Quarry Sites

Mr McBRIDE (MacKillop) (14:34): My question is to the Minister for Infrastructure and Transport. Is the government aware of two high-quality road-making quarry sites in my electorate of MacKillop and that they are not being used? With your leave, Mr Speaker, and the leave of the house, I will explain.

Leave granted.

Mr McBRIDE: Papineau Rocks at Keilira and Mount Monster near Keith are two quarries that have high-quality road-making material. It is my understanding that, despite this, the government is currently sourcing lower-grade material from other sites.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS (West Torrens—Minister for Infrastructure and Transport, Minister for Energy and Mining) (14:35): You might be surprised to know that I don't monitor the quarries personally and I don't check individually the quality of the road base and the materials that we use; however, challenge accepted. I will ask my agency to go away and look at this.

However, I do caution the member—and I do so in a collegial way—it would be inappropriate for me to tell my agency from where and how it sources its road base. It is done through a competitive process. Obviously people can be prequalified to provide certain products, but the idea that I would intervene and tell my agency, on the advice of the local member of parliament and the proponents who own the quarries, that their materials are superior to the ones we are accessing from their competitors and that we should then direct my agency to go to those other quarries, could raise the concern of a certain agency that just tabled a document in the house called the Independent Commission Against Corruption. I think it would be inappropriate for me to do so.

However, if the accusation is correct and we are using inferior products, I would then also add this point: it is my aspiration that the Department for Infrastructure and Transport use the minimum viable product possible to try to save as much cost as possible when we do road maintenance. We are attempting to maintain a road network that is thousands and thousands of kilometres of sealed and unsealed road network, of which we do not have the financial capability to keep up to a standard that everyone would expect. We are 7 per cent of the population, we have 10 per cent of the country's roads and we get about 5 per cent of the funding.

Again, while there might be products that are superior and more expensive, it does not mean that they are also the right products to be used. If my agency is being prudent and frugal—good. I hope that they are using their procurement appropriately. I have no evidence to hand that they have not done so to this date. I hear this a lot from people in my own electorate who say to me that they produce certain products that the government consumes: 'Why aren't these products procured from me?' It is inappropriate for me to then say to my agency, 'Jim Smith down the road makes these types of products that we use, buy it from them.' There is a process we go through.

I hear what you are saying, but I also am prepared to defend my agency, because it's important that integrity remain and that we get the cheapest possible products we can and if that means paying a higher haulage cost but a cheaper rate per tonne of product that we buy that ultimately is cheaper, well, so be it. We are all South Australians and we want to support as many South Australian businesses as possible. I will check what the member is saying, but at this point I am satisfied my agency is doing its job appropriately.