POPULATION GROWTH

The Hon. R.L. BROKENSHIRE (14:31): I have a supplementary question: will the minister explain why the whole focus with population growth is in the Greater Adelaide plan and why there was no focus to create jobs and population growth in rural and regional areas of South Australia?

The Hon. P. HOLLOWAY (Minister for Mineral Resources Development, Minister for Urban Development and Planning, Minister for Small Business) (14:31): There must be a misunderstanding of what is happening. Here we are talking about the 30 year plan for Greater Adelaide which presently covers about 81 per cent of the population of the state. Basically, it is from a little north of the Gawler River across to Murray Bridge and the remainder of the Fleurieu region, so it is a fairly significant area.

Obviously, there are other plans and the government has released a number of plans for regional areas. Rather than have a five year regional plan, the government made the decision some time back that it would have plans for individual areas. We have already released some, and I think there is currently one in relation to Port Augusta, where the consultation period has probably closed.

We have done the same with Mount Gambier, Yorke Peninsula and, I think, Kangaroo Island as well, and there are others around. We are considering the planning framework for other areas in this state region by region. So, it is not correct to say that we are not doing things. Clearly, those plans will also have regional targets. In fact, I think it is inevitable that there will be growth, perhaps greater growth within some of our regional areas than will occur in the greater metropolitan area.

If some of these mining areas come on to the extent that I hope they will, there will be significant employment growth within some particular regions of our state. Other regions have particular challenges, but the government will address them on a case-by-case basis.