Crown Land Management (Section 78B Leases) Amendment Bill

Second Reading

Adjourned debate on second reading.

(Continued from 14 November 2019.)

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN (22:48): I rise on behalf of the Labor opposition to make some brief comments about this bill and indicate that Labor will not be supporting this bill in the chamber today. Our objection to this bill is based on a principle which Labor has held for some time on this matter—indeed, one we legislated for some 10 years ago now—that private ownership of and dwellings on coast protection land and Crown land is not desirable, and where it would not be given approval now, should be returned to public ownership when existing rights cease. I understand that this process has taken place in Victoria where a significant number of previously private properties have been taken back under public ownership and returned to their natural state.

In a time of increasing population, growing pressure on the environment and the catastrophic effects of climate change already evident, we should do all we can to ensure that our most affected and yet most fragile environment, our coastline, is protected as best we can. A quirk of this bill is that it was under a Liberal government in a time before any of us were in this place—perhaps save for the Treasurer, I suspect—when this issue was initially addressed, that it was first decided that the properties being considered under this legislation would not be a part of a process of allowing private ownership. Again, I emphasise that was a Liberal government decision.

Alas, we now have an environment minister with a bent for not necessarily doing the best thing for the environment. He went to the election with a commitment to look at the existing arrangements. One of the key reasons given by the Minister for Environment that this legislation is necessary is that the process of handing over these properties would ensure existing and future buildings on these properties would be made to comply with building codes and standards for wastewater and so on.

I understand that when questions were asked on this aspect during the committee stage in the other place, it became evident that these codes are already applicable under current arrangements, so that is not a valid reason to be voting for this bill. For these reasons, I can advise that Labor will oppose the passage of this bill and conclude my remarks for the moment.

The Hon. M.C. PARNELL (22:51): This bill comes as no surprise. The Liberal Party has for years wanted to undo the policy of resumption of private shacks on public land. In opposition, they introduced a bill to do this, but they failed. Now in government, they are trying again. As they are now the government, they have certainly got the numbers in one house, so again the Legislative Council will have the final say.

I was taking a trip down memory lane and looking at the last time we had this debate back in 2013. I am very pleased that the Labor opposition have not changed their opinion. At the risk of channelling Mr Hunter, who was recorded in a number of country newspapers in relation to what he said in this parliament, this bill is the Liberal Party at its privatising best. He went on:

Michelle Lensink wants to hand out prime chunks of South Australia's Crown land to benefit a select few.

Mr Hunter also said:

The Liberal Party should be ashamed of this blatant electioneering, which not only contradicts its 1994 policy that resulted in life tenure leases, but also shows a clear lack of care for the environment and the public at large.

I am glad the Labor Party have stuck with their policy.

Depending on what statistics you look at, it seems as if the private shacks that are affected by this bill only number around 230 or so on Crown land. They are located at Milang, Glenelg River, Fisherman Bay and along the Murray River. I understand there are another 80 to 90 shacks in public parks, 62 of which are in the Coorong National Park and 20 in Innes National Park.

In relation to the shacks on Crown land, many of these have been held by the same family for generations, and there is no doubt that many families with access to a shack have a strong connection with their shack and the local area. For others, it is a good source of holiday season rental income. But it is interesting that we are now down to the last few hundred. When you look at the statistics of South Australian shacks in previous freeholding exercises, there were 4,200 that were being considered back in 1983. Ten years later, 1994, the debate was around 2,000 shacks, and we are now down to the last couple of hundred.

Despite the undoubted pleasure that a small number of lucky families derive from these shacks, the decision that we make as a parliament should be in relation to the public interest, not just the private interest of shack lessees. I refer members to the consultation report that the government published just last month, entitled 'Retaining shacks as part of vibrant holiday communities', a summary of consultation May to August 2019 on the preliminary discussion paper, and the Crown Land Management (Section 78B Leases) Amendment Bill.

It will surprise members to discover that the people who responded to a survey on whether they should have more rights over their shacks were the people who had rights over their shacks. They were the bulk of the respondents. When they were asked whether they would consider applying for longer tenure—in other words, 'Would you like to not have to hand back your shack to the state when the lessee dies?'—shock horror, nearly 80 per cent said yes.

