Bills

Emergency Management (Miscellaneous) Amendment Bill

Second Reading

Adjourned debate on second reading.

(Continued from 19 March 2025.)

Ms CLANCY (Elder) (12:01): I rise today to speak on the Emergency Management (Miscellaneous) Amendment Bill. The Emergency Management Act establishes the legislative framework and principles for coordinating the necessary activities before, during and after identified major incidents, emergencies and disasters. It assigns key accountabilities and provides authority to effect response and recovery operations.

The act has been crucial to our state time and time again over the nearly 20 years since it was first put in place. It was needed in the management and response to COVID-19, the recent River Murray floods, the statewide blackout in 2016 and a number of bushfires, including those in late 2019. It is likely it will be needed even more as we continue to see the effects of climate change through an increase in natural disasters.

The horrific fires in California might have been happening when we were sweltering through our summer, but it was in winter for them—horrific fires blazing for weeks in winter. Climate change is real. Our farmers have seen the changes for years, and cities are now experiencing its effects more and more. We do not have to look far to see the damaging effects of climate change. I am sure many, like me, refreshed the BOM radar over and over again looking at Queensland and northern New South Wales as Tropical Cyclone Alfred loomed.

I want to thank all the incredible people who worked so hard to keep people safe during the extreme weather faced up there, including many volunteers. Back in 2011, I witnessed the inspiring determination of Queenslanders following the floods that started in late 2010. My friend Ryan was doing so much to help people and I wanted to contribute as well, so I flew up to Brisbane and helped sweep sludge out of people's homes near Goodna.

It was awesome to see communities coming together to support one another, people helping others when they have lost everything themselves. The Mud Army, as it became known, formed in the thousands, and there is a beautiful story in Trent Dalton's book Love Stories about what the Mud Army meant to a woman named Moana, so please add it to your reading pile.

I would like to now share part of a statement on ex-Tropical Cyclone Alfred by Emergency Leaders for Climate Action, which is a coalition of former fire and emergency service leaders from every Australian state and territory. Here it is:

As 38 former Australian fire and emergency service chiefs who have directly responded to countless extreme weather events over the past five decades, we are deeply concerned about the trend of worsening extreme weather disasters, fuelled by climate change.

The ongoing impact of ex-Tropical Cyclone Alfred on communities in northern New South Wales and southern Queensland highlights that many Australians are increasingly being impacted by consecutive, compounding climate disasters including heatwaves, drought, fires, storms and floods, leaving little time for recovery. Many people impacted by flooding and damaging winds from Alfred are still re-building from the record breaking catastrophic 2022 floods.

Queensland has had to deal with many disasters in the last seven years, including bushfires and floods in 2018, Black Summer in 2019/20, floods in 2022, bushfires in 2023, more bushfires in 2024, floods in January 2025, and then TC Alfred in March 2025. The climate is changing and this is becoming our new reality.

Make no mistake, this is climate change in action and as the world warms at record rates, impacts unfortunately will worsen, whether it be catastrophic bushfires like our Black Summer, Maui in 2023, the winter firestorms that devastated Los Angeles this year, the deadly 2024 Spanish floods, and now the major impacts of a slow-moving ex tropical cyclone that reached as far south as northern NSW, something we can expect more of in future.

Scientists are very clear: climate pollution from the burning of coal, oil and gas has intensified not only hot, dry weather that fuels catastrophic fires, but also the frequency and intensity of extreme rainfall events.

TC Alfred was made more intense by record hot ocean temperatures, higher levels of atmospheric moisture, and higher sea levels. Similarly, the successive storms and intense rainfall that led to the devastating 2022 floods in many parts of Queensland and NSW were intensified by climate change.

Scientists have tried to warn us for decades but were not listened to until after the change of Federal Government in 2022. We are now living through the predicted consequences of increasing climate pollution and inaction for many years by governments worldwide.

Fire and emergency services and the Australian Defence Force are now having to respond to more frequent and extreme natural disasters, stretching their capacity. More intense, frequent extreme weather events put emergency responders in greater danger, for longer and more often. As former emergency service leaders, this fills us with dread, particularly when selfless, brave responders lose their lives trying to save others.

All Australians are suffering from the ravages of the climate crisis right now, and Governments at all levels must acknowledge that prolonging the use of fossil fuels will make future disasters even worse. This is why slashing climate pollution this decade must be a top priority. At the same time governments must invest heavily in adaptation and community resilience measures to keep people safe. Australia has made progress in recent years, but we must go farther and faster. The safety and wellbeing of all Australians, courageous emergency responders, and our kids' futures depend on it.

As we approach a Federal election, Australia can't afford to slip back into climate denial, inaction, and far-off 'solutions' that will actually increase climate pollution.

