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House of Assembly - Fifty-First Parliament, Second Session (51-2)
2008-06-05 Daily Xml
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KANGAROO ISLAND TRANSPORT

Mr PENGILLY (Finniss) (12:20): I move:

That this house notes the failure of the Rann government in not achieving a fair and equitable cost to travel on the sea route between the mainland and Kangaroo Island, and the subsequent impact on residents, pensioners, farmers, small businesses and travellers.

I wish to qualify, before commencing my debate, the fact that on the parliamentary register my wife is noted as being a very small shareholder in Sealink through being a family beneficiary. Nothing quite stirs the emotion of Kangaroo Islanders like the cost of travel between the mainland and the island and as a life-long islander I share those sentiments and express my concern at the increasing costs to that service.

It is interesting to note that currently the Kangaroo Island Development Board, with some government assistance by way of a grant, is doing a study called the water gap project. Services come and services go, and over decades services have run originally between Port Adelaide and Kingscote/Penneshaw, and then Kingscote to Port Adelaide with the Troubridge and the Island Seaway. We have had services run between Glenelg and Kingscote, between Wirrina and Kingscote, the most recent of which has fallen over, again for a variety of reasons, and we have the service that operates currently by the Sealink company between Cape Jervis and Penneshaw with two ferries, one based at Penneshaw and another at Cape Jervis, and they cross over.

Quite apart from the cost, the fact remains that the island has the best service that it has ever had in relation to regularity and frequency of trips during peak times. A government agreement requires that all freight has to be moved within a certain period of time. The service operates almost every day of the year, with the exception of Christmas Day. There are perhaps one or two days a year, during a midwinter storm, that it does not operate, and that is basically because it cannot get into Cape Jervis.

The issue is one of equity. I have raised this in a past life, as have my predecessors, and as has my current successor, all to no avail. The issue is one of subsidisation. You may or may not be aware that the service operating between Melbourne and Tasmania is subsidised and it is an extension of the national highway. What we seek for the island ferry service is also an extension of the national highway to bring some fairness and equity to the people of the island, and their businesses.

The punt services operating across the Murray River are free of charge. They are all subsidised. You can hop on a punt to go across and there is no charge. It is absorbed in the greater cost of transport in the state. Unfortunately, because of federation and the distribution of House of Representatives and Senate seats, Tasmania receives an extremely substantial subsidy. The people of Kangaroo Island do not enjoy that. For a long time, all they have been asking for is some equity. I will read into Hansard some travel cost figures and times shortly.

I raised this matter with the former federal government. For many years the Hon. Alexander Downer (the federal member representing Kangaroo Island and the member for Mayo) took this up with the Rann government and got nowhere. I have taken this up with the Rann government and got nowhere. They blame the feds, the feds blame the state and, actually, while all the argy-bargy goes on, people are still paying the same amount.

The other aspect of this is that the island is highly promoted by the government, and rightly so—and I support that—as being a unique and very special tourist destination around the world. That is great but, equally, the cost of getting visitors—the tourist population—to and from the island is large. Only last week, I think, a woman from Tasmania who wanted to go over to the island got to Cape Jervis and was horrified by the cost. She had her facts wrong when she rang in, and we corrected them, but the cost does frighten a lot of people away.

I will read into Hansard some of the travel costs. The cost for a return trip for an adult from Cape Jervis to Penneshaw is $86 on SeaLink. The cost of a passenger motor vehicle (a five metre vehicle) is $168 return. The important thing is that the distance travelled between Cape Jervis and Penneshaw is 16 kilometres and takes approximately 45 to 50 minutes. For a car, the ferry between Melbourne and Tasmania costs $234 return. The cost of a day ticket—that is, sitting up on the ferry—is $240 return. A variety of cabin prices are available, but I will use one in the mid range. A twin cabin inside is $248 one way and, obviously, double that for a return trip. That cost is for the off-peak season. During the peak season, the cost of the day ticket is $176, and the twin cabin is $303, or $606 return. The distance travelled is 429 kilometres and takes a total of about 10 hours.