Who would have thought that nearly 80 per cent of people who, for many years, have had access to public land for their private holidays thought that having more tenure would be a good idea. In fact, there was only one, solitary shack lessee out of 143 who said they did not want to have longer tenure. They were then asked, 'What sort of longer tenure would you like? Would you like to own it or would you just like to be able to lease it permanently and then sell the lease to someone else when you did not want it anymore?' Nearly 40 per cent wanted freehold ownership and 60 per cent wanted transferable term tenure. So there were no surprises in the government's consultation asking people who stand to gain whether they like the bill that provides them with that gain.

I will declare at this stage that, to the best of my knowledge, I have never stayed in one of these shacks on Crown land, but I have certainly seen plenty of them, and I will go through some that have piqued my interest. I do not know whether other members of this chamber, or indeed members of the other place, made any declarations about whether they were shack lessees, whether it was a place at which they would holiday or whether they knew people who had shacks and used them.

I know my colleague the Hon. Tammy Franks raised the issue of when it is appropriate for members to declare an interest. I would suggest that anyone who is involved with one of these shacks would have to declare that interest. It is not an interest that they hold in common with the bulk of South Australians, nor with a majority of South Australians, or even a large minority of South Australians. We are talking about a couple of hundred shacks; 99.9 per cent of South Australians do not lease them, own them or stay in them.

There are a few shacks that have come to my attention. When you are boating on the Coorong, you can see the shacks on the peninsula, and you can see them if you go hiking in Innes National Park. They are hard to miss, and it usually elicits two reactions: the first is, 'What a spectacular place to have a holiday'; and the second is, 'How on earth did they get permission to build that there?'

My first exposure to shacks in South Australia was as a young law student in 1984 and 1985, when I took two canoe trips along the navigable section of the Glenelg River. We canoed from Casterton to the sea over two separate trips. It is around 150 kilometres, and the last 60 or 70 kilometres are through the Lower Glenelg National Park in Victoria. My enduring memory of that trip is how peaceful it was. It was quiet; you could observe kingfishers and musk ducks, and Australian darters that were drying their wings on the riverbank.

Then, the peace and tranquillity of Victoria morphs into South Australia when the river crosses the state boundary, and everything changed. The tranquillity and unspoilt beauty of nature were replaced with rows of ramshackle shacks that stuck out over the water. There was the noise of speedboats and waterskiers—I expect, by now, that jet skis have added to that din—and once the river turned back into Victoria, the tranquillity returned.

I know that since I took that trip, the Victorians have opened up some of their stretch of the river to waterskiing in their special purpose areas. Still, in that Lower Glenelg National Park, over 95 per cent of the river is still limited to canoes and slow-speed vessels that travel at five to 10 knots. There are some slow put-put fishing boats, but you do not get the waterskiers and speedboats. Most importantly, there are no visible buildings on the bank; all you see on the Victorian part of the river are the river, bushland and wildlife.

I do not believe the Victorians have ever allowed shacks on their part of the river. Across the rest of Victoria, the shacks that were built on Crown land or in national parks were removed decades ago. In fact, I was told that by a Victorian national parks manager who was recruited from Victoria to come and work for the National Parks and Wildlife Service in South Australia. I remember him saying to me, 'I don't understand your attitude to private shacks in national parks. In Victoria, we just bulldoze them.'

South Australia has never had the courage to make that hard decision and my guess is that too many influential citizens owned or leased shacks and they were not about to give up their good thing. I think that is the difference between Victoria and South Australia. It is worth exploring some of the history of this because it helps us understand why we are in the position we are in today.

The very early shack licences were annual licences. They were issued under sections 244 and 246 of the Crown Lands Act. They permitted entry and occupation of land for 12 months and they were renewable. After the First World War and up until the end of the Second World War, licences were generally issued for camping on licensed sites. After 1945, the practice apparently was to issue shack site licences in place of the camping licences for all new occupations. In the period after the Second World War, up until about 1960, upon request from councils it was common practice to issue annual licences to individual councils for the shack areas that were in their jurisdiction.