Despite the massive impacts of ex-TC Alfred, in some ways this time we 'dodged a bullet'. Its slow movement meant that residents of northern New South Wales and south-east Queensland, as well as emergency services and Federal Government agencies including the ADF had time to prepare. This helped save lives. We acknowledge the focus that the Prime Minister and dedicated public servants in rebuilt agencies, like the National Emergency Management Agency brought to the response effort, working hand in hand with the Premiers of Queensland and New South Wales. This was in stark contrast to the previous Coalition government's mismanagement during the Black Summer bushfires, as well as the devastating floods in early 2022.

Time was on our side for this cyclone, but we are fast running out of it when it comes to staving off much worse impacts.

We no longer have the luxury of time to put off dealing with climate change.

Australians, and the emergency services that protect them, cannot afford our country once again slipping backwards on climate action. This is the time all political parties and candidates should be pressed on how they will act immediately to deeply cut climate pollution, and how they will build up (certainly not cut back) the public service in critical areas including climate research, weather forecasting, and emergency response and recovery agencies that we rely on to protect us all.

For those who tuned in halfway through, that was a statement from Emergency Leaders for Climate Action.

As a state government, we are committed to doing what we can to address and mitigate the effects of climate change. Last year we introduced a bill to modernise the Climate Change and Greenhouse Emissions Reduction Act to provide a more contemporary legislative framework to deliver South Australia's climate change policy objectives.

The bill, which passed the Legislative Council on Tuesday with amendments and then this house yesterday, enshrines in legislation South Australia's short-term and long-term emissions reductions targets to help limit the extent of climate change. The bill also provides for improved climate risk assessment and climate adaptation measures, including sector planning to support South Australians to respond and adapt to the impacts of climate change that are already in train.

When that act came into operation in 2007, it was the first of its kind in Australia. It has guided policy and planning in our state to achieve world-leading outcomes in renewable energy generation and climate mitigation. The bill is an important part of the South Australian government's broader policy agenda to deal with climate change and respond to the declaration of a climate emergency. It replaces the South Australian target of at least a 60 per cent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 with our current state target to achieve net zero emissions by 2050.

A net zero target was first adopted by the Weatherill government in 2015 and aligns with Australia's national target and commitments under the 2015 Paris Agreement. A short-term target for at least a 60 per cent reduction in net greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 is also enshrined in the act as well as a state target of 100 per cent net renewable energy generation by 2027.

Our federal counterparts, the federal Albanese government, is doing a lot too, setting the target of net zero emissions by 2050 in law while working towards reducing Australia's emissions by 43 per cent by 2030 and maximising cheap, clean, reliable, renewable energy to get our energy grid to 82 per cent renewables by 2030, with 750,000 rooftop solar systems installed since they were elected. It delivered a 25 per cent increase in renewables in our national energy grid in two years and ticked off enough renewable energy projects to power almost seven million homes, with record numbers in the pipeline.

The Albanese government is investing in battery storage and transmission to ensure reliable power everywhere, rewiring the nation with $20 billion to modernise our national energy grid. It is improving charging—

Mr Whetstone: She must be speaking on the wrong bill.

Ms CLANCY: Do you want to make a point of order?

Mr Whetstone: I wasn't talking to you.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order!

Ms CLANCY: I will not respond to that but I would like to make it very clear that climate change is leading to more emergencies, so it is very, very relevant to the bill that is before us currently.

Members interjecting:

Ms CLANCY: Get up. Up you pop! I did not say the pandemic.

Members interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member for Chaffey, you have a chance to speak. I think you have exercised your chance to speak, so I suggest you listen to others like others listen to you, even if they disagree with you.

Mr Whetstone: I am listening.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Quietly. No, quietly.

Members interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member for Chaffey, do you wish to leave the chamber?

Ms CLANCY: I think that a flood is an emergency, so I think it is worth talking about climate change and the increase in events like floods and bushfires when we are talking about emergency management. An emergency is not just a pandemic, but if the member for Chaffey, who has the River Murray flowing through his electorate, thinks that the only type of emergency possible is a pandemic, I note that.

Other things the federal Albanese government is doing to mitigate climate change are ensuring the benefits of reliable renewables are shared with households and businesses and creating thousands of jobs. It has established a new vehicle efficiency standard to give people more choice of cheaper and cleaner cars, established a Net Zero Economy Authority to help regions and workers adjust to the move to a low-carbon economy and has secured a strong future for Australian-made aluminium with a $2 billion green aluminium production credit.

Knowing climate change is resulting in more intense, frequent emergencies, this Emergency Management Act must be as effective and fit for purpose as possible. To ensure that is the case, an independent review of the act was conducted by PG Consulting, the first full-scale review of the Emergency Management Act since its commencement 20 years ago. The proposed legislative amendments are informed by the extensive stakeholder engagement undertaken throughout the course of the review.

