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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, First Session (52-1)
2011-06-22 Daily Xml
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APPROPRIATION BILL

Second Reading

Adjourned debate on second reading.

(Continued from 21 June 2011.)

Mr VAN HOLST PELLEKAAN (Stuart) (19:31): I am pleased to take this opportunity to speak on the budget that we received a bit less than two weeks ago. Certainly, from the opposition side of the chamber, there have been many very good speeches about a lot of detail and, I think it is fair to say, a lot of disappointment in this budget, particularly on behalf of families.

More importantly, I am willing to say that one of the realities about all budgets is that there is never enough money. It does not matter whether it is a government of a state, a nation or a household, there is never enough money. So, the majority of our arguments in this place are about priorities. They are about priorities of how to spend the money that is available.

How you raise that money and whether you should be raising more or less is an issue, but the majority of what we talk about in here is really to do with priorities of how to spend what is available. Again, as I am sure people are becoming very familiar with, my priorities are in the country, they are in the outback, they are in Stuart, and then more broadly throughout the rest of rural and remote South Australia.

I would like to highlight a couple of good things in the budget. No government is completely good or completely bad and there are some good things in the budget. As an active CFS volunteer member, I am very pleased to see some money in this year's budget, an increase of $25 million over four years, for firefighting and the CFS. I think that is a real positive.

I am also very pleased to see money for the medical heating and cooling (electricity) rebate, which I think is very important. I congratulate the government on following the Leader of the Opposition's announcement quite a few weeks ago that that would be Liberal Party policy. So, I think that is tremendous as well.

I also congratulate the government on what the government has called the Office of Public Integrity, which the opposition, under our leader Isobel Redmond, calls an ICAC (independent commission against corruption). Let us hope they both achieve the same thing. Let us hope they both do what every fair-minded person would want, which is to ensure that everybody, every agency, every thing under the government's control operating in this state operates effectively, independently and fairly, without corruption.

When I mentioned priorities before, my priorities are things like roads. I am disappointed that there is not more money for outback roads. I note that there is some additional money for roads, particularly starting in Kangaroo Island, which is terrific. But the outback dirt roads, primarily Strzelecki track, Oodnadatta track, Birdsville track and some of the main dirt roads that connect them, are very, very important to this state.

Yorkeys Crossing is such an important infrastructure opportunity for this state, and I really do fear what I see as the government and BHP trying to stare each other down in a game of chicken. We all need it. It has got to happen. Yorkeys Crossing is a bypass of Port Augusta (temporarily, I just hope), but what we really need are two lanes going each way across the gulf through the middle of Port Augusta. But we have a bypass for now, just sealing the existing Yorkeys Crossing to take the heat out of traffic congestion in Port Augusta and also allowing the heavy transport that will be required for the development of Olympic Dam by BHP when that happens.

I know that is not a fait accompli, but I am confident that will come about. However, I see the state government saying, 'Look, we're going to hold off and not fund it because BHP will need it, and so we'll get their money' and BHP saying, 'Well, it's not our problem. We're going to bring this wonderful big project to the state. It's the state government's—and also the federal government's, by the way—responsibility, so we'll get them to fund it.'

In the meantime, while they are staring each other down, waiting and waiting, playing this game of sort of dare-devil chicken, the people of Port Augusta are suffering, and also, very importantly, heavy freight movements across our whole nation are suffering. From Sydney to Perth, from Adelaide to Darwin, all traffic goes across one bridge each way across the top of the gulf at Port Augusta; and, when it rains, the currently dirt road around Port Augusta is impassable, with only about five or six mils of rain. So, it is a very, very serious issue for our nation, but I am disappointed that there is no money for that in our budget.

Everyone knows about health services. I will not go into great detail here, but one of the simplest, easiest and least expensive opportunities that this government has to contribute to health services in country South Australia would be to put more money into PATS (Patient Assistance Transport Scheme). It is crying out for more money so that rural and outback people can get to specialists in Adelaide. It is not expensive. Just a few million dollars would make an enormous difference to people's lives.

With respect to shared services, well, the member for Kavel referred to it a day or so ago as 'shared shambles'. That is just taking jobs away from rural/regional centres, and it is not saving the money that the government says. More money is going to be poured into that, and that is a great shame.

I mention country remote education and small schools' grants. People who remember the speech I made last year know how terribly, terribly disappointed I was—and still am—that the government took away the small schools' grants last year and has missed the opportunity to reinstate that. I and other members of the opposition met with the Isolated Children's Parents' Association (ICPA) representatives today, and one of their responsibilities is trying to help kids who are involved in School of the Air.