In 1960, the shack policy was modified to allow new areas approved by the department of lands to be licensed to councils for shack sites and the transfer of these shack sites took place from 1960 to 1965. The first review of shack sites on waterfront Crown land was undertaken in 1973-74, following which a cabinet subcommittee was formed to determine the government shack policy. Criteria were developed to determine those areas of shack occupation that fell within acceptable and non-acceptable sites. Areas generally within 50 metres of the face of a frontal dune or the edge of a cliff along the coast were classified as non-acceptable.

In 1979, the then government announced the shack site policy, which included an undertaking that a review would be made of all non-acceptable shack sites. The most important aspects of the policy were that, in acceptable areas, individual shack owners were able, upon request, to apply for freehold title to their site and in non-acceptable areas some shack owners were issued with a 10-year lease. Persons who were owners of shacks at 5 November 1979 were given an undertaking that they may retain their shacks for the remainder of their lifetime plus the lifetime of any surviving spouse. Upon the deaths of the present shack owners and any surviving spouse, the shack was to be removed.

The 1983 review recommended the creation of three classifications for shack sites: acceptable sites; miscellaneous lease sites, which were to go from 30 to 40 years; and life tenure sites. In the end, the recommendation of the 30 to 40-year leases was not proceeded with because of a change in government. In November 1989, the government announced the change in policy for shack sites held under terminating tenure, with terminating dates as outlined in the lease document. This was that unacceptable Crown land lease shack sites held under terminating tenure would be granted non-transferable life tenure effective from 4 November 1989.

Under the policy at that date, there were two categories of shack sites on Crown land: (1) environmentally acceptable sites that could be converted to freehold and (2) environmentally unacceptable sites from which shacks would eventually be removed. The reason for going down that track is that it is these environmentally unacceptable sites that the government now wishes to privatise either by freeholding or permanent leasehold.

I am grateful to the parliamentary library for providing some of that information and also the district council of Yorke Peninsula, which had a good summary on its website, both of which refer extensively to the 1994 report, 'Freeholding of shack sites on Crown land', a report of the shack site freeholding committee from November 1994. I think it is also important to refer to the comments that were made in this place by the Hon. Trevor Griffin. In July 2000, he made it very clear why what the government is now proposing is the wrong way to go. He says:

The intent of section 78B was to ensure that sites that were considered unacceptable for shacks and holiday accommodation for environmental and amenity reasons would cease to be used for those purposes but at the same time would also accommodate the interests and expectations of those who held existing shacks on such sites at the time the policy that shacks should be removed from unacceptable sites was announced.

So, back then, the Liberals were with the program. They recognised that some of these holiday shacks really should not be there. They had failed every previous test of freeholding and privatisation; they were unacceptable. These few hundred that are left that have failed every previous test to improve their tenure, they have allowed to be privatised—they are the ones the Liberals want to do. I agree with the Hon. Ian Hunter that this is the Liberal Party at their privatising best.

The issue of private shacks was actually on the agenda of the local council at Murray Bridge today. In fact, I think it was at 3 o'clock today that submissions closed on a proposal, in that council area, as to what to do with a number of shacks that are effectively in the heart of town. They are on the river at Wildens Way. There is a community campaign at present to oppose the sale of this riverfront land because it is denying the public right to access the river.

I will not go through a lot of the history of access to rivers and access to the sea, but, since the origins of colonisation, the policy was always to maintain public access to rivers and to the sea. Whilst those policies have been ignored on many occasions over the last 150 years, still it was the official policy to maintain free public access to these important community assets—our rivers and our coasts.

The Greens' position on this bill is that, over the years, there have been more than enough concessions granted to those who have been lucky enough to acquire leasehold interests over public land. Those people have benefited from the privatisation of the commons. The vast bulk of shacks have already been freeholded, and really the only ones left are those that are in unacceptable locations, whether it is environmentally, aesthetically or for other reasons. They did not make the cut when the privatisation freeholding juggernaut was in full flight, and they do not make the cut now. This is pure and simple privatisation of the commons, and the Greens do not accept that this is the right way to go.

The Hon. J.A. DARLEY (23:07): I rise to contribute to the second reading of this bill. The bill concerns Crown land that is subject to leases under the Crown Land Management Act. Most of these leases were granted on a life tenure basis, which meant that once the last lessee listed on the lease dies, the lease extinguishes and the land must be remediated back to its original condition.