The review received feedback from the emergency management sector, multiple levels of government, non-government and volunteer organisations and the general public. The government considered the recommendations and observations contained within the final report and chose to publish the final report with an accompanying government response which accepted, or accepted in principle, all of its recommendations.

This amendment bill has been developed to incorporate all 28 recommendations made in the final report of the independent review. Two of the significant amendments are introducing the role and powers of a state recovery coordinator and introducing a new declaration category that would support the scale up and down of emergencies.

The State Recovery Coordinator will strengthen emergency management arrangements, with them responsible for, among other tasks, leading state-coordinated recovery planning and recovery operations when it is determined a state-recovery response is required for an emergency outside of a declaration period.

Part of the impact of an emergency declaration is the message it sends to communities about the seriousness of an emergency. The current declaration is quite a blunt instrument, as we are either in a declared emergency or we are not. In the act, we have a declaration framework where we have identified major incidents to a major emergency to a disaster. Each category brings with it a different understanding of the severity of the situation.

These changes made within this amendment bill will strengthen the act and ensure our legislative framework provides a basis for effectively managing all stages of emergencies into the future, whether that emergency be a pandemic, a flood, a bushfire or a number of other potential natural disasters, or otherwise. I commend the bill to the house.

Mr TEAGUE (Heysen—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (12:16): I rise to make a brief contribution. We are supporting the bill. It is following on from a review that has taken place after the act was enlivened on the very rare occasion of a one-in-100-year pandemic that the state, along with the rest of the world, suffered through and had to manage over an extended period of time.

It was under those circumstances that the operations that the act had contemplated were really tested and stretched beyond what had been contemplated for these purposes, as a result of that one-in-100-year pandemic. It is right to draw a distinction between no doubt significant events that the state has had to deal with, like the significant fires that have occurred in recent years and, of course, the flood that was experienced more recently, but those are not the occasions for the application of this act.

This act is concerned with the circumstances a state might find itself in, previously contemplated to be of very short duration, where there is such an acute moment of emergency that it is necessary to apply a whole different set of emergency management arrangements. It was for the reason that when the one-in-100-year pandemic hit the state—the COVID-19 pandemic—and it was necessary to apply this act that then carried on for a great length of time. We managed it under the act, and that just had to be part of what was being adapted to, along with so many other things that were in the nature of the response.

I think what is well to do in the course of this debate is to really draw that distinction between the events that are handled by our emergency services, sometimes with the help of the appointment of some superadded coordination on the one hand, and the likes of the pandemic on the other. The whole purpose of this bill is to now revisit the act in the light particularly of that experience, with a view to making it fit for purpose should we ever have to face like circumstances again, and maybe hope that we do not.

I want to take a moment in the course of this debate to pay tribute to former Premier Steven Marshall and to the former Minister for Health and Wellbeing, the Hon. Stephen Wade, who were, as members of this parliament, both the leading lights leading us through that pandemic. Both of them have given thoughtful contribution to the review that took place that informed this bill, along with so many others who were at the forefront of confronting the pandemic, so I pay tribute to them both.

They were both, although now both no longer in the parliament, thoughtful, diligent and committed (such as they are) to provide feedback that has led to these changes that will hopefully set the state in good shape should it be necessary to confront circumstances of that nature again. So it is important that the parliament take the responsibility to consider a review after such an extraordinary one-in-100-year pandemic event and that those changes find voice in a bill which will serve to improve such future response in the event that it may be called upon. Let us hope that does not occur for the better part of another 100 years. I commend the bill.

Mr ODENWALDER (Elizabeth) (12:21): I rise to make a brief contribution on the Emergency Management (Miscellaneous) Amendment Bill, which, of course, is a critical piece of legislation that strengthens our state's ability to confront the evolving challenges of emergency management. I remember back at the beginning of 2020 the immediate aftermath of the terrible fires we saw in 2019-20. At the time, that was a significant—well, it still is—natural disaster and there were reviews planned into that. If my memory serves me correctly, that was the very beginning of the Royal Commission into National Natural Disaster Arrangements.

I thought at the time that would really bring into focus some of the issues we are discussing today and some of the recommendations that have come out of the most recent review. But, of course, as the previous speaker pointed out, that was pretty soon superseded and blown out of the water, in fact, by the COVID-19 pandemic. I think in some ways, even though the royal commission did its work and released its recommendations, some of the important recommendations and some of the work of that royal commission and the review into the fires here in the state were somewhat subsumed by the response—properly—to the COVID-19 pandemic, but here we are.

