Shop Trading Hours

The Hon. F. PANGALLO (14:58): My question is to the Treasurer and Leader of the Government, the Hon. Rob Lucas, regarding shop trading hours. Will the Treasurer provide exemption certificates under the act to non-exempt shops to enable them to trade longer hours should the government's proposed bill to deregulate shopping hours fail to pass the upper house when it is finally introduced, and have noncompliance notices already been issued to stores claimed to be operating outside existing regulations?

The PRESIDENT: Treasurer, the first half of the question might be slightly out of order but I will allow you some latitude as to whether you wish to answer it. It's supposition as to whether it passes the chamber or not and the honourable member probably should not have asked it.

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS (Treasurer) (14:59): I'm sorely tempted to ignore the first part of the question but in the interests of good relationships with new colleagues in the chamber—which are always important to encourage, I find, Mr President; my long history in this chamber is to be nice to as many people as you can for as long as you can because you never know from whence people might come to support a particular issue that might be of importance to you as a minister or as a government.

In relation to the first part of the question, it does presuppose, as you rightfully pointed out, Mr President, the possible result of a deliberation by this chamber or another chamber in relation to the proposed shop trading hours legislation. However, in that hypothetical circumstance, all I can say is what I have said previously, and that is that there is a long-established precedent under the existing shop trading laws that largely former Labor ministers—because we have largely had former Labor ministers in South Australia for most of the last 30 or 40 years—have used to provide exemptions.

The best example that I can give to the honourable member is the traditional pre-Christmas exemption arrangements where former ministers—and I said largely members of Labor governments and most recently the former attorney-general John Rau, who was the industrial relations minister, but many former ministers have done the same thing—that is, the considerable powers that exist within the existing shop trading hours legislation allowed minister Rau to exempt a large number of stores to trade outside the normal trading hours in that period leading up to Christmas. That is a long-established convention recognised by South Australians and that remains, of course, an option for any minister with or without amended trading laws in South Australia.

I think that is the most comprehensive response that I can give to the member, other than saying that the alternative to the current dog's breakfast legislation that we have before the house—is that when we do come to debate the issues in the coming weeks and months I think it will be self-evident to anybody who is prepared to look rationally at shop trading laws legislation that there are, indeed, significant anomalies that have built up after decades and decades of bandaid changes and amendments to the original shop trading laws in South Australia.

The safest, best and most sensible resolution to all of this is comprehensive reform providing freedom of choice for traders, consumers and workers. If a trader wants to trade, if a worker is prepared to work and if customers want to shop, why should the laws of the state stop that sensible arrangement from occurring? It occurs virtually everywhere in regional South Australia, with the exception of the limitations in Millicent at the moment.

Those members in this chamber who come from God's own country in the South-East in Mount Gambier will know that stores there can actually trade on Christmas Day, on Good Friday and on Anzac Day morning. They make their own decisions as to whether they want to trade or not trade. Stores as close as Mount Barker in the Adelaide Hills can trade on Christmas Day, Good Friday and Anzac Day morning. Three or four kilometres down the road at Stirling—no, no, no, not allowed to.

The Hon. T.J. Stephens: Naughty Stirling.

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS: Naughty Stirling, exactly—as my colleague interjects, inappropriately, Mr President, but nevertheless usefully. Why on earth do we have that situation in Mount Barker? We have had many debates about Mount Barker in terms of extending services such as transport and others, but they can actually trade in Mount Barker for the lucky citizens of Mount Barker. In Mount Barker they have Coles and Woolworths and they actually have a Foodland, and they have an IGA—all happily trading together, all in that little locale of Mount Barker in the Adelaide Hills. The Foodland has not gone out of business; in fact, I think the Foodland actually only opened in the last couple of years in the full knowledge that Coles and Woolworths were trading happily whenever they wanted to in Mount Barker.

So there are all those sorts of examples, which will be made very clear to members as they consider their approach to the legislation. The best answer I can give in relation to the honourable member's first part of the question is, yes, there is considerable power in the existing legislation and, should this parliament say that we are not going to give you a sensible reform of trading hours laws in South Australia, the existing legislation is the existing legislation, and that will need to be enforced.

In relation to the second part of the question, which is in relation to, in essence, under the existing laws, if there are other arrangements where people are trading unlawfully, what will be the circumstance? The circumstance will be that, if the parliament says that you have a dog's breakfast of legislation in South Australia but you are going to have to stick with it, then that will be the circumstance, and we will need to police those particular circumstances.

In relation to the past practice, I have given the example I think in this chamber before where former minister Rau, when advised that within regional areas a number of independent supermarkets had been trading unlawfully outside the legislation on Sundays for 10 or 15 years, he did not retrospectively institute prosecutions in relation to those independent retailers, and we made no criticism as an opposition of his approach in relation to that.

He recognised that people in those country communities were clamouring, were crying out, to be able to trade on Sundays. They wanted, contrary to the shop trading laws of the state, those supermarkets to be able to open so they could go and buy their goods and produce on Sundays. They wanted it, but the law prevented it. So the former minister, minister Rau, did not institute prosecutions over 10 or 15 years, or whatever it was, but allowed councils to, in essence, get rid of the proclaimed shopping district status they had; that is, to deregulate completely.

So under a Labor government, under a Labor minister—contrary to the bleatings we have heard from the Labor Party in recent times—they instituted a complete deregulation of shop trading hours in most of these regional areas.

A number of members are shaking their head—representatives of the Labor Party and the shoppies union. They know that was the circumstance that their minister, their government, instituted—complete deregulation. A Labor minister, a Labor government, said, in relation to those communities, 'You can shop on Christmas Day, you can open and trade on Good Friday, you can open and trade on ANZAC Day morning. I'm a Labor minister, I represent a Labor government, and I'm going to do that.'

What we have now is a more restricted freedom of choice option that is going to be provided by a Liberal government. We won't be allowing in the metropolitan area those stores to be able to trade on Christmas day, on Good Friday or on ANZAC morning, unlike the former Labor minister and the Labor government, in some of the regional areas, and we are saying that there should be greater freedom of choice for the other days of the year, with the exception of those 2½ days.

So, no, we won't be going back and seeking to prosecute people who have been operating outside the current trading laws, but if this parliament says to us, 'We're not going to let you do sensible reform,' if this parliament says, 'You've got dog's breakfast legislation, you police it and you live with it,' then, sadly, we'll have to do so, and, sadly, to some of those traders who wanted to trade after 9 o'clock on a weekday night in the metro area, to some of those traders who want to trade on public holidays, such as Boxing Day, to some of those traders who want to trade after 5 o'clock on a Saturday or a Sunday in the metropolitan area, we will have to say, 'You can't do so, and if you do trade then you will be prosecuted.' That is the simple reality.

So great responsibility rests on honourable members in this chamber, including the honourable member who asked the question, in relation to the shape, nature and direction of freedom of choice in terms of shop trading hours laws over the coming weeks and months.