Most, if not all, lessees have placed shacks on the land they are leasing, which have been enjoyed for many generations. However, given most of these leases were signed in 1989, we are now reaching a period of time where many of the last-named lessees are passing away and these shacks are facing demolition, if they have not already been demolished. This bill will allow for these leases to either be transferred or sold to the lessee or another person nominated by the lessee. It also outlines that the minister has the ability to have unauthorised fixtures removed from Crown land.

I understand that the provisions of the bill will allow for temporary leases to be granted to lessees, whereby conditions could be made for the upgrade of certain facilities or buildings. Upon satisfying these conditions, I understand that freeholding or a new long-term renewable lease will be granted. I think this is a bit rich because councils have always had the authority to require lessees to upgrade the shacks, and therefore if councils have not required this in the past it is now their problem, not the government's.

Allowing freeholding or renewable leases is something I have advocated for many years now, and I am pleased that this bill has been introduced. I note that this was part of the government's election promise and am aware that the department has been working on this for about 18 months. Ideally, I would have liked for us to have arrived at this point much earlier. Nonetheless, I am glad that we are finally here. I support the second reading of the bill.

The Hon. J.M.A. LENSINK (Minister for Human Services) (23:09): There is a great deal of consistency in the contributions from the various parties. Can I start by thanking the Hon. Clare Scriven, the Hon. Mark Parnell and the Hon. John Darley for their contributions to this legislation, which does fulfil a longstanding position of the Liberal Party and other parties in this place.

I acknowledge Mr Darley's party and SA-Best for their commitment and, in years gone by, indeed, Family First's continuing support for this particular measure. I also acknowledge that in the gallery today we have Mr Keith Turner and Mr Geoff Gallasch, who have been on this journey for a considerable number of years as well.

Before I go back to the script, I think it is worth responding to some of the comments made by those who continue to be opposed to these measures. The history of many of the shack sites is that they are associated with particular regional farming communities. That is how they have developed over time. For instance, Lucky Bay on Eyre Peninsula has a very strong association with the farming community of Kimba.

I think anybody who goes to those sites would have a quite different view from the Labor Party and the Greens' assessment of those sites, in that you would consider that most of those are no different from shacks that have been freeholded around South Australia, so I reject the continued assertion by those opposed that there is some special type of tenure that is being granted to these shack sites that should have been opposed for environmental or amenity reasons.

I think I have heard in the past Labor members describe people in the remaining shacks that have not had ongoing tenure as squatters, but I just remind them that in other states, particularly, shack sites have often been used by working people. I refer to a series that was narrated by John Doyle, famously of Roy and HG, who talked about the uniquely Australian built forms, whether they be homes or holiday homes. One episode was on the Queenslander, one episode was on federation homes, and one was devoted to shacks. I am assuming that those opposed are taking the view that this is some sort of class issue as well, so that is one of the reasons why they are unable to support these shacks in South Australia.

I have also pointed out in previous contributions how the shack lessees and groups have contributed to positive environmental protection in those particular areas. Because they have a stake in that area, they are often actively involved, working with local park rangers where they are located in national parks to assist with removal of weeds, and assisting in local rescues of people who get themselves into trouble, particularly down at Innes National Park.

I am aware that I am straying a little into the national parks issue rather than the Crown lands issue. I think these are pretty unfair comments to be made. I think the Hon. Mr Parnell was implying that the shacks encourage hoon behaviour. That has certainly not been my experience.

The Hon. M.C. Parnell: I don't think I said that.

The Hon. J.M.A. LENSINK: I reinterpreted your words. Now back to the script. The South Australian government has committed to creating new opportunities to retain shacks on Crown land and in national parks, which will benefit shack owners, regional economies and the broader community. This amendment bill impacts upon shacks on Crown land.

As part of the election commitment to retain shacks, amendments are sought to the Crown Land Management Act 2009. The amendments have two purposes: firstly, to improve tenure for those shacks on Crown land that can satisfy contemporary safety, amenity and environmental considerations and, secondly, to permit the minister to remove unauthorised fixtures on all Crown land and recover the cost of the same from the occupier, which initially relies on a presumption that the fixture was erected by the land occupier as at time of the fixture erection.