The COVID-19 pandemic, of course, focused everybody's mind on the Emergency Management Act. As the member for Heysen pointed out, we saw that piece of legislation tested and pulled in every direction such as we have never seen before, and those responsible, from the Premier to the police commissioner to the State Coordinator, were obviously very stretched. They were tested. They were put through things they had never been put through before and that has obviously informed the now review of and now amendments to the act, which I think are absolutely necessary.

For nearly two decades, of course, that act has stood as a pretty robust framework. It has guided South Australia through some of its darkest hours, whether it is the River Murray floods we have talked about, the 2019-20 fires, the 2016 statewide blackout or, of course, most recently the COVID-19 pandemic. The act has been a cornerstone of resilience. It has provided the authority and the coordination, as I said, from the government through to the State Coordinator role necessary to respond and to recover from such crises.

But the world is not static, nor are the threats we face. South Australia, like the rest of the world, finds itself in a shifting emergency management landscape. Climate change, as the member for Elder has very succinctly pointed out—much to the consternation of the member for Chaffey—has ushered in more frequent, more intense and often concurrent emergencies, whether they are floods, fires, or storms, and they have tested our preparedness like never before. Again, I point to the 2019-20 fires as an example of that.

Add to that the rise of new threats such as cyber incidents and it becomes clear that we cannot rest on the successes of the past. We must adapt, refine and fortify our legislative tools to meet the demands of the future, and that is precisely why the government commissioned the independent review into the Emergency Management Act. This is the first comprehensive review since its inception 20 years ago. Again, the review into the 2019-20 fires and the royal commission into natural disaster preparedness, I think was the title of it, looked at some of these issues and touched on the Emergency Management Act, of course, but did not constitute a wholesale review of the act itself. It was probably well overdue.

The review was conducted by PEG Consulting, and it was not just a cursory glance: it was a thorough examination with extensive stakeholder engagement. We heard from everybody from the emergency management sector, all levels of government, the non-government sector and, of course, the volunteers, who often form the backbone of any emergency response and recovery.

So the final report of this review delivered 28 recommendations, all of which the government has accepted either in full or in principle, and I imagine there are others that the government is working through. Those recommendations are as follows:

1. The Emergency Management Act objectives and guiding principles be amended to reference:

mitigation, including recognising this is a shared responsibility;

that volunteers are key contributors to South Australia's emergency management efforts; and

that specific planning for vulnerable people is required.

Obviously, that involves a whole-of-government response.

2. The definition of 'recovery operations' be expanded to include activities on private property.

3. References to the 'scene' of an emergency should be recast to take account of all hazards.

4. The prescription of membership of the State Emergency Management Committee (SEMC) and procedural matters should be removed from the Emergency Management Act and dealt with via the minister's guidelines and chair's duties.

5. The Emergency Management Act should assign responsibility for an assurance function to enhance the current arrangements for oversight and accountability.

6. To support the evolving types of emergency responses required, the Emergency Management Act should add a fourth declaration category so that the State Coordinator may use section 25 powers in anticipation of, or in the scaling down of, a declared major emergency or disaster.

That is an important point. The ACT and Tasmania state of alert models should inform this declaration category, and we will get to that shortly.

7. Amend the Emergency Management Act to allow for an alternative extension process for a disaster if, due to the impact of the disaster, both houses of parliament are unable to approve an extension.

8. Reinstate the temporary powers from the COVID-19 Emergency Response Act 2020 to the Emergency Management Act for a comprehensive and flexible framework for managing declared emergencies.

9. Amend section 25(3) of the Emergency Management Act so that the State Coordinator is not required to take advice from a particular source and may take advice from any source the State Coordinator considers appropriate.

10. Provide the State Coordinator with an information-gathering power to determine whether there is, or is likely to be, an emergency that warrants the making of a declaration. Regulations should be able to be made relating to the use of the power.

You can see clearly reflected in some of these recommendations the experience of government and the experience of the State Coordinator himself, through the COVID-19 emergency, finding expression in some of these recommendations.

11. The Emergency Management Act include a section that provides ministers with the ability to dispense with procedural requirements of another act during a declaration period.

12. Incorporate an explicit mechanism in the Emergency Management Act to facilitate the mobilisation of the public sector workforce when necessary to respond to a declared emergency.

13. The Emergency Management Act should establish a (separate)—and it is important to emphasise separate—position of Recovery Coordinator. The role should not be limited to the declaration period.

14. The Recovery Coordinator should be an authorised officer who reports to the State Coordinator during a declaration period.

15. Powers should be available to the Recovery Coordinator on the making of a regulation, which should specify the purpose, duration and any conditions on the use of those powers. This could include the nomination of a minister that the Recovery Coordinator will report to—that is outside of a declaration period—and recovery powers should include (but not necessarily be limited to) land access and powers for constructing or removing temporary structures.

