Regional Growth Fund

The Hon. N.J. CENTOFANTI (Leader of the Opposition) (14:28): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before asking a question of the Minister for Primary Industries and Regional Development regarding grants.

Leave granted.

The Hon. N.J. CENTOFANTI: Under the Regional Growth Fund, the previous Liberal government initiated an Opening our Great Outdoors grant, which was targeted at supporting economic-generating regional tourism activities. According to the Auditor-General's Report, released on Tuesday, 43 applications were received and only six have been approved, for a total of $4.8 million.

The opposition has been contacted by a number of constituents about seeking an update on the progress of their applications because, as the minister likes to say, the communication they have received is zero, zilch, none. My question to the minister is: do the minister and her department intend to approve any further applications, and if not, why haven't the minister and her department informed the unsuccessful candidates of the outcome?

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN (Minister for Primary Industries and Regional Development, Minister for Forest Industries) (14:29): I thank the honourable Leader of the Opposition for her question. The Opening our Great Outdoors fund was a nature-based tourism grants fund, which, as I understand it, was almost a direction from the then Minister for Environment in the former government, an informal direction. It used the funds from the Regional Growth Fund.

The Regional Growth Fund, apparently, according to the way it is described in the guidelines, is for broad-ranging regional growth projects. This one was limited to tourism. It is debatable whether that really met the intent of the Regional Growth Fund. No doubt some of the applicants and some of the projects and proposals would have merit; however, on coming to government, it became clear that the Regional Growth Fund guidelines needed to be reviewed.

The honourable Leader of the Opposition mentioned the Auditor-General's Report. I would like to mention the Auditor-General's Report as well. In the report, it says that the Regional Growth Fund is a fund over 10 years. 'Its purpose is to unlock new economic activity in regional South Australia'—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN: —'deliver critical economic infrastructure to create direct benefit across regional industries'—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: I can't hear when you are all talking at the same time. Minister, please continue, and I would like to hear you in silence.

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN: —'and strengthen regional communities.' The Auditor-General goes on to say, 'We have raised issues about the grant assessment and approval process for the RGF in previous years.'

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order! Minister, please continue.

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN: The Auditor-General goes on, 'In 2021-22'—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order! Minister, please continue.

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN: The Auditor-General goes on:

In 2021-22 we reviewed PIRSA's management of RGF grants and the guidelines and approvals in place before the election in March 2022. References to the Minister below refer to the former Minister for Primary Industries and Regional Development.

No planned program evaluation for the RGF

The SA Government—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Members on both sides!

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order! Minister, please finish. Conclude your remarks, please.

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN: The Auditor-General said, 'The SA Government does not currently have a grant management guideline.' He went on to make a number of other remarks. PIRSA, of course, was invited to give a response. The Auditor-General's Report also says:

There have been various competitive, strategic and special grant rounds over the past four years. We were advised, however, that PIRSA currently does not have a plan to evaluate the RGF grant program…

PIRSA provided the following response to our finding:

'The RGF commenced under the former Government in 2018 with a strategic and competitive pool of funding. Since that time, at Ministerial [discretion], the fund has been modified to include many programs with different application processes and eligibility criteria.'

The Hon. N.J. Centofanti interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: The honourable Leader of the Opposition!

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN: The report goes on:

'Due to the highly variable nature of the program this presents a challenging environment for PIRSA to conduct a full evaluation of the RGF and all its sub-programs.'

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: Ministerial failure. Liberal government ministerial failure.

The PRESIDENT: The Hon. Mr Hunter, let your minister finish. Please conclude your remarks, minister, so we can move on.

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN: Certainly. I understand that the opposition would be most uncomfortable to be hearing these remarks from the Auditor-General's Report.

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN: The Auditor-General's Report went on to outline a number of applications and assessments that did not necessarily indicate clear recommendations from PIRSA.

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order! Members on both sides! Minister, sit down, please.

The Hon. N.J. Centofanti: Zero, zilch, nothing. It's outrageous.

The PRESIDENT: The honourable Leader of the Opposition! I would like to hear the conclusion to the answer, which I am sure is about to come, and then we will move on. Minister, please conclude your remarks, if you have anything else, and then let's move on.

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN: Thank you, Mr President. I will round up rather than going into full detail about the various things in the report, noting that some expenses in a grant application did not appear to be eligible, that there was not a clear recommendation from PIRSA to a grant that was approved by the minister, and so on. As a result of all of these, I determined that we needed to review the Regional Growth Fund guidelines. That is going through at the moment, and when that review is complete—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order! The honourable Leader of the Opposition! That is enough from you.

The Hon. K.J. Maher: I have never seen behaviour like this in the chamber. It's appalling behaviour.

The PRESIDENT: Now that is outrageous. Minister, please conclude. I have had enough.

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN: If I can finish my sentence. I would be delighted to complete my answer.

The PRESIDENT: Just finish. Come on, finish up.

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN: Yes. Once that review is complete there will be further information available. I do note that a number of the proposals to that fund certainly had merit and I will look forward to making announcements in the future.