The amendment clauses 4 to 7 inclusive and clause 9 of the amendment bill relate to life tenure leases for holiday accommodation purposes; that is, shack leases on Crown land that were issued under section 78B of the Crown Lands Act 1929. This act was repealed in 2010 but was the legislation that was in place when the freeholding project for river and coastal shacks was implemented. Currently, life tenure leases for holiday accommodation purposes for shacks on Crown land and in national parks terminate upon the death of the last lessee that is named on the lease.

In 2010, the Crown Land Management Act 2009 replaced the Crown Lands Act. The current act does not allow the holder of a section 78B shack lease to apply for a new longer term lease or to purchase land due to the following transitional clause found in schedule 1, which states:

A surrender of a lease that was granted under section 78B of the Crown Lands Act 1929 (and that continued as a lease under this Act in accordance with clause 13) cannot be made conditional on the granting of an interest in the land to the lessee or any other person.

Clause 9 of the bill removes transitional clause 14 from schedule 1 of the Crown Land Management Act 2009. The amendment does not mean that a section 78B shack lessee will automatically be granted better tenure but provides an application pathway, which is clause 7 of the amendment bill that amends section 37A. The application pathway allows the holder of a section 78B shack lease to apply for a long-term lease or to purchase the land. The shack will still need to meet other regulatory requirements and specifications to be eligible for longer tenure, including contemporary safety, amenity and environmental standards.

I note that the legislative pathway envisaged by the proposed section 37A is not prescriptive. To do so would have limited the broad category of situations which might arise for ministerial consideration. Applications will be in a form and address matters as the minister considers fit. Any life tenure at surrender will be on terms determined by the minister. Incapacity to satisfy certain terms of surrender, including an obligation to meet identified contemporary regulatory standards at cost of the applicant and by application to third-party authorities, will largely determine successful surrender. Issues at each site differ. Inflexible application of developed policy is prohibited at common law.

I might actually be doing the second reading explanation instead of the other one, which I apologise for. Yes, I apologise for that. I think I have started on the second reading explanation rather than the summing-up. I think that is probably enough said, given the hour. I thank honourable members for their contributions and look forward to the committee stage of the debate.

Bill read a second time.

Committee Stage

In committee.

Clause 1.

The Hon. M.C. PARNELL: The minister, in her remarks, mentioned the association that a number of shack districts have with various rural communities, and I am sure she is right. She mentioned farmers at Kimba who apparently had a number of the shack leases at Lucky Bay.

I know that the Hon. John Dawkins, and others as well, is familiar with the fact that there is currently a dispute at Lucky Bay between the leaseholders and the state government. With sea level rise and erosion the leaseholders are anxious that their shacks will effectively end up being flooded. They have applied for permission to build rock walls and hard protective measures but those applications have been denied.

The government has said that they are comfortable with moving a bit of sand around. That might protect from sea level rise for a little while but, ultimately, the fate of those shacks is to end up underwater. My question is: are Lucky Bay shacks ones that are being proposed for freeholding or for longer transferable tenure?

The Hon. J.M.A. LENSINK: I apologise for misleading the honourable member in my summing-up remarks. I should not have used that as an example because the shacks at Lucky Bay are not ones that will be captured by this particular legislation. They are under a head lease with the council.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: Given the government is now well advised on the potential sea level rise issues and coastal erosion issues that will pertain to South Australian shores in the coming decades, what protections has the government put in place in this legislation to indemnify the taxpayer against any future claims from people who now go and buy these properties from the government and want to make a public liability claim or some other sort of claim against the government for selling land to them which will now be underwater in the future? Given that the government does know about the potential in the future, will they be liable?

The Hon. J.M.A. LENSINK: I thank the honourable member for that question. The advice I have received is that there are two things. Firstly, there are land management agreements that would be registered by the lessees that will indemnify the government against future claims and, secondly, the shack sites or precincts will need to have a coastal protection strategy, which will be the responsibility of lessees.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: What is the nature of these coastal protection strategies that lessees or owners of these now Crown land sites but soon to be freehold sites, potentially, be required to put in place? Is it just a form-filling exercise or will they need to get proper engineering advice? Is it something the ordinary person will be able to do without having to go to professionals to make some sort of claim from the government in terms of the future safety of that site?

