Members, Accommodation Allowances

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS (West Torrens) (14:24): My question is to the Premier. What appropriate action will he take, given his previous answer, given the Terry Stephens' scandal that is engulfing his government?

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL (Dunstan—Premier) (14:24): I think that we all appreciate that that is a very hypothetical question. We will wait to see what comes back from the Auditor-General and what comes back from the commissioner for taxation in South Australia. You, sir, have also asked the Auditor-General to look at country MPs' travel allowances for this house and for all of the members of this house, some of them Liberal, some of them Labor, some of them on the crossbench, and he will do that analysis. He will potentially come back to us with recommendations.

From time to time, we do look at the issue of entitlements and from time to time we update those here in the South Australian parliament. Even in my short period—much shorter than the member for West Torrens, who has been here for much longer—we have had changes to those entitlements for MPs and from time to time they do need to be upgraded.

But I will reiterate the point that I made yesterday, and that is that we have people who represent the people of South Australia in this place from all parts of the state. In this house, we have 47 separate electorates, many of them in regional or remote South Australia, and it is absolutely vital that we have representation of our entire state. Those people who live outside the metropolitan area do have an added burden. They are away from their communities, their constituents, their families and their friends for an extended period of time and I think that it is correct that there is remuneration provided to offset those costs and that situation for our country members.

It has been a longstanding practice, long before this government came to power. It was in place for the 16 years of the previous government and governments before that. We have a process that is underway at the moment. There are reviews into this matter. We will look at what comes from those reviews and, if there are recommendations, we should take action.