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House of Assembly - Fifty-First Parliament, Third Session (51-3)
2009-12-03 Daily Xml
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MAWSON ELECTORATE

Mr BIGNELL (Mawson) (15:51): I rise today to thank the Premier and all the ministers who came to the electorate of Mawson last week for Community Cabinet. Since the Rann government was elected in 2002, it has been to all parts of South Australia several times. Some 51 community cabinets have been held around the state. I attended the very first one at Tailem Bend and Murray Bridge, in the seat of Hammond, back in 2002.

Last week, we kicked off with a visit to the Woodcroft Primary School, the state's biggest primary school, with 950 students. It is also one of the state's best primary schools. The Premier spoke to all the students (they were very well behaved) and staff and presented some of the students with their Premier's Reading Challenge medals.

I must congratulate the students at all the schools around the state who have taken part in Premier's Reading Challenge. I think it has been a great thing to introduce a little bit of competition, particularly for those of us who have boys and know that young fellows do not see reading as being cool—that is, until we introduced Premier's Reading Challenge during the Athens Olympics, where we gave them a chance to stand on the dais or stand in front of their school community and receive a medal for their reading ability.

We also went to Hackham East Primary School, and the Minister for Education joined us there. Again, the Premier presented Premier's Reading Challenge medals. We were delighted to see some performances by the students at Hackham East Primary School. Students from that school came to parliament last year and performed for the Premier and the education minister, and earlier this year they performed for the Governor-General of Australia at the Convention Centre. They did the haka, and the boys had their shirts off and the face paint on. That is something about which they have engaged with schools in New Zealand that were on their blog site. Some of the students at the school come from New Zealand, and their parents have been involved in teaching the other students how to do the haka. I congratulate everyone at Hackham East.

The Premier and I also visited a retirement village and a nursing home, as well as meeting with business leaders and other community people in the electorate of Mawson. While we were doing that, other ministers, such as the minister for agriculture, were getting around and having meetings with people to find out what was of concern in the local area, and that is something that the Rann government has done very well over the past eight years. We get out and listen to what people want and then we either go to the ministerial offices or into parliament and make a difference. If you are not engaged with the community you are out of touch, and when you are out of touch you get voted out.

We are a government that has always been very much in touch with our community, and our side of parliament is well served by hardworking local members who are out there listening to communities and coming in and fighting for our fair share in our communities. I am very proud to stand here today and recount some of the things that we have done in the south since I was elected in 2006 to represent the seat of Mawson.

We have an early childhood centre at Woodcroft, which will be opening in January, an ambulance station at McLaren Vale, which was opened in our first year in government, and a market square for Willunga. We have had ongoing support and funding for Hackham West Community Centre and a major renovation for Willunga Primary School. We have more doctors: we now have a record 3,255 doctors in South Australia. We have new buildings for McLaren Flat Primary School and a $163 million upgrade for Flinders Medical Centre. We have had major growth in the Tour Down Under, including getting Lance Armstrong here for this year's race and also for next year's event.

We have a new Hackham West Children's Centre, we have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on local sporting clubs, and there has been constant promotion of the McLaren Vale wine and tourism industry. I have played a major role in going to overseas markets to help to grow our export markets on behalf of McLaren Vale winemakers—and, indeed, on behalf of all South Australian winemakers. Wine is the second biggest export earner for the state, it is a very important industry, and I am proud to have backed it for the past four years.

We have had a massive increase in water recycling in the south, and we are spending millions of dollars to make sure that we capture more stormwater in the south to use on our parks and gardens. We have had record spending on road infrastructure. We are electrifying the rail network in South Australia and extending the line to Seaford. These things will benefit the people in the south.

I am proud to stand on my record of the past four years of approaching ministers—probably being a little bit of a pain in the neck—because I put the people before the party. When the people of Mawson need something I will go in to bat for them. I hope that, in the lead-up to the election on 20 March, I can get that message across to people. I look forward to serving another four years in this place.

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