They desperately need an upgrade to the electronic communication platform, Centra, which the kids use. Roughly 45 families and 68 students throughout outback South Australia, and some fringe outer country areas, are suffering. They are having a hard time because they cannot learn. Consequently, the future of these kids is being affected by the fact that there is not enough money to go into this.

Special education is very, very important, as well as the issue of people with disabilities in general in country areas. Every person in this house would really have a good feeling for how hard it would be for anyone with a disability. There are some programs that provide support but never enough. But I can tell members that it is so much harder for anyone in the country who has a disability to get by and just to get around and live the sort of life that every South Australian deserves.

With respect to funding for police, I have called many times for extra funding for after-hours services. I am not saying that we need more police roaming all over the country, but in Port Augusta, particularly, we do not have enough police and enough resources for after-hours policing to look after people.

Aboriginal Affairs: very interestingly, in a budget context, Lew Owens, through his report for the government very recently—I think it was August last year—said that there is enough money going into Aboriginal Affairs services. So, here is a golden opportunity for the government in the government's budget to do something effective and say, 'Actually it does not need any money.' In fact, we could even possibly save some more money to provide services to Aboriginal people and Aboriginal communities—two very important ones in the electorate of Stuart being Davenport and Nepabunna. So, a bit of rearrangement, potentially even a budget saving with better organisation, would help Aboriginal people in the electorate that I represent.

Regional Development Australia and Outback Communities Authority: again, last year in the budget, money was withdrawn from the RDAs. It is really shameful stuff given that the state government allowed them to do a complete redevelopment of themselves on the promise and the expectation that they would have local, state and federal government money. The government let them twist themselves inside out to reinvent themselves, realign themselves, get themselves all organised to perform in a three-tiered funding model from every level of government, and then after they finished that said, 'By the way, we are going to take our funding away.' So, I am dreadfully disappointed that the state government has decided not to reverse that decision.

I will just touch on that and pick up on a very insightful point made by the member for Goyder when he spoke: not once in the Treasurer's budget speech did he mention small business. I do not care if you live in the city, I do not care if you live in the country, I do not care if you live in the Outback. In South Australia, small business is the heart of our economy. A lot of other things contribute, and we need BHP, we need Roxby Downs, we need all sorts of other businesses from minute to gigantic, but small business always is, and always will be, the heart of our economy in South Australia and our major employer.

Small business is not about small business people making money and living high on the hog. Small business must be successful so that small business can employ South Australians, because the most important thing that we can do here in the parliament is help people with jobs, and give them every opportunity they can possibly have to have as much employment opportunity as possible, and that will happen through small business.

Dingo control, invasive weed and pest control are very important issues for South Australia but no extra funding in this budget. Also, the shameful, sad situation where the government is going to sell 111 years of forward rotations of the forestry off-take in the South-East of our state. As the Leader of the Opposition quite rightly said, 'You are going to sell 111 years—the next 111 years, three or four generations, probably four generations—of our lifetime for the same value as 15 years of current income.' Why on earth would you do that? Nobody would do that in their own private business unless they were in a very desperate situation, and I find that dreadfully sad. Obviously, the South-East is not in Stuart but I can tell you that the people of Stuart are very angry about that decision.

I think some of these decisions come about because the government undervalues a lot of what goes on in rural and remote South Australia. As I said before, it comes back to priorities—never enough money—it is about your priorities. Where are you going to spend your scarce money? For example, the government does not value country hospitals nearly enough. The government understands very well, and I have said it in here quite openly, that minister Hill has a very tough portfolio.

It is not easy, but do you know what? Minister Hill and the government value hospitals purely by the value of the health services they provide, and that is incredibly important but it is not nearly enough. They sustain small communities. If you do not have a hospital you will not retain families with kids, and you will not retain ageing people who need the health services. No hospital, no aged care, no pharmacy, and it rolls on from there.

Country hospitals employ 30, 40, 50 people. So, the value of the health service is not nearly enough to South Australia when you look at that hospital, and I think it is undervalued. I think that the value of small communities in general is not fully understood. If we do not have small communities with people who can live and work, and, very importantly, find jobs in small communities in South Australia, we will not have the people then who support the incredibly important agriculture, fishing, mining, wine—all these other things that we have going on in country South Australia, without which the state cannot survive. The state will not survive without those industries which operate in country South Australia. If you do not have the small towns to provide a workforce, you will not have those industries, and we cannot live without them. Even the most city-centric focused person in this chamber must understand how important to our state those industries are.

