Southern Expressway

Mr KOUTSANTONIS (West Torrens) (14:51): My question is to the Minister for Transport and Infrastructure. When will the government install screens on the overpasses along the Southern Expressway. Sir, with your leave and that of the house I will explain.

Leave granted.

Mr KOUTSANTONIS: A further two rock-throwing incidents are making the Southern Expressway unsafe.

The Hon. S.K. KNOLL (Schubert—Minister for Transport, Infrastructure and Local Government, Minister for Planning) (14:51): I thank the member for West Torrens for his question and say that this government has moved since day one to deal with this issue. It's why you saw on Monday the first works around creating mesh over 2,000 square metres of rock area around various bridges across there being secured. It's why yesterday we saw the upgraded CCTV cameras being installed—

Mr Koutsantonis interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for West Torrens will cease interjecting. He is now on two warnings.

The Hon. S.K. KNOLL: —at 13 locations across the Southern Expressway. But I would like to talk to the house, if I can for a second, about what happens when putting up throw screens goes wrong. It's where you get incidents where chunks of concrete fall off bridges and start to hit motorists who are driving under South Road. That is what happens when you do not get the design work done properly. That is what happens when these things go wrong. Chunks fall off bridges and bridges need to be closed, and traders around the vicinity of the area struggle to trade. That's what happens when a government doesn't do its job properly. It is why we will not do anything—

Mr Bignell interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Mawson will cease interjecting.

The Hon. S.K. KNOLL: —that increases the risk to those road users using the road. It's why we need to be extremely careful about the throw screens that we put up, and any temporary measures that we are looking into as well, to make sure that it doesn't actually increase the risk to motor users on those roads. The worst thing that could happen is that it is not a rock that is being thrown off and someone doing something malicious but because something falls off one of the bridges because the structural integrity has been compromised by a throw screen that hasn't been designed properly, or a temporary screen—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order, members on my left!

The Hon. S.K. KNOLL: —that's put up that blows off the bridge—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. S.K. KNOLL: —and onto the car itself. That's why governments need to employ essentially what doctors do, and that is in the first instance to do no harm. That's why we need to make sure that we get this right before we take action— because otherwise we could see a situation like we saw on the shared-use pathway on the Glenelg tram overpass: 11 months and millions of dollars to fix what was essentially a design flaw—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. S.K. KNOLL: —in the process.

The Hon. S.S. Marshall interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The Premier will cease interjecting.

The Hon. S.K. KNOLL: The bridge was literally falling apart—

Mr Mullighan: It's the same bridge design, is it?

The SPEAKER: The member for Lee will cease interjecting.

The Hon. S.K. KNOLL: —and that is why we will make sure that we do our homework properly, that we are prudent, that we work as quickly as we can but as safely as we can to make sure that the treatments that we put in place to solve this issue from an infrastructure standpoint are appropriate and safe.