Legislative Council Fifty-Third Parliament, Second Session (53-2) 53 2 Parliament of South Australia Legislative Council published Question Time Stormwater Management Stormwater Management The Hon. J.A. DARLEY Legislative Council Stormwater Management The Hon. J.A. DARLEY (15:31): Can the minister advise the basis on which the councils will participate in this, how their proportion of the $140 million is to be shared by the councils? The Hon. I.K. HUNTER Legislative Council Minister for Sustainability, Environment and Conservation, Minister for Water and the River Murray, Minister for Climate Change Stormwater Management The Hon. I.K. HUNTER (Minister for Sustainability, Environment and Conservation, Minister for Water and the River Murray, Minister for Climate Change) (15:31): This is a brilliant question, and I thank the honourable member for his insight. A long-time sticking point has been to try to get councils at the up end of the stream to actually invest in programs and infrastructure down at the bottom where most of the impact will be, for instance, in West Torrens. A lot of the impediments to an early resolution have been caused by councils higher upstream than those downstream. I remember the Mayor for West Torrens, John Trainer, a former member of the other place—in fact, a former speaker I think in the other place—lamenting at great length that, even though the residents of West Torrens, through their council, are prepared to invest in infrastructure projects, not just in West Torrens but further upstream, councils such as Mitcham and Unley were not prepared to invest their ratepayer funds in mitigation work further downstream. It echoes the problem we have with the federal Liberal government and the New South Wales and Victorian states over the River Murray. Upstream states don't care what happens in South Australia, don't fight for our interests. Federal Liberals in the commonwealth government don't care what happens to South Australia in terms of the River Murray. In exactly the same parallel fashion, people upstream of West Torrens, where a lot of the flooding will be (there will be flooding elsewhere), don't care. That has taken us 10 years to resolve. I am very pleased to say to the Hon. Mr Darley that we have overcome that hurdle. It is not a question now of just funding projects in your local council area but of seeing the catchment as a whole system, and we will be investing accordingly.