State Final Demand

Mr MALINAUSKAS (Croydon—Leader of the Opposition) (14:07): My question is to the Premier again. Does the Premier still believe that two consecutive quarters of negative growth in state final demand constitute a recession?

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL (Dunstan—Premier) (14:07): I thank the Leader of the Opposition for his question. I think he is referring to state final demand figures that came out today. I've got to be clear, I haven't gone through those—

The Hon. S.C. Mullighan interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Lee is called to order.

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL: —in detail. I think most people would appreciate that there has been another pressing issue for us as of today. But the Leader of the Opposition is right: there are very significant headwinds economically both here—

The Hon. L.W.K. Bignell interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Mawson is called to order.

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL: —in South Australia and more broadly—

Mr Picton interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Kaurna is called to order.

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL: —around Australia and globally at the moment. Just a cursory glance at those state final demand figures that came out today shows that South Australia had a 0.1 per cent contraction in the December quarter last year. I note that that is a smaller contraction than has occurred in Victoria or Queensland and significantly lower than has occurred in Tasmania.

I think we have been very clear that there has been a slowdown in the Australian and the global economy through 2019. This accelerated further in the December quarter, and we are not immune from it here in South Australia.

Ms Stinson interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Badcoe interjects.

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL: We do face significant headwinds, and that's why we are doing everything we can to make sure that we keep our economy strong. Yesterday, I provided the house with an update with regard to my cause for optimism going forward. However, the effects of the coronavirus and the bushfire recovery are going to have an effect. That is a fact. It had an effect in the December quarter and it's also going to have an effect in the March quarter of this year.

There are a number of issues. I haven't gone through final state final demand figures in a great level of detail, but there were a number of issues which specifically affected us in that December quarter. We know that the first of the fires began in the December quarter last year. In fact, the Kangaroo Island fire began on 13 December last year. There were many issues which I think helped to slow the South Australian economy and, more broadly, around Australia. We will be focused on doing everything we can to minimise the effects of the slowing economy to make sure that we can maintain jobs and continue to do everything we can to support optimism in this state.