultant. I understand this report actually outlines various options for rezoning or proposals to develop the site. Aggrieved by this lack of information, I have actually lodged a freedom of information request with the council, which internal review rejected, and it now sits with the Ombudsman.

The point I am trying to make is that here we have a group in the community wishing to engage with the government council and have a mature discussion and dialogue about an important issue affecting that part of the community. What does the council do? It shuts the door on them to the point that nobody seems to know what the council is doing in this area. Given that the new planning laws talk about charters of engagement and how to engage with the community, the council's actions are quite inappropriate. Again, I get questions about transparency and accountability of this council's decision.

The last issue I would like to touch upon in the few moments I have left is that council is redeveloping its civic centre, which is a good project. Unfortunately, I understand that has gone astray and that the budget has blown out. Again, all those decisions have been made behind closed doors. People do not know what decisions council is making and how these impact on them. These sorts of decisions are things that actually turn people against council.