16. The use of recovery powers should be time-limited, but an extension process subject to parliamentary scrutiny should be available.

17. Information sharing powers should be available to the Recovery Coordinator and be underpinned by the trusted access principles outlined in the Public Sector (Data Sharing) Act.

18. The Emergency Management Act should be amended to clarify that section 25 powers retain primacy over other powers in the act.

19. The minister responsible for the administration of the Electricity Act 1996 should be able to give a direction that is reasonably necessary to respond to an electricity supply emergency to any person or class of persons.

20. The electricity supply emergency declaration period and its extension arrangements should be amended to align with the processes and timeframes for a major emergency declaration.

21. It was recommended that we amend section 27D to ensure that the type of information that may be requested is not inadvertently limited.

22. The Emergency Management Act should permit the minister responsible for the administration of the Electricity Act 1996 to share information with the State Coordinator.

23. The Emergency Management Act should provide equivalent protections to such protected information as the Security of Critical Infrastructure Act 2018 (SOCI Act).

24. The protections afforded by the Emergency Management Act should be expanded to address information that may be commercially sensitive and information that may be held by a person (who is not engaged in the administration or the enforcement of the Emergency Management Act) as a result of a direction issued under that act.

25. The penalty for confidentiality matters in section 31A of the Emergency Management Act should be increased to be commensurate with other legislation.

26. The Emergency Management Act should make it clear that liability protections do not extend to workers compensation claims which result in adverse outcomes for individuals following emergency management directions relating to their workplace.

27. The volunteer and employment protections should be strengthened to include a remedy.

28. The Emergency Management Act should have a review clause that requires it to be reviewed every seven years to ensure it remains fit for purpose and reflects contemporary emergency management practice.

As I said, these recommendations, all of which the government has either accepted or accepted in principle, were informed largely through the COVID-19 pandemic and the direct involvement of both the government and the relevant ministers, but also of the police commissioner in his role as State Coordinator in order to make the Emergency Management Act more flexible and more responsive to the needs, particularly in areas of recovery.

I will turn to the two most significant amendments proposed in the bill, starting with the introduction of the State Recovery Coordinator. Recovery is no longer an afterthought in emergency management; it is a vital pillar. Too often, the focus falls on the immediate response to a crisis, while the long, arduous process of rebuilding lives, homes and communities is left under-resourced and under-coordinated. This bill changes that.

The State Recovery Coordinator will lead statewide recovery planning and operations, stepping in when a coordinated response is needed, whether during a declared emergency or, importantly, beyond it.

During a declaration, the State Recovery Coordinator will operate as an authorised officer under the State Coordinator, holding delegated powers akin to those of the Assistant State Coordinator—Recovery under current arrangements.

This bill empowers the coordinator with recovery powers activated by regulation—powers tailored to the specific emergency, whether that is erecting structures on private land or bypassing usual approval processes to expedite rebuilding. These powers will be clearly defined: the regions affected, the purposes they serve and the timeframes in which they apply.

This flexibility ensures that recovery efforts are neither delayed by bureaucracy nor left without authority when the cameras and the headlines move on. Moreover, the State Recovery Coordinator will have the ability to share and request information to support recovery efforts. It is a practical measure that ensures decisions are informed and effective. It is important to note that this is not about creating a new layer of red tape; it is about equipping a leader with the tools to rebuild stronger and smarter.

The second major amendment introduces a new declaration category: the state of alert. This was an important focus of the review and the recommendations. We need some flexibility in the Emergency Management Act so we do not have the situation where it is either a declared emergency or not an emergency. That gives the government flexibility, it gives agencies flexibility, and it importantly gives the State Coordinator a lot of flexibility. Under the current act, we face a binary reality: we are either in this situation where a declaration of emergency is enacted and all of the processes and powers that are commensurate with that declaration are enforced, or we are not. There is very little flexibility in terms of the way that operates now.

It is a fairly blunt instrument, and it is very effective in clear-cut disasters. It was extremely effective, of course, throughout the majority of the COVID-19 pandemic. Like the member for Heysen said, I want to commend both the police commissioner acting as State Coordinator and former Premier Steven Marshall for their response, particularly their initial response to the pandemic. I think it was largely without fault in those initial stages, but, as we have said, we all ran up against the limits or the inflexibility of the Emergency Management Act as it stood and as it currently stands.

We all recall the peaks and troughs of that emergency. There were moments of acute danger followed by periods of cautious relief, only for the threat to surge again with variants like Omicron. A major emergency declaration carried a weight that at times felt misaligned with the lived experiences of South Australians.