The Wallaroo to Lucky Bay ferry, which is approximately 55 kilometres and takes about one hour and 45 minutes, is $60 return for a passenger. For a car up to 5.5 metres, it is $240 return, and I think the member for Stuart uses that quite regularly. Yet again, we have the ferry that runs from Sorrento to Queenscliff at the bottom of Port Phillip Bay, and the cost of a vehicle and driver on that ferry is $106 return. The cost of a vehicle and driver during the peak season is $118 return, which is quite a difference. The distance travelled between Sorrento and Queenscliff is 12 kilometres and it takes approximately 40 minutes.

The other interesting thing is that, apart from Tasmania with two of those ferry services, you can actually drive. Whether they drive or take the ferry is, of course, an option for those who choose to travel. I do not mind travelling on ferries on good days, but I would prefer not to travel on them on bad days. The people of Tasmania and Kangaroo Island have nowhere to go; they can either fly or go on the ferry. They have no other option. Tasmania is heavily subsidised by the federal government of the day, and that will continue. There is no question that that will continue. It is regarded as an extension of the national highway.

It is interesting to note that the ferry that used to operate between Kingscote and Port Adelaide was also an extension of the national highway; however, when services changed, that went and the subsidy disappeared. We have moved on from those days. Tourism to Kangaroo Island is growing rapidly and international visitation is increasing markedly—which is good—and the costs are going up accordingly. The costs of doing business on the island are extremely high. I make no bones about pointing out that, if one chooses to live on an island and bring up one's family there, one should expect the costs to be greater than living on the mainland of Australia.

No-one has any argument with that—and no-one should have any argument with it. We should also bear in mind that there is no public transport available on Kangaroo Island. Indeed, there is no public transport available between Kangaroo Island and the mainland, or from Kingscote to Penneshaw and Penneshaw to Adelaide and onwards. Nothing is available. Pensioners get very little by way of reduced fares. Kangaroo Island residents do get a cheaper fare. They get an 'island resident' fare. If members want to travel to Kangaroo Island they will pay full tote odds. It is holding the island back and it is not doing the island any good whatsoever.

On behalf of my constituents—and one could say I have some self-interest because I put freight on the ferries, as well—I urge and plead with the house to support having that section of water between the island and the mainland declared an extension of the national highway. It is in the long-term interests of South Australia to do so. It is in the best interests of the economy of South Australia, whether it be primary industry, fishing and tourism, or the day-to-day travel arrangements of islanders and those from the metropolitan area who want to go to Kangaroo Island, to have it declared an extension of the national highway, and for the people of South Australia to assist the residents of Kangaroo Island, and those who want to come back and forth, to do it in a cheaper, more equitable way.

I know no-one would like the fares reduced more than the SeaLink company. It is paying over $700,000 a year wharfage to the department of transport, and that is spread all around the state. It is not a freeloader. In addition, the SeaLink company pays a licence fee to the Kangaroo Island council, which is probably now about $160,000 to $180,000. It pays a licence fee to the Kangaroo Island council, which goes back into infrastructure on the island to cater for visitation. No-one is freeloading on this issue.

It is time equitability was put into this debate and the government recognised the importance of Kangaroo Island and what it produces by way of agriculture. I think its agricultural production was about $60 million to $70 million in the past year, and tourism sits alongside that. They do not compete with each other but, rather, help and complement each other. This is a debate that is well past.

Some $100 million worth of economic activity is produced on Kangaroo Island. A subsidy to the island on the component of the sea travel service is well and truly due—and it should be done immediately. We should stop having argy-bargy between the feds and the state on this issue. No-one would congratulate the Rann government more than I if it was to make it an extension of the national highway in order to give full respect to those people who reside on Kangaroo Island and make a large contribution (by size of population) to the economy of South Australia, given that only 4 500 people live on the island.

It is high rainfall country, for which there will be an increasing demand due to climate change. We will rely more on the high rainfall districts of South Australia (including the South-East, Lower South-East, Fleurieu Peninsula, Lower Eyre Peninsula and Kangaroo Island) for agricultural production. In order to do that, we will have to get it back and forth to the mainland at a reasonable cost in order to continue to contribute to the economy, if we are going to stay in business.

