Mining Employment

The Hon. S.G. WADE (14:26): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before asking a question of the Minister for Employment, Higher Education and Skills in relation to employment in the mining and energy resources sectors.

Leave granted.

The Hon. S.G. WADE: On 11 August 2014, Premier Weatherill announced that the government had identified 10 economic priorities to guide the transformation of the South Australian economy. Soon afterwards, the government established an economic priorities website where information on each priority was made publicly available. The website includes an economic dashboard that tracks the specific targets and objectives that have been established as part of the 10 economic priorities process.

One of these objectives is to increase the value of our mining and energy resources production from $7 billion to $10 billion, creating an additional 5,000 jobs by December 2017. A number of government ministers have highlighted the government's commitment to create these additional 5,000 jobs since the economic priorities were announced. For example, on 13 November 2014, the Treasurer highlighted this commitment in a media release entitled 'New record for mineral and petroleum production in South Australia'.

More recently, on 15 January this year, the Minister for Employment, Higher Education and Skills drew attention to the 5,000 jobs targets in a media release entitled 'SA's headline employment rate decreases to 6.5 per cent'. In that release the minister said she was 'encouraged by the growth in South Australian job numbers over the past 12 months' and that she was 'anticipating significant growth in the mining and energy industry that could see up to 5,000 jobs created'. My questions to the minister are:

1. Does the minister stand by the government's commitment to create an additional 5,000 new mining jobs by the end of 2017?

2. How many of the additional 5,000 jobs have been created since last August when the Premier announced the 10 economic priorities?

The Hon. G.E. GAGO (Minister for Employment, Higher Education and Skills, Minister for Science and Information Economy, Minister for the Status of Women, Minister for Business Services and Consumers) (14:28): I thank the honourable member for his most important questions. Indeed, this government has set itself a series of 10 economic priorities for this state. We have set ourselves a range of key performance indicators or specific targets to ensure that we fulfil those strategic commitments, and one of those is in relation to increasing jobs in the mining and energy resources sector. My understanding is that we are well underway in relation to that; that sector has done particularly well and that target of 5,000 still stands. In relation to where we are at, I would need to take that on notice, and I am happy to bring back a response.

The PRESIDENT: A supplementary from the Hon. Mr Ridgway.