State Budget

Dr HARVEY (Newland) (14:23): My question is to the Premier. Can the Premier please update the house on how the Marshall Liberal government's budget is delivering a stronger South Australia?

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL (Dunstan—Premier) (14:24): I thank the member for Newland for his excellent question. I must say, I enjoyed being out in his electorate with him earlier this morning. He's got a great rapport with the locals. They are very excited about the budget that has just been delivered and, in particular, the way in which it is going to help the people of the north-east who have been long neglected by those opposite when they were in government.

When I look at the recent ABS statistics, they show a very pleasing picture for the people of this state. In fact, we have created 60,000 jobs in South Australia in the past 12 months—60,000 jobs have been created in South Australia; 22,400 jobs have been created—

Mr Malinauskas interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Leader!

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL: —in the last two months, yet they still complain. They hate good news: 22,400 people have found work in the past two months and they are still whingeing, whining, carping and complaining.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Member for Kaurna!

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL: Well, guess what? We think it's great that people have found jobs here in South Australia because of the hard work of the government and the great health response that we have had in South Australia.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Playford will cease interjecting!

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL: In fact, I am pleased to report to the parliament today that 871,000 people are employed in South Australia. It's a state record. Let me tell you also, sir, 418,500 are women—also a record here in South Australia. We are moving in the right direction, providing the stimulus and support to create those jobs, to sustain those jobs, to bring South Australians back home. That's what we have been doing, but there's more work to be done.

That's why yesterday's budget was a very positive budget for job creation here in South Australia. The $17.9 billion worth of investment into critical infrastructure in South Australia will create a pipeline of work not just over the next four years but, as you would have seen with some of our announcements, including the north-south corridor, these are projects which run right through to 2030 keeping people employed in South Australia, giving them hope—new roads, rail projects, infrastructure projects, school projects, health projects, which will create thousands and thousands of jobs.

Out in the member for Newland's area, of course we are having a look at the fantastic project to expand the park-and-ride out at TTP. What a great project: 400 additional car parks—$48.5 million. Those opposite thought they could do two park-and-rides for $15,000. That was going to be a couple of marquees, I think. What we are doing is making sure that we are putting that infrastructure in place, getting people onto public transport, something which is very important, but also along the way—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Member for Wright!

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL: —creating 215 jobs, and I hope a lot of them go to people in your electorate because they seemed very happy about the announcement while we were out there today.

We also know that one of the big items in the budget was our new $200 million Jobs and Economic Growth Fund. This is a very important opportunity for us to invest in a series of projects, whether they be in defence, space, cyber or one of the other critical nine areas that we have in our Growth State strategy. This is a great new fund for us to develop to create jobs, sustainable jobs, in our state moving forward.

We also know that we are now starting to return people to South Australia for the first time since 1991. We've got a net migration back to South Australia. One of the principal reasons why we have that is that we've got good job opportunities in this state. In fact, job advertisements in South Australia are also at the highest level they have ever been.

I've got to tell you that one of the other things that I get superexcited about in terms of job creation is our ability to get people into apprenticeships and traineeships. Yesterday, we heard that the number of commencements is double that of three years ago, and that's because of hundreds of millions of dollars going into skills development in South Australia. This will create a great pipeline of skilled workers in our state for generations to come.

The SPEAKER: The time for answering the question has expired. Before I call the member for—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! Before I call the member for Kaurna, I call to order the member for Chaffey, I call to order the member for Cheltenham, I warn the member for Wright and I warn the member for Playford for a second time.