One of the things that concerns me most about this budget is where we are going with debt. We are heading towards an unsustainable level of debt for our state. I have heard all the analogies from the Treasurer in the media saying, 'Oh, well, the average family on an income of this equates to a mortgage of that, and surely that's all sustainable.' And do you know what—he is right. He is 100 per cent right, so long as you pay your debt off. So long as you take out your home loan over 20 years, 30 years or whatever it takes, and you pay it off, you get rid of it, and you work it down. So long as you do not die with that debt and leave it to your heirs. That is where we are heading at the moment.

The picture is grim, but it is grimmer than we know if we concentrate on the net operating position—and this comes directly from the general government sector budget estimates tables—that the government claims we will be in; so, surplus versus deficit. The 2007-08 budget said that at the end of this financial year (30 June, just a few days away) we would have a surplus of $278 million. In 2008-09, they said we would have a surplus of $434 million. In 2009-10, they said we would have a surplus of $78 million. In 2010-11, they said we would have a deficit of $389 million. So, the same point in time, 30 June, which is just around the corner. But, over time, as we get closer and closer, we realise how bad this is.

Nine months ago we were told that, in a few days' time, we would have a deficit of $389 million. Now we are told we are going to have a deficit of $427 million. The budget came out on 16 June and we are now told that, at the end of June this year, we will have a $427 million deficit. But, for the same point in time, 30 June 2011 (which is a few days away), in the 2007-08 budget, we were told that we would have a surplus of $278 million.

The closer the time gets, the more the reality comes into focus, and the reality is getting worse and worse. We now know that, at the end of this financial year, our estimate is that we will have a $427 million deficit. Do you know what is really scary about that, Madam Speaker? The fact that, at this point in time, the Treasurer is also telling us that, in four years' time, at the end of the current budget estimates period, we are going to have a state debt of $8.2 billion.

Now, just going back to the numbers I gave you before. We have gone from a prediction of a $278 million surplus at the end of this financial year—just four or five years ago—to now knowing that it is going to be a $427 million deficit. So now, looking four years out, we are told that there is going to be an $8.2 billion debt for our state. What will it really be when we get there? Four years down the track, almost to the day, I am sure we will all be taking about this, and I guarantee this house that we will be facing a lot more than $8.2 billion, and that is the very, very scary part about what is going on here.

We have a grim picture, but the reality is much worse. As the Leader of the Opposition quite rightly said in her budget reply speech, $8.2 billion on the books—$8.2 billion state debt at the end of the four-year period—but when you put in the WorkCover deficit, the hospital, the oval and you wrap up all the other things that the government tries to hide away and not put in as the actual public sector debt figure, we are be actually much closer today to $24 billion dollars of state debt in four years' time. This figure of $24 billion is an extraordinary number for a state like ours. It is incredibly scary, particularly given that we know that, when we get there in four years' time, it will be much worse.

This is all in the context, of course, of growing GST revenue. The government has said and the Treasurer has said that GST that the federal government collects from all of us and then hands back to the states is actually reducing, but the reality is, as the shadow treasurer (the member for Davenport) has highlighted, GST revenue is actually growing. GST revenue is not shrinking. GST revenue is actually growing through this period. There are no excuses for what is going on here at the moment.

Obviously, in opposition I am hopeful and I work very hard every day to ensure that in 2014 we swap from a Labor to a Liberal government but, whether or not that happens, one of my greatest concerns is that as we look over the next few years the South Australian taxpayer, the South Australian infant, and the South Australian pensioner are going to be stuck with some dreadful things that this government is going to leave behind. We are going to be stuck with all that debt that we know about, but we are also going to be locked into the new Royal Adelaide Hospital.

We are going to be locked into paying $1.1 million every day for 30 years. We cannot get out of it. Once the health minister and the Premier sign that off, there is no going backwards. We are locked into it. We are going to be locked into the Adelaide Oval. We are going to be locked into a high cost of living, increases in water prices and increases in electricity prices. A very real example is $11 a kilolitre for water that you cannot even drink. In half a dozen of the small communities in my electorate of Stuart, out on the Barrier Highway, that is what this government is doing: locking us into gigantic spending programs that we will not be able to get out of, locking us into high taxes. Taxes will go up more than double the inflation rate through the next budget. It is dreadfully scary stuff.

I would just like to finish by talking about one of my very genuinely heartfelt theories: you do not have social success, and you cannot address social issues if you do not have a strong economy, and you will not have a strong economy if you do not address social issues. They go together. You will be successful in both; you will be unsuccessful in both. As I said, with regard to priorities, we can all argue about where the money should be spent. We might have different ideas on either side of the chamber here, but if we do not have a strong economy we cannot address the social issues, and I fear that our economy is not going to be strong.

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