Appropriation Bill 2018

Estimates Committees

Adjourned debate (resumed on motion).

Dr CLOSE (Port Adelaide—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (16:00): I was talking about education and the concerns I have about the funding for infrastructure for year 7s moving into secondary settings not having been provided through the budget process, but taken from funding that was intended for another purpose, which was to upgrade the facilities at those schools and to expand capacity for growth in the area, not expand capacity for students who are in schools just down the road.

I am particularly concerned that the government does not appear to have been able to supply detailed information about the schools that are in the first tranche of the Building Better Schools program. There are some 31 that are either high schools or area schools, birth or reception to 12 schools, and that means their work will be proceeding apace yet there is no advice about which of those 31—or perhaps all of those 31—will be losing some of the money they had expected to be able to use for one purpose but will now be required to spend on another purpose. I am hopeful to get more information about that from the minister in due course.

Of course, there are a number of high schools in Adelaide, in particular, that do not have funding under Building Better Schools—because they previously received significant upgrade money—that are already very full. Brighton, Marryatville, Adelaide and Glenunga are the notable ones, and I am uncertain how the government proposes to increase the capacity or reduce the pressure on those schools. The minister appears to believe—and of course I take him at face value—that zones will not be changed and that special entry programs such as the languages selection for Adelaide High School, for example, or the Ignite program at Glenunga, will not be adversely affected by the need to fit in another year level of students.

However, I am a little at a loss to see how else that will happen. The severing of sibling rights for special entry could well occur, and I think that would be of deep concern to parents who have or who intend to have an older child attending school on those grounds. I believe that is already underway for Henley High School with their sports program, and it is causing some concern.

The early childhood area appears to have few, if any, initiatives within the budget. There was some discussion about the question of having three-year-old preschool, an issue I have been pursuing for some time. Members may recall that the previous premier, the current member for Cheltenham, had pursued with the federal government an attempt to facilitate the offering of three-year-old preschool. The minister referred to a report that was taken to the ministerial council without giving any detail in the estimates committee so, for the record, the report, which was produced earlier this year, includes a recommendation that three-year-old preschool be progressively implemented in Australia.

It includes the comment that two years of early childhood education is the minimum duration needed to have a good chance of reaching a good level of performance at age 15. That reference to age 15 is because the only international assessment we have with which to compare different education systems is PISA, which is undertaken at the age of 15 across all countries every few years.

It is clear from the PISA evidence that systems which start preschool from the age of three have students who do significantly better by the age of 15 than our own students. We are one of the very few nations now, with the wealth that we have, that does not offer 15 hours of preschool for three year olds: in fact, the same report notes that internationally many countries are offering 20 to 30 hours of preschool for both three and four year olds.

This is an area that this country must deal with, and it should not be a matter of Labor or Liberal. Federal Labor is advancing the case very strongly, and I note again that that was not welcomed warmly by this government, but it is a place we will need to be if we want to be able to compete internationally with high-quality education. There is no point in lamenting every year the NAPLAN scores in South Australia if we are not prepared to do something to improve our education, and early childhood education is the best way to invest in order to make a difference.

We also discussed SACE briefly. I am looking forward to seeing the minister at the SACE ceremony early next year. I do not believe as shadow minister he attended at least the last couple and always asked questions about how much it cost but I was pleased to hear that it is still going to happen and that he does intend to be there. Of course, there is also a big review going on, but we will discuss that once the review is completed.

There was a discussion of TAFE, seeking the justification for the closure of the seven campuses. The person who is Acting Speaker at the moment might be very interested in understanding the justification, and I am still battling to see how we can grow TAFE while shrinking it, particularly in the city. A concern that I have about the way in which, although additional funding is being provided to TAFE, it is largely coming back out again in the form of savings that are back-ended through the forward estimates. The money that is also going in on another budget line is because of closing TAFE campuses and dealing with the shortfall in projected revenue. I would have thought the only thing we can do with TAFE in South Australia is to grow TAFE in order to help it remain and be even more so the major player that is required for our skills and training.