The cost of getting grain from the island to the mainland is about $68 a tonne, and getting fertiliser back is unbelievably expensive. And it is lineball. It is okay while commodity prices are reasonably high: if grain prices are up at around $300 a tonne, a person can just about make ends meet. However, if we get a fizzer or if grain prices return to $140, $150 or $160 a tonne, you are out the door; you just will not have any production.

People on the island are turning to smaller and more efficient ways of primary production. But the linchpin of it all is to declare an extension of the national highway and to promote the island's economy and pick up the reasonable costs of production and moving between the island and the mainland. I urge the house to support my motion, which is not unreasonable or unfair. It is a motion about commonsense and it is in the best interests of South Australia and my electorate—the place where I have lived all my life.

Mr O'BRIEN (Napier) (12:36): I commend the member for Finniss for an excellent exposition of the issues facing his constituents. It was extremely well researched, and I thought the comparison of ferry fare prices around Australia really bore out the central thrust of his argument.

The member may well be aware that, in 1995, the then state Liberal government introduced a 10-year annually declining freight subsidy scheme, which obviously expired in 2005. The intent of that scheme was to allow businesses and the community on Kangaroo Island to make adjustments over a 10-year period so that, by 2005, with adjustments to the cost structures and the like, they would hopefully be in a position where the impost of freight charges would not negatively impact on their bottom line. From what the member for Finniss has said, that scheme was not successful.

In the interim, the Labor government wanted to see how the new Kangaroo Island ferry service between Wirrina Cove and Kingscote worked out. We are only talking about a three-year period between the end of the decade-long subsidy scheme and today. However, as the member for Finniss has pointed out, the Kangaroo Island ferry has not proved to be economically viable and has not injected that degree of competitiveness into the equation that the government was hoping would arise.

The member for Finniss made mention of the work of the Kangaroo Island Development Board, and that is where the government takes issue with the member's motion. The Rann government, through the Department of Trade and Economic Development, has put $90,000 into the Kangaroo Island Development Board's business plan exercise, which is working up a business case on the water gap cost issue. I would have thought that probably it is a little presumptive to be moving this motion when we have yet to get the business case.

I would hope that the proposition that the member for Finniss is championing—the extension of the national highway—could be injected into that business plan and that the member for Finniss would be the champion for that. Rather than note the failure of the Rann government on this issue, I think the member for Finniss ought to have held fire and allowed the Rann Labor government the opportunity to consider the business case that has been worked up by the Kangaroo Island Development Board on this issue of the water gap so that we could devise an appropriate response.

In making the point of developing an appropriate response, I think the member for Finniss would probably not want us to go back to the subsidy scheme that the former Liberal government had in place. It ultimately did not deliver the desired benefits. So, I think the government and the house will be awaiting with great interest the development of the business case. I am sure that the Department of Trade and Economic Development will go through that with a fine toothcomb and, if embedded and central to the proposition within the business case is an extension of the national highway, I hope the member for Finniss is foremost in the lobbying exercise at the national level, because it will ultimately be a decision that the federal government will have to make. For those reasons, we oppose the motion.

Mr PEDERICK (Hammond) (12:41): I rise to support the motion of the member for Finniss that the house notes the failure of the Rann government in making transport to Kangaroo Island a fair and equitable process. The island is a lovely place to visit. I must admit that I have visited the island a couple of times recently. One visit related to a meeting about water. The subject of water never seems to go away no matter where you are in this state or country at the moment. Previous to that, I was assisting the CFS in mopping up a week after the fires.

It was interesting that the member for Finniss mentioned the price of freight of grain from Kangaroo Island. I was very impressed as a farmer in my past life to note the crops through which the fire had burnt—and I was hoping that the farmers had adequate insurance. With its rainfall and soil types, obviously it is a place where they can grow abundant crops. I saw some of the best canola crops that I had ever seen. I would not be surprised at all if their yields were approaching 2.5 tonne per hectare.

