Motions

Regional Bus Services

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN (17:20): I move:

That this council—

(a) acknowledges the importance of regional city and township bus services to rural communities;

(b) calls on the state government to conduct a review of all regional city and township bus services to ensure they are adequately funded and are providing a transport service that meets the needs of those communities; and

(c) calls on the state government to provide the completed report to this council by 30 October 2020.

If you live in regional South Australia you need a car because if you rely on public transport to get somewhere, to where you want to go, you will not get there. It is a fact and something that every single regional resident of our state would no doubt be aware of.

South Australia's regional public transport system is in dire need of an overhaul. If you live in metropolitan Adelaide your modes of transport are many. You have access to buses, trains and trams that virtually run around the clock—except, of course, when the Minister for Transport cuts services, cuts stops, cuts routes, etc., but of course that is a different issue. However, in regional areas services are few or non-existent. If we want a regional public transport system that actually serves people living in regional areas, first there needs to be a review and then there needs to be funding to implement the required changes.

I would like to acknowledge the member for Mount Gambier who has moved a similar motion in the House of Assembly, and I will outline the differences in our two motions later in this contribution. In my home area of Mount Gambier, Mount Gambier Bus Lines is contracted to operate the Mount Gambier bus service and I am advised that the managing director Sam Lucas fully supports this call for a review.

For a transport system to be effective it need three things: a suitable span of hours, suitable frequency and geographical coverage. For many people in Mount Gambier this falls at the first post. I spoke with a young woman—I will call her Annabelle—who does not own a car and who is employed at the Mount Gambier hospital. She lived until recently near Jubilee Highway East. It is not a huge distance—I think it is about three kilometres—and in fine weather she walks to work. Anyone who is familiar with Mount Gambier knows that we are blessed with abundant rainfall, most days of the year sometimes it seems, and so those fine days sometimes are not very frequent, so instead she would like to be able to use the bus.

There is a bus loop that connects her home and the hospital but it starts at 8.30 in the morning. It starts at 8.30 in the morning but she needs to be at work by 8.30 so it is of no use to her. It is not a criticism of the service, it is a product of the funding arrangements that are in place, but it is important. It limits the employment options for those who do not have a licence or who do not have a car.

For people who have medical conditions, for example, that prevent them from gaining a licence, this is a major barrier. It is a major barrier to their employment because they simply cannot get to a workplace at a normal starting time. We are not talking about having buses that run for people who start at 4am or 5.30 in the morning or those who perhaps do not have the most common time to start work, we are talking about an ordinary start time of 8.30, and it cannot be accommodated in the current service.

The public transport service available for Mount Gambier residents is a service that operates on a 30-year-old model. Bus routes in Mount Gambier have not changed since 1990. The time has come for a review of these services in Mount Gambier but also across other parts of regional South Australia. After all, regional residents pay their taxes and make a significant contribution to South Australia.

If the state is to succeed in its plan to grow the regions, to increase populations in regional towns and cities, incentives need to be offered. It is fair to say that the availability of basic public transport is one of the criteria that many people would look for before moving to a regional area. As the regions grow so should the public transport networks.

Those of us who live in regional areas, and I know there are now two of us in this chamber instead of only one—I was the only one until recently—

An honourable member interjecting:

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN: Sorry, apart from Victor Harbor, of course. Lots of people do not consider Victor Harbor regional, but that is another issue.

The PRESIDENT: The Hon. Ms Scriven!

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN: We are not unreasonable in regional areas. We know we do not have the population to have services running every five minutes to every part of the region, but major regional services, Mount Gambier being one example, should have sufficient services to be usable around common working hours and common needs.

The latest census tells us that 81.8 per cent (8,700) residents living in Mount Gambier travel to work in a private car, and 8,100 of them drive as the only occupant in that car. The RAA estimates that it costs anywhere between $7,000 to $17,000 a year to run a car. That is a major economic impact on people living in the regions who must have a car because there are no other choices. Improvements to the public transport system in Mount Gambier and indeed across other parts of regional South Australia will provide residents with options.

As I mentioned, we have few transport services of any kind in regional areas. We saw that the Marshall Liberal government was willing for even one of those few, the Overland, to disappear. The Overland travels from Adelaide to Melbourne through Murray Bridge and Bordertown and it is an important option for people who experience difficulty in accessing other modes of transport, particularly people with disability. But the government cut the relatively small amount of funding provided to this service, and it was only because the Labor government in Victoria came to the rescue that South Australia has not lost this iconic train service and what is an important option for those people living in the areas that I have mentioned.

I understand the member for Mawson in the other place has also long advocated for the need for the town of Myponga to be connected to regular and reliable public transport, the sort of transport that metropolitan residents have long enjoyed. The member for Giles has also raised the issue of public transport in his area of Whyalla. I know they would not be alone in the major population centres outside metropolitan Adelaide.

The three demographics identified as being most in need of public transport systems are young families, youth and older people. There are currently 12 regional community passenger networks in South Australia, which are smaller services provided by trained volunteers. In Mount Gambier, the South-East CPN service is operated by the Red Cross and mainly caters for people aged over 70. The service, however, is designed to be a last option for those who need it for local medical appointments, shopping and social activities. Small communities now rely on locally funded buses like the community bus which services Port McDonnell, Allendale and Kongorong.

Just to ensure that members are aware, Port McDonnell, for example, where I live, is about 28 kilometres to Mount Gambier, so a similar distance from Elizabeth to Adelaide or Noarlunga to Adelaide. If you do not have a car and you want a job in Mount Gambier, which, after all, is where the majority of jobs in that part of the country are located, there are no options. The community bus has particular criteria; it only operates twice a week, I think it is. Certainly, it is twice a week at the moment; I think it may have been three times in less recent times.

One young person who normally had access to private transport was unable to use that at one stage, so they took a taxi to work—$90. It was $90 to get to work one morning because there were no other options. That was an exception, but what it means is that those smaller townships still in quite close proximity to Mount Gambier have no options except private vehicles. I would be very surprised if anyone, even in this chamber, thought about paying $90 to get to work. Someone from Elizabeth would not do that; they would not be able to do it, most likely. Someone from Noarlunga would not be able to do it; they would not be able to do it on a regular basis. It is not feasible, and yet that is what people are facing even though they are not far from the major population centre.

The peak industry body representing bus and coach services in South Australia is Bus SA. They have their Moving People SA 2025 Agenda, which recommended that regional accessibility committees should be established in the Riverland, in Mount Gambier and in the Port Pirie region. A study was conducted in 2017 by then minister Stephen Mullighan, the member for Lee in the other place, that led to the trial of the regional accessibility committee for a year in Port Pirie. Much of this study would still be relevant today, and I would urge the government to have a look at it.

I commend the member for Mount Gambier for moving a similar motion in the other place. The difference between his motion and mine is that I have proposed a date by which a report should come back to us. We do not want this issue to get lost or to be ignored. I am hopeful that the government actually will work on this, giving it some priority because they tell us that #RegionsMatter. It would be good to see some proof of that. Even without this coming to a vote in this place this week, I hope that it will have some attention from the government.

I will also take the opportunity to indicate my intention to bring this motion to a vote on the next Wednesday of sitting. I think it is appropriate that a date is set and a time line put in place because regional residents deserve attention to this matter. It would be good for local residents, it would be good for the local economy and it would be good for the state. I commend the motion.

Debate adjourned on motion of Hon. D.G.E. Hood.