Leigh Creek

The Hon. D.G.E. HOOD (14:34): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before asking the Minister for Manufacturing and Innovation a question regarding Leigh Creek employment levels.

Leave granted.

The Hon. D.G.E. HOOD: The face of Leigh Creek is set to change dramatically after Alinta Energy confirmed that mining operations will cease on 17 November this year, forfeiting along with it another 253 valuable jobs. The decline in this market has been linked to the increased push towards renewable energy by some.

Initially, a suggestion was made that workers could return to the Public Service as a result of a pre-privatisation deal; however, of the 253 soon-to-be-redundant workers from Leigh Creek, only 69 actually qualify for this, leaving a concerning 184 people likely unemployed. These figures of course only account for the mine workers, not those workers employed at the Northern and Playford B power plants in Port Augusta who will be made redundant by 31 March next year. My questions to the minister are:

1. What, if any, pre-emptive strategies were implemented to ensure that workers were retrained, or at least given the opportunity to retrain, prior to the announcement of the closure, and what is the current status?

2. Has the government committed yet to how the approximately $250,000 of the million-dollar support package for Leigh Creek will be used to support the ongoing viability of Leigh Creek?

3. What proportion of the million-dollar support package has the government assigned to those workers who are not yet covered by the pre-privatisation arrangement?

4. How does the government anticipate this will help them, and when can the workers access that assistance?

5. What, if any, of this support package has been assigned to innovative employment opportunities or other potential manufacturing opportunities in the region?

The Hon. K.J. MAHER (Minister for Manufacturing and Innovation, Minister for Automotive Transformation, Minister for Aboriginal Affairs and Reconciliation) (14:35): I thank the honourable member for his questions about Leigh Creek, and particularly the future of the workers. As the honourable member points out, there are between 200 and 300 Alinta workers in Leigh Creek. Of those, a bit over a quarter have a right to return to the public sector. So, when the mine stops operating on 17 November and as people are made redundant towards and after that date, about 70 of those workers have a right to return to the public sector under the terms of the legislation that set out the privatisation of our electricity assets in the late 1990s.

There are a number of things that the government and other groups have been working on with workers in Leigh Creek. I know that there are a range of views and desires from workers in Leigh Creek about what they want to do. I have been up there a number of times, and I will be in Leigh Creek again over this weekend. There are some people who have worked in Leigh Creek who are planning to use the opportunity to use their skills elsewhere in South Australia and Australia in similar industries. There are some who want to stay in the area and look for other opportunities.

I know that, as has been outlined to the Hon. Stephen Wade with Holden, Alinta are doing a lot of work with their own workforce in terms of skills recognition and providing packages for training. That has commenced and is ongoing in earnest. The state government, much like with Holden, is providing a similar package for the Alinta supply chain.

On the railway, in Port Augusta and Leigh Creek, there are those that are employed by other companies that provide services and are involved in the supply chain to Alinta, for which the state government is providing some of that skills recognition, career advice and support for training. That is estimated to be about 50 to 100 people. In terms of the Alinta staff, Alinta themselves have started the process and are providing training for their workers, and the state government is doing that for the supply chain.