The state of alert, of course, addresses this gap. It provides a mechanism to scale up or scale down our response, maintaining necessary powers like border closures or quarantine measures while sending a proportionate message to the community about the level of risk. Imagine, for instance, a moment during the pandemic when the immediate threat had eased, yet vigilance was still required. A state of alert could have signalled that we were not in the grip of a full-blown emergency but nor were we free of danger. It offers a middle ground between the normal state of affairs and a crisis, ensuring that our response matches the reality on the ground.

Beyond these headline changes, the bill also incorporates a recommendation to facilitate the mobilisation of the public sector workforce during emergencies. This mechanism, aligned with updates to the South Australian Public Sector Mobilisation Policy, will ensure that our skilled public servants can be swiftly deployed not just during declared emergencies but whenever a coordinated response is needed. This, again, is a practical step that recognises the value of our public sector workforce in protecting and rebuilding our state.

Importantly, this bill preserves what works. The core elements of the act—its flexibility across a broad spectrum of hazards, its clarity for agencies and organisations—remain intact. These are features that stakeholders have told the government that they value deeply, and the government has listened. The amendments do not overhaul the act; they enhance it, ensuring it remains fit for purpose in an era of unprecedented challenges.

As I close, let me reflect on why this matters. Emergencies do not discriminate. They strike urban and rural areas alike, the prepared and the unprepared. They test our systems, our communities and our resolve. Nowhere, of course, was this more apparent than in the COVID-19 pandemic but also in much more localised and perhaps much more intense situations, such as in the 2019-20 fires, Wangary fires and Pinery fires. All of those localised events tested our systems and demonstrate that emergencies and our response to emergency, and particularly our response to recovery, needs a lot of flexibility.

This bill ensures that South Australia is not just reacting to these crises but also anticipating them, managing them and, again, importantly, recovering from them with greater strength and coordination. It is a testament to the lessons of the past 20 years and a commitment to safeguarding our future. I commend the bill to the house and urge all members to support it.

The Hon. A. PICCOLO (Light) (12:39): I stand in support of this bill. Before I address the specifics of the bill itself, I would like to provide some context on why this bill has come about and make some comments relevant to this discussion. This bill will come into effect when there is an emergency, followed by the initial response and the recovery, and this bill deals with the third part of that equation, namely, dealing with the recovery.

It is important that we also understand the emergency part and the response part first to make sure that we provide the context for that recovery, with which this bill deals. The emergency obviously deals with group of people who are affected by the disaster, whether it be a flood, bushfire or any other natural disaster that affects people. With that in mind, the state's resources are put towards the initial response phase and the response phase generally involves people within the SES, the CFS, the Metropolitan Fire Service, SAPOL, ambos and a whole range of other people, whether they be in the environment sector or are people rebuilding Stobie poles, cables, etc.

It is important to understand that for this bill to work effectively we need a really good response first. It is important that we have the resources and capabilities of our emergency services, like the SES. I am happy to acknowledge that there is major investment in the SES in my electorate: we have a new SES unit being built. I think it is the first to be built in over 20 years. Further, it has a record number of volunteers in training at the moment, and later this year that SES unit will be ready to respond to any floods, car accidents or any other response required—storm damage, etc.

It is important I say that because, just earlier this week, the Premier announced a major growth plan for the northern parts of Adelaide, including Gawler and further north. With that growth comes a lot of challenges, and we also must deliver the services we require to keep those communities safe. At the moment the only SES units are based at Salisbury or Kapunda, and this new service in Gawler will be able to respond to any flood related to the south or north Para or Gawler rivers, but also to any other emergency in that area. I am glad to hear that it is going to be well covered by volunteers.

We also have the CFS when it comes to bushfires. I am fortunate to have a CFS brigade just down the road, so I feel quite safe and, should any event occur, the response will be quick. Throughout the Mid North region are a number of CFS units and they do their very best with the resources they have. But, I must confess that some of the feedback I am getting is that there are some difficulties in recruiting at the moment for volunteers, and the volunteers are the backbone, the lifeline, of our CFS, so as a government and a community we need to make sure that we create opportunities for volunteering, while fully understanding what are the barriers to those people recruiting.

The CFS in the metropolitan areas or urban areas is supported by the Metropolitan Fire Service. We have one of those in Gawler and we have a retained unit in Kapunda. My understanding is that the Kapunda unit works really hard but is struggling to find recruits to do the work and often they are not available to respond to emergencies. Again, it is incumbent on us as both as a government and as a community to make sure we have the resources available in every community to respond in a timely fashion to minimise any loss of life and to minimise any damage to property.

