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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, First Session (52-1)
2011-05-05 Daily Xml
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GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTABILITY

Mr HAMILTON-SMITH (Waite) (15:32): I rise on the question of government honesty and accountability. In particular, I refer to the hospital proposed for the rail yards and the sale of forward rotations of timber from our South-East forests. These two proposals are nothing more than a big, fat privatisation. It is a Labor lie and a broken pledge. How this government or any member of it can complain about the former Liberal government's lease of ETSA and in the same breath claim that this hospital and a forward sale of timber from our forests is not a privatisation beggars belief. How can one be decried as a privatisation and the other held up as sound government practice? It is a Labor lie. They promised there would be no more privatisations and they are merrily going about selling off the farm.

I want to talk for a moment about public-private partnerships. This is the disguise Labor is using to break its pledge to the people of South Australia. On this side of the house we do not object in principle to public-private partnerships, but this government did not honestly tell the people of South Australia the details of their rail yards hospital deal before the election. They misled the people of South Australia, in my view, quite dishonestly.

In my view, there is a need for a special report into how we account for public-private partnerships works by the Auditor-General. I want to outline to the house evidence given to the Public Works Committee this week by the Auditor-General. I was pleased to hear that, once financial close on the hospital has been effected, the Auditor-General will be initiating an audit into the procurement process, the public sector comparator and its use in valuation of the proponents' bids, and the selection of the preferred proponent, including aspects of financial close and contracts.

But sadly, I tell the house, this will not be done until after financial close. It will be too late for us to have this information before the taxpayers are signed up to the deal. I am concerned that the Auditor may need to come back to the parliament if he does not have full powers to order and monitor the public private partnership build throughout the process. This is beyond the actual opening, because it is a privatisation of the hospital and is being built by a private consortia. If he needs to come back for further powers there is cause for concern.

We do not know if the Auditor-General will provide a special report to the parliament or include his findings in his annual report. But sadly it will be after the deal is done, as I have mentioned, beyond the point of no return. The taxpayers of South Australia will have been committed to this multi-billion-dollar farrago over 35 years without having given the government a mandate for it.

The Auditor-General has not ruled out seeking an independent legal opinion on the legitimacy of the government's secret crown law advice that the hospital PPP does not need to come before the Public Works Committee. Any reasonable reading of the act, particularly section 16a(1), sees that this work is a construction where the cost is being met by the parliament or a state instrumentality, and it is being constructed on behalf of the Crown, and it is being constructed on land of the Crown.

Why keep that advice secret? I call on the Auditor-General to obtain that independent advice and provide it to the parliament. The taxpayers of South Australia are looking to him, who the Premier has described as the independent watchdog to keep our money safe, and to alert us of concerns about public works spending, be it on hospitals, desal plants or stadiums that have not been subject to thorough scrutiny. One word from him on this and it would change the entire debate.

The Auditor-General has also raised concerns about whether the stadium deal will be subject to a full audit as a normal public work because the stadium management authority, in his words, 'is a non-government concern that may not be subject to public finance and audit legislation'.

This government has no mandate for this particular public private partnership. All South Australians should now lobby this government not to sign the agreement, and the government must reveal the date and the place of the intended signing. This must become a campaign. This deal must not be signed.

The public sector comparator must be immediately released. The government must present an alternative plan to build the hospital based on a government borrow and build as a standard public work so that we can see which deal is better for the taxpayers. The Premier and the Treasurer must justify why it is necessary that our constituents pay the consortia 15 per cent interest, or more, when we can borrow on their behalf at around five per cent—one third of the cost.

This is Labor madness. There is no mandate for it. It is a privatisation, plain and simple. The deal must not be signed as planned until the business case against the government borrow and build has been made. This should be done both in the parliament and through the Public Works Committee.

My personal view is that members in this house should be asking themselves whether they should pass Supply until or before this matter is openly disclosed. The last time Labor was in government it bankrupted the state through uncontrolled spending by a privately run bank underwritten by the taxpayers. Here we go again. A privately run hospital underwritten by the taxpayers. Up to $10 billion to $11 billion to be forked out over 35 years, possibly more. If it goes ahead, this hospital, this stinking, rotting, dud deal will become an epitaph over the political graves of the Premier, the former treasurer, the current Treasurer and this festering Labor government.

Time expired.

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