Separation of Church and State

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS (West Torrens) (15:06): My question is to the Minister for Environment and Water. Does the minister stand by his comments regarding the separation between church and state? Sir, with your leave, and that of the house, I will explain.

Leave granted.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: In what was described by InDaily as a 'barnstorming speech', the minister told the congregation he attended, and I quote:

Pay very close attention to what’s happening in your parliament and what your local members of parliament are doing… this idea of the separation of church and state—forget it.

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL (Dunstan—Premier) (15:07): As the member for West Torrens would be more than aware, the Minister for Environment and Water is not responsible for this as part of his portfolio arrangements and I will respond on behalf of the government. I think we are very fortunate in South Australia to be established as an act of the British government, the British parliament, in 1834, and we were very different right from day one. We were differentiated in terms of religious freedom and we were differentiated in terms of democracy and in terms of enterprise. These are areas that I think we should all be very proud of here in South Australia.

An important part of that was that separation of church and state, which didn't exist in other parts of the world and, in fact, became one of the reasons why many people chose to come to live here. In fact, the settlement of the Barossa, and those fabulous wines that come from the Barossa, is really because we had George Fife Angas supporting those Lutherans in what was then Prussia, now Germany, coming here to escape religious persecution.

I think right from day one we have wanted to separate out the issues of church and state, but this does not mean that Christians or in fact anybody of any faith should be excluded from the political process. One of the great things about the democracy that we have here in Australia, and specifically here with our fabulous heritage and history in South Australia, is that we encourage everybody to be involved in the political process.

We encourage a broad church in South Australia. We would like to have as many people engaged in the political process as possible. Separation of church and state—the government is not told by the church what to do and of course they would not seek to do that. We have a very good working relationship with church leaders and church attendees and faith leaders here in South Australia—a good working relationship where, during COVID, we had very regular meetings asking them to work with us to keep their communities informed about this disease, and that's exactly and precisely what they did.

But we also believe that people of faith should not be excluded from the political process. In fact, all South Australians should be actively encouraged. I think that it's wonderful in this place—and one of the happiest times that I ever spend in this chamber—when a school group comes in. That school group could come from one of the fabulous schools in my electorate. Some of them are faith-based schools.

I always think it's wonderful that students are brought in here to learn about the wonderful rich history that we have in South Australia, the wonderful heritage that we have in South Australia, one that every student in South Australia should be very proud of. We do support the separation of church and state, but we actively encourage the participation of all South Australians in the political democratic processes that we love here in our state.