SAPOL, in an emergency, plays a really important role in ensuring we maintain law and order and that we are able to make sure the volunteers in the various sectors, and even other emergency services, can do their work safely. Sadly, in the case of an emergency people sometimes act a little irrationally and cause more difficulties for our emergency services workers, so SAPOL plays an important role. I note that the government is making a huge effort in recruiting and also supporting our police force, as well as putting a lot more resources into our police force to ensure they are able to do the work they need to do—again, in a timely fashion.

Ambulance officers also play an important role in an emergency, whether they are paid officers or are volunteers through the St John's Ambulance Service, or other volunteers. It is no different to a lot of other paid or voluntary services; we need to make sure they have the actual resources to do their jobs well.

I raise these matters to give a full picture of what we are talking about today, to make sure that these people, the people in the response part of any emergency, can do their job well knowing that once they finish their job the recovery process starts. It is increasingly clear, particularly around major bushfires which may burn for days or weeks, and sometimes up to months, that the recovery process does not start after the response part but often starts during it.

Recovery processes start as soon as it is safe to do so, to ensure that we secure property and secure life. As a result we need a recovery system that is a bit more flexible and responsive, and that is where this bill comes in. What this bill does is modernise recovery response processes to make sure we do not have any hold-ups, misunderstandings or lack of clarification or clarity in terms of whose role it is to do what and when.

We are now preparing to amend the Emergency Management Act that: establishes the legislative framework and principles for coordinating activities before, during and after identified major incidents, emergencies and disasters; assigns key accountabilities; and provides authority to effect response and recovery operations.

The current act has been in place for nearly 20 years, and during this time it has provided a sound basis for the state's ability to manage and respond to emergencies and incidents. The act has served the state well through a number of significant disasters, including the River Murray floods, the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2016 statewide blackout, and multiple bushfires, including the Pinery fire (which was in part of my electorate at the time) and the 2005 Wangary fires.

Despite our preparedness to date South Australia, like the rest of the world, is experiencing a changing emergency management landscape. We are facing threats from climate change resulting in more frequent, intense, longer term and at times concurrent emergencies, as well as new and emerging threats such as cyber incidents. In order to ensure the state is best placed to deal with future challenges, an independent review of the act was conducted at the request of the state government.

This was the first full-scale review of the Emergency Management Act since its commencement 20 years ago. The proposed legislative amendments are informed by the extensive stakeholder engagement undertaken throughout the course of the review. The review received feedback from the emergency management sector, multiple levels of government, non-government and volunteer organisations, and the general public.

The government considered the recommendations and observations contained within the final report and chose to publish the final report and accompanying government response, which accepted, or accepted in principle, all its recommendations. The amendment bill has been developed to incorporate all 28 recommendations made in the final report of the independent review, in one way or another.

There are two significant elements to the proposed changes and amendments sought. One is to introduce the role and powers of a state recovery coordinator, and the other is to introduce a new declaration category that would support the scale up and scale down of emergencies. As I said, what this bill does is quite rightly recognise that what we need is a seamless process from emergency to recovery. This bill helps to do that.

In terms of the proposed state recovery coordinator, recovery efforts have become an increasingly important element of emergency management, and the provision of a state recovery coordinator within the act will strengthen emergency management arrangements. The State Recovery Coordinator will be responsible for, amongst other tasks, leading state-coordinated recovery planning and recovery operations when it is determined that a state recovery response is required for an emergency outside of a declaration period. Recovery powers are often required after a declaration to progress recovery operations, or even when a declaration is not called. It was recommended that the role of the State Recovery Coordinator be identified in the act and have powers that come with it.

The government accepted that during a declaration period, as an authorised officer, the role will have the powers available to it as delegated by the State Coordinator, similar to the current arrangements for an assistant State Coordinator—Recovery. Outside of a declared emergency, there will be questions about when a recovery power should be exercised that may take a matter outside of a usual approval process; for example, one that may require development approval, and that was certainly the case on Kangaroo Island.

The scope and detail of powers required may vary depending on the type of emergency; for example, it might be appropriate that regulations provide notice to a private landowner if recovery powers are to be used to erect a structure on private land. For this reason, it is appropriate that recovery powers are activated by regulation and that other processes are streamlined through that process. The regulation could specify the powers that are available, the regions that are captured, the purpose for which the powers may be deployed and the period for which the recovery declaration applies.

During a declaration, to maintain authority and a command and control dynamic, the State Recovery Coordinator will report to the State Coordinator—again, this bill makes it quite clear who is accountable for what activity and leadership throughout the response and recovery phase. Other powers the State Recovery Coordinator will have are the ability to share information as required and to request information to support the recovery process.