There have been issues for years about access to Kangaroo Island. I remember as a child travelling on the Troubridge from Port Adelaide overnight. What a wild and lengthy ride. We also had the Fokker Friendship planes operating in those days. I think they were 44-seater planes. Thing have changed since then with the present modern ferries—and I note that one company has just ceased operating—and new people operating those flights.

It is not just access for tourists or residents, it is also the cost to the community. I believe they still freight their waste from Kangaroo Island to a waste depot south of Adelaide. This is a huge cost to the council. I guess that they have been forced into that position because of the costs imposed with waste management and the very scientific and environmental way in which waste is handled. In fact, waste has been made a business, I believe. That is just a huge cost on its own.

In relation to the tourism sector, I believe that, if a national highway was opened up over the sea route to Kangaroo Island, the government would get its money back tenfold because it would make the island that much more accessible not only to international tourists but also local tourists. I know that it is something which sticks in your mind when you think about going to Kangaroo Island. You think about all the water you have to cross and whether to go via Cape Jervis, fly or what.

At the end of the day, whether or not people wish to make that trip gets down to cost. I certainly support the fact that we need to make it easier for people to gain access to the island. Finances are tight. It is a very nice place to visit. However, it also needs assistance, as the member for Finniss said, in the freighting of produce. The island has a very broad agriculture base, as well as a forestry industry cranking up. As I said, the waste is transported from there to the mainland. With those few words, I support this very commendable motion from the member for Finniss.

Mr VENNING (Schubert) (12:45): I rise briefly to support the member for Finniss. A motion such as this is most important to a member of parliament, especially the member for Finniss who actually lives on the island. I commend him for raising this matter. Kangaroo Island is a very important part of South Australia. It is second only to the Barossa—I could not resist that—in relation to a major Australian tourism destination. Kangaroo Island offers unique opportunities for everyone. I could say that, in some areas, Kangaroo Island is better than the Barossa. I cannot say that, can I? I will just say that if you took the Barossa and Kangaroo Island out of South Australia, what tourism destinations would be left? Not many. Anyway, it is important that we support this motion today, because we noted just a few weeks ago the closure of Kangaroo Island Ferries, which ran between Wirrina and Kingscote.

I was very concerned about that, because it was an option people were using. When that one is taken away it leaves the remaining ferry without opposition, and that is the very point the honourable member is raising. We must try to keep the cost as low as possible so that people can afford to use it. Without the other ferry operating, it means that the remaining ferry has the monopoly. Some people would argue that the ferry ought to be free because it can be argued that it is an extension of the South Australian road network. It is. If it were not free the government ought to subsidise it heavily, particularly for those people who live on the island and who rely on it for freight and to get to and from the mainland, because sometimes when the planes cannot fly people have to use the ferry.

I also mention the cost to freight for farmers. I have been to Kangaroo Island but not lately. I am due to go again, and by invitation of the honourable member I might go sooner.

Mr Pengilly: You might not be given a passport!

Mr VENNING: No; I will have to behave myself. I have many grazier friends who have bought farms on the island, and even some grain growers. To export product from the island to the mainland just kills the profit motive. Kangaroo Island is a fantastic place for raising fat lambs, but the cost of getting them over to the mainland is huge. I believe that the government must say 'Well, there is no alternative for these people, other than building a bridge.' It is a bit long for a bridge. I fully support this motion, particularly where the honourable member refers to the impact on residents (and he is one), pensioners (there ought to be a very heavy subsidy for them), farmers, small business and travellers, which, as I said, is tourism.

The government ought to at least address this. The honourable member would not have raised this if there was not a problem. There is a problem. It is to the point of being a prohibitive cost. The honourable member has raised it here because he is the member. It is just like when I hammered Gomersal Road. Eventually we got Gomersal Road, didn't we? Now I am amazed, and the government is amazed, that since Gomersal Road was opened how much more traffic travels on it than the government thought—in fact, the volume of traffic is eight times more than the government's predictions. It is the same with this. If the government makes this vital link affordable, I am sure the patronage will go up markedly, because it is very expensive, particularly if people have to take their car over there.

