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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, First Session (52-1)
2011-06-22 Daily Xml
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PUBLIC WORKS COMMITTEE: ADELAIDE TAFE SA CAMPUS

Mrs VLAHOS (Taylor) (11:26): I move:

That the 406th report of the committee, entitled Adelaide TAFE SA Campus, be noted.

The Adelaide TAFE SA Campus redevelopment will involve approximately 2,500 square metres of under-utilised space at the Adelaide TAFE SA facility in Light Square. This will allow TAFE SA to pursue a consolidation of programs at the most modern and accessible TAFE SA sites to ensure that students can not only easily access the facilities, and reduce the ongoing maintenance costs of the development, but will also benefit from having a concentration of expert knowledge based there.

This project will see the business services and health and community services programs, currently both running at Panorama and Adelaide TAFEs, consolidated into the Adelaide campus in the heart of the CBD, creating a new centre for business services. The project will also incorporate the creation of a new client services area that will provide a shopfront on Currie Street for current and potential students to obtain course information and enrol in TAFE.

The cost of the building and associated work has been estimated at $4.2 million by cost consultants Davis Langdon. Funding will be provided by the approved 2011-12 DFEEST capital programs, and the operating costs for the refurbished areas will be met from the existing programs and facilities operating budgets. Construction is anticipated to commence in July this year and will be completed around December 2011. It is anticipated that the new educational facility and client services will be open for the start of the 2011 TAFE year to accommodate existing student numbers from Panorama.

Based on the evidence presented to it, and pursuant to section 12C of the Parliamentary Committees Act 1991, the Public Works Committee reports to parliament that it recommends the proposed works.

Mr HAMILTON-SMITH (Waite) (11:28): The opposition supports this matter, as we have the preceding two matters, and commends it to the house. In speaking to it, though, I make the point that as a CBD development this sits with the earlier proposal we considered about the former Clipsal site and the new Bowden Urban Village. Combined, these two developments are new initiatives in the city, and I urge the government to consider its vision for the CBD and the inner-city fringe more completely.

I urge the government to bring something to the parliament and to public debate about a revitalised vision for the city because what we seem to have are piecemeal offerings, welcome though they may be, like this proposal for a new and revitalised TAFE CBD venue and the Bowden village. We have the new oval proposed at Adelaide Oval and the hospital proposal. All of these things, when you look at them, will change the nature of the City of Adelaide and move the momentum from probably the east of the city, to some degree, to the west of the city. That is going to change the dynamics of the Adelaide CBD.

The previous Liberal government established the west of the CBD as an arts precinct when we moved not only TAFE there but also a number of other arts institutions, particularly to the Hindley Street part of City West. Now is the appropriate time to look at how all of these developments—the Bowden village, this TAFE proposal we are considering now and the other initiatives the government has announced—are going to change the way City West functions and operates. I would like to see a more encompassing vision from the government about how they see all that happening.

For example, I imagine that once this TAFE proposal, Bowden and the hospital are in place there will be a lot more movement during business hours in the west. There will be a lot more people looking to have lunch, to have coffees, to do retail shopping. Doctors' precincts will need to be established. There will probably be new residential opportunities along Hindley Street and in that western part of the city, flowing from the fact that we are moving people into Bowden, into the hospital and into this TAFE facility that is now being built and which is before us now.

So, how is that going to impact on public transport? How will that impact on development opportunities? Are we sitting down now with developers to look at the need for things like car parks, new commercial and tourism opportunities in the west of the city, and new residential opportunities flowing from the hospital development? As we know, a lot of short-term rental developments have occurred in the east of the city to hinge off visiting families and so on as they come to see their loved ones in the Royal Adelaide Hospital. There are a whole lot of other implications. We already have in City West a large amount of student accommodation infrastructure, which I am sure will interconnect with this TAFE proposal that we have before us today.

While I welcome this proposal and the opposition fully supports it, having sat through it on the Public Works Committee, what I am looking for is a grand vision, an encompassing vision, one that brings together these piecemeal developments that we are seeing at Bowden, the hospital, this TAFE proposal and a range of other initiatives into a broader plan for the west of the city, because things are going to change. When we bulldoze the existing RAH and build this new one, people and momentum will shift.