As I mentioned, the second key part of this amendment is to introduce a new declaration category that would support the scaling up and down of emergencies. In terms of the state of alert, it is proposed that part of the impact of an emergency declaration is the message it sends to communities about the seriousness of an emergency. There needs to be a high threshold for an emergency declaration, which will be clarified. The current declaration is a fairly blunt instrument, as we are either in a declared emergency or we are not, and that lack of flexibility can, at times, hinder the appropriate response and recovery efforts. Through the categories in the bill all the powers remain the same, except in a major emergency or disaster declaration where powers are retained by the State Coordinator.

The challenge with the COVID-19 situation was that there were peaks and troughs throughout the emergency where the traditional understanding of a major emergency declaration was at odds with the COVID reality that South Australians were living—again, reinforcing that we need to be able to scale up and scale down the response and recovery process as required, and we need the flexibility to do so and the right accountabilities and leadership.

The review agreed that a state of alert may have allowed the powers required to manage the pandemic to be in place—e.g. border closures and quarantines—while community messaging around the threat could have been more proportionate. For example, prior to the Omicron variant there was a view that the COVID threat was diminishing. A step-down to a state of alert may have allowed for the restrictions required to maintain certain protections, while simultaneously messaging that, while at the time the risk to the community was not on par with a major emergency, the state was on alert for what could be a rapidly changing risk. That is the key element of this bill: the capacity to be flexible in our approach to response and recovery.

One recommendation that was accepted in principle from the review was that this would incorporate an explicit mechanism in the Emergency Management Act to facilitate the mobilisation of the public sector workforce when necessary to respond to a declared emergency. Certainly, in this case there was a health response, but also, for example, there is the capacity of schools to respond. Other institutions need to be able to respond, and there need to be certain powers and clarification of who does what to make sure that we respond in a timely fashion to minimise the impact of any disaster.

This recommendation was included in the amendment bill, but it is proposed that this mechanism will also specify the need for a public sector mobilisation response outside of a declared emergency, in accordance with amendments being made to the South Australian Public Sector Mobilisation Policy. We have an incredible public sector that can be utilised in terms of emergencies to make sure we are kept safe. If there is one thing we learned from COVID-19, it is the importance of having the capacity in our public sector to respond quickly without fear or favour. That is one thing we learned from that event, and where we were lacking public sector capacity it was made very clear that there was a need to maintain that.

Importantly, the bill preserves the key elements of the current act that are highly valued by stakeholders. The act is well understood by the agencies and organisations who work in the emergency sectors involved in the state's emergency management arrangements. The bill also maintains the flexibility provided in the act to carry out emergency management activities across a broad spectrum of hazards. This is core to the utility of the current act.

In conclusion, the changes made within this amendment bill will strengthen the act and ensure that our legislative framework provides a basis for effectively managing all stages of emergencies, from the emergency itself through to response and to recovery, to make sure that the people affected can be attended to quickly and that both life and property can be saved.

The Hon. B.I. BOYER (Wright—Minister for Education, Training and Skills) (12:56): I thank all the members of this place who have spoken on the emergency management bill at its second reading. Thank you for your contributions on both sides of the house. I think it is true to say that the South Australian public welcomes bipartisanship whenever the two major parties can come together and provide it. It is especially important in areas around emergency management.

There is no place for partisan politics when it comes to how the state responds in a crisis or in an emergency. There is no place for misunderstandings or political pointscoring when it comes to how we respond to a bushfire or a flood, or indeed something that had previously been almost outside the realms of possibility, or so it seemed, in terms of the COVID pandemic. Of course, these things can be upon us in the blink of an eye. We often do not get the opportunity to see the emergency slowly coming towards us, although sometimes there is a bit more opportunity. I point to the floods as an example of that, where we saw the crisis unfolding and it gave us the opportunity to try to put things in place where we could before the impact was truly felt.

But that is not often the way that these things work out, particularly in the case of perhaps a bushfire, for example. There have been lots of high-profile examples of those in recent years, and they have caused the loss of property and sometimes of life. It is important that we do our work in this place as legislators to make sure that we are constantly updating the legislation that governs how we respond—the legislation that gives powers to the police commissioner or the other chief executives of our emergency service organisations to make sure that, when a crisis hits or when an emergency hits, they are in a position to respond straightaway and they have the powers they need.

It is of course also important that there is a really strong level of confidence in the South Australian public that, when these things happen, we will respond and they will be protected and that the first responders and the government departments are in a position to do that well—that they have the powers available to them that they actually need and that we are not operating under a piece of legislation that is outmoded, outdated or behind what the equivalent agencies in the jurisdiction over the border might have. We need to make sure that we are constantly remaining vigilant and that we accept that it will never actually get to a point where we have—

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Minister, you are required to seek leave to conclude your remarks, if you wish.

The Hon. B.I. BOYER: I seek leave to continue my remarks later.

Leave granted; debated adjourned.

Sitting suspended from 13:00 to 14:00.