West End Brewery

Mr MALINAUSKAS (Croydon—Leader of the Opposition) (14:08): My question is to the Premier. Has the Premier taken any action to prevent Lion Nathan from closing down its West End Brewery operations and moving interstate?

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL (Dunstan—Premier) (14:08): Well, we have been working very hard since we came to government to improve the competitiveness of this state. In fact, there of course has been no direct approach, and there is certainly no suggestion that anything that we could have done would have improved the viability of this plant.

It was made very clear to me by Mr Brindley that beer sales have been in decline for some period of time. They had a major and significant overcapacity on that site and they made a business decision. A private company made a private business decision. They will be keeping some capacity here in South Australia to support their sales and their marketing and their sponsorship capability, but the processing for the beer production in South Australia will conclude in June 2021.

What we have been doing during this COVID period is extending a range of supports for businesses here in South Australia, whether they be payroll tax waivers or deferrals, land tax deferrals or waivers, or specific supports to industries which have been adversely affected. The federal government has been doing exactly and precisely the same things with their very significant support, especially around wage subsidy with the JobKeeper program, which is helping many, many businesses.

But our focus with our government is to do everything we can to improve the overall competitiveness of our state. We have stated that we would like to grow our economy in South Australia by 3 per cent per year. Of course, as you would be aware, sir, this is an extraordinary year where there would be few places in the world that would be able to achieve that aspiration of growing by 3 per cent. What we know is that long-term growth under those opposite was around 1 per cent.

Mr Malinauskas interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order, the leader!

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL: It was around 1 per cent over the previous decade that the Labor government was in place here in South Australia. That was completely unacceptable and that is why we have worked very hard—

Mr Malinauskas: Jobs growth decline under your watch.

The SPEAKER: Order, the leader!

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL: That is why we have worked extraordinarily hard to improve the competitiveness of our state since we have come to government. Our focus is on creating more jobs in South Australia. What we have been doing since coming to government is reducing payroll tax in South Australia. We are very pleased to have wiped out payroll tax for the small business sector in South Australia. It's a very important sector of our economy. We have been able to reduce land tax in South Australia and we have been able to reduce the emergency services levy—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL: —in South Australia. We have been able to—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! Members on my left will cease interjecting. The Premier has the call. He is entitled to be heard in silence.

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL: One of the things that we have been doing to improve the attractiveness of South Australia is to very significantly—

The Hon. A. Koutsantonis: Yes, but they are closing.

The SPEAKER: Order! The member for West Torrens is called to order.

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL: One of the things that we have been doing is to very significantly invest in skills in South Australia, because we know that this is a critical input into the overall viability of business in South Australia. We have massively ramped up the expenditure which goes into our skilling Australians program. We have very significantly increased the commencements and completions for apprenticeships and traineeships and this is a real outlier compared to the rest of the country.

When we look at the most recent NCVER figures, they are extraordinary, and I commend the Minister for Innovation and Skills and his department, but, most importantly, I commend the employers in South Australia who have sat down and worked with the government through the Training and Skills Commission and the industry skills boards to actually identify those opportunities where there are skills gaps in South Australia. Now we are applying our focus to be able to do everything that we possibly can to address those skills gaps and get people into jobs in South Australia.

There is a lot more work to be done, and obviously COVID is a very difficult situation for our nation, but we are doing everything we can to make this a more attractive place for businesses to come and set up business and grow. Whilst those opposite may not be that interested and prefer to shout out negativities at a time when—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order, members on my left!

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL: —the world is actually looking for positive news, we were absolutely delighted last week to announce that Accenture, one of the largest global consulting firms, made a decision to bring up to 2,000 jobs to South Australia. This is really important.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL: I would also like to say it was great to read media reports today that CyberCX is setting up in South Australia and many, many companies are moving to South Australia to create those jobs of the future. There is much more work to be done on this area and we are up to that task.

The SPEAKER: Before I call the leader, I call to order the member for Playford. I call to order the member for Ramsay. I call to order the member for Lee. I warn the member for West Torrens and I call to order the leader.