If I can now move to the environment portfolio, a very polite and reasonable conversation was had throughout the estimates period with the minister, which pleased me. I am concerned about the staff cuts that are going to occur. I appreciate the way in which staff cuts are counted. The plan in the budget is 20 in the next financial year, 87 in the following financial year and six in the financial year after that, which is 113 FTEs over that period. If you count that in terms of work effort, the 20 in the next financial year are also not working in the subsequent two years, the 87 are also not working in the final year, then that is in fact a work effort number of some 200.

What concerns me, because we have already talked about that element previously, is that Treasury have come out and said in this year they will finance TVSPs. So all departments, of course, are very quickly moving to put out for expressions of interest to seek to shed their staff now while Treasury will pay for the TVSP package. What concerns me is that, although no staff need to go according to the budget this financial year, in fact many will this year, and we will lose that work effort in the important area of environment and water.

We discussed at length the opening of the reservoirs for recreational purposes. I noted that there is only $5 million allocated to that which appears to be relating to infrastructure associated with walking trails and barbecues and so on. There is no funding that has been allocated for increased water treatment and I think what that means is that either there is some fantastic advice that I am yet to come across that says you can have people going into the water and that it will not require any additional treatment—and I know that Professor Don Bursill is very sceptical of that being sound advice that might be yet to be received—or we will run a risk which I am sure the government does not wish to do or, thirdly, there will be little or no activity in the water itself and that the opening up of the reservoirs will be about walking and barbecues. We will watch that very carefully.

Marine parks are undergoing a review at present. I was disturbed that the company that is undertaking that is EconSearch. It is a sound company, but it is an economically specialist company, not scientifically or environmentally specialist, and I will be very interested to see how that transpires. The minister said that he was not putting words into the conservation sector's mouth but 'I understand the conservation sector has a reasonable level of confidence'. That is not the case.

As I am sure the minister is now aware, I believe he will be receiving or has received correspondence to that effect. The conservation sector, I believe, is extremely concerned about any kind of review of the marine parks network that does not have a very serious scientific approach. However, I was pleased to hear the minister say that he was absolutely open to considering more marine parks and more sanctuary zones, and we will see how that plays out.

We did not have a discussion about the Murray-Darling Basin Royal Commission, the lack of extension, and therefore the inability of the commissioner to summons people from the commonwealth to attend and give evidence, because the minister felt that that belonged entirely to the budget line of the Attorney-General. That may be technically correct, but I would love to hear the minister speak passionately and loudly to defend our water and the absolute need for us to hear from everybody about what is happening with the loss of our water in the up-river states.

There was a discussion about NRM. We are yet to see where the minister will take his NRM reforms, so I will suspend judgement. I am on the Natural Resources Committee of parliament and I look forward to participating in the review of the proposed legislation. I was interested that the minister said that he was considering taking some of the levy money raised in one part of the state and spending it in another. I am not sure at this stage whether that can take place legally, but it will be interesting to see in the process whether it is considered by the government to be an acceptable approach, whereby people in Adelaide would have some of their levy raised through the council processes not spent in their region.

I wait with interest to find out how the money from the Green Industries fund is being spent. It appears to be being spent on all sorts of parts of government, including in the Minister for Energy's area, I believe. I am interested to find out how much is being spent in various areas and how those who provide the money for the fund feel about that.

There was a discussion about the dividends being raised in SA Water. It remains to be seen how legitimate it is to appropriate that degree of extra money without causing pressure on water prices. The fees will be going up in the EPA, both specific fees to be applied to petrol station owners—essentially, the people who have underground tanks for storing petrol—but also more generally on licensed entities.

My concern is that, while I would love to see greater regulation—for example, in relation to Adelaide Brighton Cement in my area, which a lot of the local community has very serious concerns about—raising additional fees will not result in any additional regulatory effort, but it is a way for the EPA to receive less money from general appropriation and to receive money directly from companies. This will not make a jot of difference for the people in Port Adelaide who live right next door and who are concerned about the impact of both noise and dust emissions.

Finally, with Green Industries, formerly known as Zero Waste, the minister spoke today in a government question about the money that is being spent to respond to China's refusal to take any more plastics, that it is not going to local government but is going to industry. I think that is a high-risk strategy. If it comes off I will be supportive but, if not, I will be raising it many more times.