LOCAL GOVERNMENT, CONSTITUTIONAL RECOGNITION

The Hon. S.G. WADE (14:42): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before asking the Minister for State/Local Government Relations a question relating to constitutional recognition of local government.

Leave granted.

The Hon. S.G. WADE: The 2009 High Court case of Pape v Commissioner of Taxation found the commonwealth does not have the power to directly fund local government. In September 2010, the then federal government announced that it would pursue recognition of local government in the Australian constitution as part of a prenuptial agreement between the Australian Greens and the Australian Labor Party. On the eve of the federal election, the Labor government abandoned the proposed referendum. My questions to the minister are:

1. Does the state government consider that federal funding of local government continues to be at risk?

2. If so, does the government intend to take any action to protect local government funding?

The Hon. G.E. GAGO (Minister for Agriculture, Food and Fisheries, Minister for Forests, Minister for Regional Development, Minister for the Status of Women, Minister for State/Local Government Relations) (14:43): We were obviously disappointed that the constitutional recognition did not go ahead. We had indicated, in principle, our support for constitutional recognition. We give constitutional recognition at state level and, although we were never satisfied with the wording that was put by the federal government (we had concerns about the actual wording that had been developed), nevertheless, in principle, we supported it.

In terms of the current funding arrangements, I have not been advised that there is any great threat to those arrangements currently, and the area that we have been concerned about has been the supplementary funding that South Australia receives and the fact that the new federal government had not given an indication about whether it was prepared to honour the previous arrangements for that supplementary funding. So we are still waiting on that. The last I was advised was that the federal government had not determined a position, so I urge the Hon. Stephen Wade to write to his colleagues and urge them to make sure that this state receives its fair share of road funding.