The Hon. J.M.A. LENSINK: The advice I have received is that it would be like any other similar development application to be referred to the Coast Protection Board for advice. It may then subsequently need engineering advice about whether seawalls or the like, for instance, might be required.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: Does the minister currently have advice with her that could tell the council approximately what the cost would be to the leaseholder to get such information together to the satisfaction of the government?

The Hon. J.M.A. LENSINK: I think the honourable member is seeking hypothetical advice.

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: Ballpark figures.

The Hon. J.M.A. LENSINK: I am not really following his logic because he is assuming that the government would have sought advice prior to the legislation passing, so he would be putting the cart before the horse. The answer to his question, in short, is no, the government does not have that advice but, following the passage of this legislation, all those processes would be undertaken.

The Hon. M.C. PARNELL: Just to pursue this same line of questioning, coast protection works usually fall into two overlapping categories. The Adelaide metropolitan beach example is a good one, even though we are not saying there are shacks on the Adelaide metropolitan beach line, but the coast protection works, whether it is building rock walls or sand carting, the two main purposes are maintaining a beach for public amenity and also asset protection.

When it comes to asset protection, the answer I think you gave to the Hon. Ian Hunter was that if the shack owners wanted to protect their asset—for example, by the construction of a rock wall or some other thing—they would need to go to the Coast Protection Board to get approval. The Coast Protection Board has a right of veto. The Coast Protection Board can exercise that right of veto and tell shack owners, 'You are not going to build a rock wall in this location.' They have the right to do that.

This brings us back to the Hon. Ian Hunter's original question which was: if they are unable to protect their properties, what comeback will they have against the state government? You have mentioned, 'We will make them sign a land management agreement', presumably agreeing not to sue the government, but does that not fly in the face of every other similar situation, such as people who want to build on flood plains and who say, 'I promise not to sue you. I promise that if I get flooded it's my own fault. I will sign as many bits of paper as you want to make sure that you are not held liable'?

Public policy has been, 'You might be prepared to do that but we are not going to let you build on that flood plain. We're just not going to let you do it: that's public policy.' Minister, does what you have said not fly in the face of public policy about protecting people from themselves?

The Hon. J.M.A. LENSINK: I will attempt to translate this as a bit of a pathway about the steps in the process, if you like. The first step in that process that I have already referred to is to assess whether there is a risk to that shack site. If the answer is no, that is not an issue. If the answer is yes, there is a risk, then the next step is the development of a strategy, which then needs to be assessed by the Coast Protection Board. If the Coast Protection Board assesses that the strategy is inappropriate, then that particular shack will fail the standard. Therefore, the 78B or this tenure arrangement will not be granted.

The Hon. M.C. PARNELL: I thank the minister for her answer. When we look at the summary of consultation, it is difficult to determine who said what in relation to this. One of the questions asked of the respondents to the survey was, 'Do you have any comments on the proposed coast protection standards?' It is unclear whether they were shack holders or other people. There is a series of dot points, and one of them is:

Existing shacks not planning to undergo new development must be exempt [from] having to comply with the coastal protection standards as required by the current development plans.

There are other comments effectively saying, 'We need to have the right to disagree with the Coast Protection Board.'

To put this into a specific question, many government agencies were consulted as part of the consultation process, and the Coast Protection Board was specifically consulted. What did they say about this process?

The Hon. J.M.A. LENSINK: The advice that I have received is that the Coast Protection Board was keen on two policy fronts in that they wanted to ensure that any of these future liability issues that have been raised would fall to the shack lessees (those with tenure, etc.), and that current Coast Protection Board policies would be applied.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: Can I ask the minister to further engage on these issues because I am really after the following information: how confident is the government that the protections they will seek to put into place will withstand the challenges to those protections? Let me paint a picture. The government is dealing with Crown leasehold land, which they want to convert to freehold land at sites that were previously defined as being unsuitable for environmental reasons or some other reasons. In fact, they have been deemed to be unsuitable for decades.

