House of Assembly Fifty-Fourth Parliament, First Session (54-1) 54 1 Parliament of South Australia House of Assembly published Question Time Glenthorne National Park Glenthorne National Park Mr TEAGUE House of Assembly Heysen Glenthorne National Park Mr TEAGUE (Heysen) (14:21): My question is to the Minister for Environment and Water. Can the minister update the house— Members interjecting: The Speaker House of Assembly The SPEAKER: Order! Come on. Members interjecting: The Speaker House of Assembly The SPEAKER: Members on my left, I have given you a bit of a go, but if this continues members will be departing. Mr TEAGUE House of Assembly Mr TEAGUE: —on the delivery of the Glenthorne National Park master plan? The Hon. D.J. SPEIRS House of Assembly Black Minister for Environment and Water The Hon. D.J. SPEIRS (Black—Minister for Environment and Water) (14:21): I thank the member for Heysen for that question and for giving us the opportunity to discuss— Members interjecting: The Speaker House of Assembly The SPEAKER: Order! Settle down. The Hon. D.J. SPEIRS House of Assembly The Hon. D.J. SPEIRS: —a really exciting environmental project for this state, particularly for the City of Adelaide, creating some 1,500 hectares of open space and a linked corridor from the foothills around Happy Valley through to the beach at Hallett Cove and Marino. It is a really solid project and one that will create a biodiversity corridor that will enable birdlife and animal life to thrive and survive in the metropolitan context, grabbing hold of that concept of a national park city and weaving the national park into neighbourhoods, into communities, into council-owned assets— Members interjecting: The Speaker House of Assembly The SPEAKER: Order! The Hon. D.J. SPEIRS House of Assembly The Hon. D.J. SPEIRS: —and working with the community so that they then support that national park by planting— Mr Malinauskas interjecting: The Speaker House of Assembly The SPEAKER: Leader! The Hon. D.J. SPEIRS House of Assembly The Hon. D.J. SPEIRS: —plants in their backyards, their front yards and their streetscapes which enhance that overall nature corridor that we're seeking to develop. On the weekend, we had a couple of open days again for Glenthorne National Park, held on the Glenthorne Farm site at O'Halloran Hill. We had 2,800 people come and visit the site, particularly to look at the master plan for the site, which was unveiled at the beginning of the open days on Saturday. That master plan has been developed through very close engagement with the immediate community, particularly the Glenthorne Partnership, the community governance body made up of representatives from local environment groups, people from an education background, people from the local council and people from the business community who have come together to help shape the vision for that national park from the community up, as opposed to that vision being pushed down on the community from government. That is one of the keys to the success of this project: the very deep engagement of the community so that we are responding to what the community would like to see develop at that park and so that a response to the particular needs of that community from the traditional owners, the Kaurna nation, who are very much a part of the Glenthorne Partnership, through to those environmental groups and through to looking for business opportunities for the local business community, can be woven into that park as well. It is an exciting project, one that will be transformative from an environmental point of view and one that has a long way to go. Really, it is a generational project, one that is rapidly gathering momentum. One of the key outcomes from the weekend, of course, which many members would be aware of, was the formal transfer of that land from the University of Adelaide through to the state government. That land will now be held in perpetuity by the state government for the community. It will be wound into our reserve system and will become part of the land managed by the Department for Environment and Water. We also have a ranger station located there, so now we don't have rangers needing to travel down from Black Hill in the north-east of the city; rather, they are located to serve the southern suburbs on the Glenthorne site. We have the ranger station open, and the community can immediately engage with the rangers there. We will continue to work forward with this project—a great project for our environment and a real flagship project for this government.