That is going to have an impact on businesses in the east of the city, who I am sure will suffer, to be frank. I am sure they will lose activity as a result of these changes, but the winners of course will be businesses, developers and developments in the west of the city, and we need to manage this process. I encourage the government to come back to the parliament with something that brings this and other proposals together into a master plan that we can look at and consider.

We all know we need to have greater density within the city. We are all aware of the need to try to stop the urban fringe from exploding outwards into areas like Gawler, McLaren Vale and so on, and to pack in a little the nature of developments in Adelaide and the immediate city fringe. Let us now see greater detail of that.

As I mentioned, that needs to include not only public transport, but I would also like to see proposals for traffic management flowing from these developments, such as Bowden and this TAFE proposal. There is already a need for an inner ring and an outer ring road in the CBD. I see that need becoming even greater as a result of these developments that the government is announcing that bring people and activity into the city. With those remarks, I commend the motion to the house.

The Hon. R.B. SUCH (Fisher) (11:34): I rise to support this report. Anyone who has been involved in TAFE, as I know you have, Madam Speaker, or has had the privilege of being the minister responsible, would have strong feelings about that organisation. I used to regard it—and I still do—as one of our best-kept secrets. TAFE is a leading provider of training in this state. Sadly, in some ways it has been knocked around in recent years by governments of both persuasions.

Mr Pengilly: You were the minister.

The Hon. R.B. SUCH: Yes, but not for all of that time, unfortunately. It got knocked around a bit by people who did not understand. Even today, I do not know whether the community and the government fully understands the potential of TAFE. We need to upskill our community a lot more than what we have been doing. We need to put a lot more emphasis on training. Australians need to live off their brains and use their brains. We cannot just be a nation that digs holes and extracts minerals, important as that is, and even if you want to do that you still have to have skilled people to do it.

I am staggered that after at least 15 years when the cry was, 'We need to upskill and train more people', we still hear industry saying that we do not have enough highly skilled and trained people to do the tasks that we need. With a population like ours, we should have the most highly skilled and highly trained people in the world. There is no reason why we cannot do that.

Adelaide TAFE has always been a centrepiece of that organisation. It is a very large campus, in terms of numbers. It provides a whole range of training options. I remember as minister walking around town looking for a site to put the Arts Centre and we decided (the group of us) that Light Square was the place to put that facility.

We know there have been some adjustments. The hospitality training has been taken out, which I think in some ways is a pity. It has been consolidated at Regency. Regency was always a fantastic hospitality training centre. I think it is important, whilst this project is basically about modifications, renovations and a bit of tizzying up, that TAFE is given a much more central role in training.

There is a place for private providers. They can do training, obviously, and some of them do it very well, but TAFE should be, and should always be, the backbone of training in this state. It needs to be properly funded and equipped to do that job.

So, I commend this renovation and upgrade, but it is only a small amount in terms of what is really needed. I hope that what happens down the track at Tonsley Park reflects a strong commitment from the government and community to ensure that TAFE is able to deliver for not just South Australia but the country as a whole when it comes to training.

Ms SANDERSON (Adelaide) (11:38): I rise in support of this report. As the member for Adelaide this TAFE facility is in my electorate. In fact, about a year go I went to the opening of the new fashion area, which was also part of the consolidating and efficiency building moving from Marleston, and that is a wonderful facility.

I believe that due to cookery and hospitality moving to Regency Park that has left a large area available, so the business services and community services that are currently provided at two sites (Adelaide and Panorama) will now be consolidated into one, creating a centre for excellence in business services, I am told. It will also allow for a shopfront on Currie Street, which I think is a great idea and a good way of accessing potential students because you have a nice area where people can call in and find out about all the courses that are available.

I am very supportive of investing in our TAFEs. Not everyone wants to go to university and, as the member for Fisher said, it is important to upskill as many people as possible to take up the job opportunities that are arising, particularly in mining and other areas. So, it is important that we encourage upskilling as much as possible. I commend this motion to the house. I am very happy to see any efficiency and accessibility improvements in education.

Motion carried.

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