COVID-19 Vaccination Rollout

Mr MALINAUSKAS (Croydon—Leader of the Opposition) (14:32): My question is to the Premier. If the Premier is unable to provide a target for the number of vaccinations administered in the first half of this year, how can he definitively commit that all vaccinations will be complete by the end of the year?

The SPEAKER: The Minister for Education.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! The Minister for Education has the call.

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER (Morialta—Minister for Education) (14:32): The Leader of the Opposition has asked a question—

The SPEAKER: Is it a point of order?

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: No.

The SPEAKER: The Minister for Education has the call.

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: The Leader of the Opposition has asked a question—

An honourable member: Why don't you give us a number?

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: Sorry, what was that?

The SPEAKER: Order! The minister will not respond to an interjection. The minister has the call.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: I am trying to answer a question from the Leader of the Opposition. I had thought this was a topic that would be of interest to the people of South Australia. It's clearly not of interest to those opposite, who continue to interject—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order, members on my left!

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: Playing politics with a pandemic is an appalling thing to do for anybody.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: Point of order, sir.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! The minister will resume his seat. Members on my right will cease interjecting. The member for West Torrens on a point of order.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: Standing order 98, sir: that was debate.

The Hon. J.A.W. Gardner: Only if it applied to you.

The SPEAKER: Order! The Minister for Education is called to order.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: Sir, I ask you to get the minister to answer the substance of the question.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order, members on my left! I am unable to hear the member for West Torrens. The member for West Torrens might repeat his point of order.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: Standing order 98: the minister claimed that the opposition are playing politics with the pandemic. Sir, that is debate, so I ask that you get the minister to answer the substance of the question, if he knows what the answer is.

The SPEAKER: I have the point of order. I am listening to the minister. The minister will remain germane to the question in his answer. The minister has the call.

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: I encourage any member of the parliament who shares the strong interest in the vaccination rollout that is held by every member of the government and, I believe, the overwhelming majority of people in South Australia to pay close attention to the advice from our Chief Public Health Officer from SA Health and to the answers given to the house just moments ago by the Leader of the Government, the Premier of South Australia. Having asked—

Mr Szakacs interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order, the member for Cheltenham!

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: Having had the Leader of the Opposition put forward a question on behalf of the opposition, I encourage those opposite as a whole to at least reflect on what the answer might be.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! The minister has the call.

Ms Hildyard: Tell us the target.

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: Are you interested in the answer?

The SPEAKER: Order! The minister will not respond to interjections. Interjections from my left will cease. All members are entitled to hear the minister's answer. The minister has the answer.

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: So, should a member want to know what we have been doing and what we have done, I will happily answer that. The member for Croydon, the Leader of the Opposition, asked a question based on the presumption of his anticipation of the Premier's answer, saying that if the Premier is unwilling to put a target on things, then how can we be confident that we will get there by the end of the year. I believe that's a fair characterisation of the question.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: And the answer is that we are working hand in glove with the commonwealth and all other states through the national cabinet, working hand in glove with SA Health and our public health officers, working with the federal health teams, of course, to get that vaccine rollout across. Of course, we at the moment have the Pfizer vaccine, which we are anticipating, as the Premier said, to be phase 1a. We actually also now have the AstraZeneca vaccine, which has been a new piece of information for that first phase that wasn't originally anticipated. The rollout has therefore adapted and changed. That was—

The Hon. A. Koutsantonis interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for West Torrens!

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: The AstraZeneca vaccine was not going to be part of phase 1a—

An honourable member interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for West Torrens is warned.

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: —until it was possible to do so. And indeed there are other vaccines that are still awaiting TGA approval. We will work with the commonwealth government, we will work with other states, to have a fair rollout that will focus on the health needs of the people of Australia, the people of South Australia, starting with those who need it most and most urgently, and then it will roll out to the whole of the population.

We are ramping up the delivery chains. The commonwealth is responsible for certain areas, the state is responsible for certain areas. The next phase will also include GPs, and the commonwealth and the state will continue to work together to ensure that we meet the goal of as many Australians as are willing to be vaccinated being vaccinated as soon as possible.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! Before I call the member for King, I warn for a second time the member for Schubert and I warn the member for Cheltenham.