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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, Second Session (52-2)
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EMPLOYMENT FIGURES

Mr MARSHALL (Norwood—Leader of the Opposition) (14:10): Does the Premier have any explanation whatsoever to the house for why we lost one full-time job in South Australia every two minutes in the month of October?

The Hon. J.W. WEATHERILL (Cheltenham—Premier, Treasurer, Minister for State Development, Minister for the Public Sector, Minister for the Arts) (14:10): The issues that are confronting South Australia are well known to all South Australians: they are a transforming economy because of a high Australian dollar, they are the international effects of the wash-over of the global financial crisis. These are the real-life effects of living in an international economy where we are exposed to the international marketplace.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The Premier will be seated.

The Hon. I.F. Evans interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Thank you to the member for Davenport for illustrating why I am calling him to order.

The Hon. I.F. EVANS: I was just trying to assist you, sir.

The SPEAKER: And you did, thank you. Premier.

The Hon. J.W. WEATHERILL: As a bit of a lesson in where we are now and where we were in the past, we had the Leader of the Opposition talking about Sir Thomas Playford during an earlier contribution in this house and saying that was a nirvana when we had high manufacturing employment in this state.

We also had a completely protected economy with high tariffs. We had an industry policy which was characterised by cheap land, cheap water and cheap power, courtesy of the nationalisation of the Electricity Trust of South Australia. Somebody saw fit to bring that to an end. We also had a system of wage fixation which was nationally established and fixed. So, we had high tariff walls and a massively different industrial and political and economical environment, no internationalisation of finance and no competition with cheap imports from overseas, because we had a completely closed economy.

We are in the midst of a massive transformation. This is both an exciting but also an incredibly uncertain time. What we need is clear leadership where we understand the future of this state is about investing in our future, not shrinking into the corner being worried about upsetting our mate Tony in Canberra. It is about asserting South Australia's interest because if we don't stand up for ourselves nobody else will.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Taylor, who is also on a warning.

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