I commend the honourable member for raising this matter. I commend him for raising matters important to his electorate, and I hope the government will support it.

Mr PENGILLY (Finniss) (12:49): I thank members for their contribution to this motion. It is a critical issue for the people of Kangaroo Island. I did pick up what the member for Napier said. As I said in my speech, I acknowledge the fact that the water gap project is being undertaken. If he would like to come to my residence on Kangaroo Island, I will show the member for Napier a stack of reports about so high, all gathering dust, which have been done over the last 40 or 50 years—at least the last 30 that I know of—and which have been done by deceit. I actually have one in my office. They have all led nowhere—report after report and no action.

While I respect the comments of the member for Napier and I have enormous respect for the amount of work that the Kangaroo Island Development Board under the CEO, Pierre Gregor, and assisted by the Mayor of Kangaroo Island, Jayne Bates, and others are doing, the fact is that I do not think that we are going to get any action unless we push and prod and the member for Finniss stands in this place and makes a pain of himself on this subject with regular abandon. That is the upshot of where we are going on this.

They will do an enormous amount of work, it will tie people up for days, months, hours, on both sides of the mainland and the island. They will have meeting after meeting and produce copious amounts of paperwork and reports. In the end—I am sorry, but I am afraid one gets somewhat cynical after seeing all of these other reports—the report will be done and I have no doubt that the report that comes out from the Kangaroo Island Development Board on the water gap will prove conclusively that that extension of the national highway is absolutely critical for Kangaroo Island and, for the life of me, I just want to see it happen.

I know residents of the island are fed up to the back teeth with waiting. The member for Napier in his remarks talked about the sliding freight subsidiary. Yes, he is quite correct and that did expire a couple of years ago, and when that expired they were exposed to the full market forces. That is how things are and that was the deal done many years ago, but I believe quite conclusively that it is time to move on, it is time to put all this stuff behind us and it is time to look to the future. That is what it is about; it is about the future of the island and what part it can play in the economy of South Australia. I think we need to get on with it. I think for the government of the day—and on either side of the house, I might add—it is time to bite the bullet and get on it.

There would be huge bipartisan support for making this an extension of the national highway; there is no question about that. It is time to put politics aside, it is time to bring this on, it is time to do it and make that section of water between the island and the mainland an extension of the national highway. It will only grow the economy on both sides. It will grow it down through the south and the Fleurieu with tourism, it will open up markets for people, and it will open up markets for primary producers, with the dairy industry on the Fleurieu, by way of being able to get hay and grain over there at an equitable cost. It will make it cheaper for the producers on the Fleurieu to get their product. Most of it comes in from the Mallee and the north of Adelaide and Victoria and the West Coast and everywhere else.

I urge this house to support my motion and make the sea crossing between Kangaroo Island and the mainland of Australia an extension of the national highway.

The house divided on the motion:

AYES (14)

Chapman, V.A. Evans, I.F. Goldsworthy, M.R.
Gunn, G.M. Kerin, R.G. McFetridge, D.
Pederick, A.S. Penfold, E.M. Pengilly, M. (teller)
Pisoni, D.G. Redmond, I.M. Such, R.B.
Venning, I.H. Williams, M.R.

NOES (28)

Atkinson, M.J. Bedford, F.E. Bignell, L.W.
Breuer, L.R. Caica, P. Ciccarello, V.
Conlon, P.F. Fox, C.C. Geraghty, R.K.
Hill, J.D. Kenyon, T.R. Key, S.W.
Koutsantonis, T. Lomax-Smith, J.D. Maywald, K.A.
McEwen, R.J. O'Brien, M.F. (teller) Piccolo, T.
Portolesi, G. Rankine, J.M. Rann, M.D.
Rau, J.R. Simmons, L.A. Stevens, L.
Thompson, M.G. Weatherill, J.W. White, P.L.
Wright, M.J.

Majority of 14 for the noes.

Motion thus negatived.


[Sitting suspended from 13:00 to 14:00]


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