The government now has advice available to it on projected sea level rise and coastal erosion due to climate change impacts, which is in the hands of the government now, obviously. Despite all that, the government overturns those decades of advice about unsuitable sites, ignores potential climate change impacts and changes the category and decides to freehold the sites, knowing its previous unsuitability and probably future unsuitability.

How does the government propose to protect the taxpayer, then, from claims for compensation when the sites are rendered uninhabitable by climate change impact, such as coastal erosion, flooding or even islanding, and therefore having no way to actually have legal access to these sites? How confident is the government that the clause it seeks to put into a sale document is ironclad and will protect the taxpayer into the future?

The Hon. J.M.A. LENSINK: I think the honourable member, in some of the comments in relation to his questioning, made a whole lot of assumptions. Can I say that he needs to get out more and perhaps visit some of these sites, as others of us have. What he has perhaps assumed in his line of questioning is that every site will be granted ongoing tenure. What this legislation provides is an ability for each site to be assessed. They must all go through the contemporary criteria, which I have already outlined, in order to receive tenure. So all of those things that I have commented about before apply.

The Hon. M.C. PARNELL: Going back to the government's summary of consultation document, I mentioned before that one of the agencies listed as having been invited to provide feedback was the Coast Protection Board; the minister paraphrased two areas that the Coast Protection Board raised. Another body that was consulted and invited to put in a submission was the Parks and Wilderness Council. My question is: will the minister provide copies of any written submissions that were made by the Coast Protection Board and the Parks and Wilderness Council, being two statutory bodies that we know were consulted and invited to provide feedback?

The Hon. J.M.A. LENSINK: If I can deal with the second first, which is the Parks and Wilderness Council, they have been consulted separately on the national parks proposal, not in relation to this one. In relation to the Coast Protection Board, we can seek approval from the board to release the information that the honourable member is seeking.

The Hon. M.C. PARNELL: I thank the minister for her response. I am looking at the Coast Protection Board's website as we speak. They have not published it themselves. Can the minister think of any reason why a submission from a public agency to a public inquiry should not be made available? Whilst the minister might think it is appropriate just to ask them for it, can the minister conceive of any difficulties that would prevent the public accessing what I think is a pretty fundamental document, the agency responsible for protecting the coast, and the vast bulk of these places are on the coast in places that would never be given permission today to build because they would not comply with modern standards, including sufficient setback from the coast to accommodate climate change?

The Hon. J.M.A. LENSINK: I can just respond as follows. In a sense, the decision is an independent board. From the government's perspective, I do not see why there would not be issues that pertain to the policy that can be released. When it comes to matters that relate to the cabinet submission, then there clearly would be cabinet confidentiality issues that may apply.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: Will the government make explicit whatever protection from liability to the taxpayer they will seek to put in place when they freehold these coastal—mainly coastal—currently leasehold Crown lands? Will you make it explicit that no taxpayer funding will be provided for future coastal engineering projects to protect those Crown lands subsequently freeholded?

The Hon. J.M.A. LENSINK: Can I just repeat that there is a process in place which we believe is more than adequate to address this issue. I am not quite sure what the honourable member is suggesting, whether we place advertisements in all the local newspapers, perhaps get a bit of lighting, put it up in lighting just so that we are being abundantly, patronisingly clear to this cohort of people. We believe that the process is adequate.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: The honourable member tells us today the process is adequate. We will see in the future whether she is right. She is going to lumber the taxpayer of the future with potential costs of liability for these places that she wants to sell to the public, to these people who are not public but actually private owners into the future if they take it up, and she will not guarantee that the taxpayer will not be lumbered with massive expenditure to do corrective seawall works because the government sold this land knowing that it is going to be prone to incursion, flooding and erosion.

The Hon. J.M.A. LENSINK: The honourable member is being petulant. I have provided information in relation to how the processes will be adequate. He clearly has a different policy position, which the government disagrees with.

Clause passed.

Remaining clauses (2 to 9) and title passed.

Bill reported without amendment.

Third Reading

The Hon. J.M.A. LENSINK (Minister for Human Services) (23:45): I move:

That this bill be now read a third time.

The council divided on the third reading:

Ayes 10

Noes 9

Majority 1

Third reading thus carried; bill passed.

At 23:50 the council adjourned until Tuesday 10 December 2019 at 10:00.