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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, Second Session (52-2)
2012-03-14 Daily Xml
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RENMARK PARINGA LEVEE BANKS

Mr WHETSTONE (Chaffey) (15:27): I rise to speak on the levee banks that surround Renmark. After asking my question today, I am still none the wiser. We have asked the question of the minister: will he support the Renmark council in the maintenance and rebuilding of the levee banks? He came back with, 'It's not my responsibility,' as when I met with him in July of last year. So, he is now putting the onus back on the council. If we do have unforseen circumstances and the town is inundated with water, whose responsibility is it? The hospital, the schools, all of the government institutions in Renmark, who is responsible for those buildings?

The condition of the levee banks is dire: the maintenance, the rabbit holes, the vehicle tracks over them, the flat tops on the levee banks. When it rains, the water sits on top of the levee banks and they continue to wash away, it washes gutters in them, and before you know it, after a rain event, there is a lot more of the levee bank that has been washed away.

What I would like to say is that due to the lack of action by this state Labor government over the past eight months in negotiating to try to get the minister to see sense, today a motion is being presented to the federal Senate to call on the state government to act on the remediation of the levee banks that protect Renmark. The federal government is listening. The Coalition, through Senator Simon Birmingham, and Independent Nick Xenophon, is listening to the people of Renmark and the concerns about the dangers presented with the floodwaters coming into the state and the uncertainty of people, businesses and institutions about people's homes and the livelihoods in Renmark that are now being threatened by potential rain.

To clarify that, the water that is coming down the river at the moment is potentially not going to breach the levee banks, but the system is full. The storages are full; the wetlands are full; the basin is wet and it is running. Any rain, any water that comes in is run-off. There is nothing soaking into the ground.

Again, we look at the weather systems in the north of the country and the unstable weather on the eastern seaboard of the country, and it is a potential threat not only to Renmark but to all the low-lying areas on the river in South Australia. Yet we get the minister putting this onus back on the council, not prepared to stand up and make a decision on putting up the $860,000 to remediate the walls.

That water is due here in about six weeks. To remediate the levee banks is going to take between six and eight weeks, so I really do think that we have a volatile cocktail of an issue here and yet the government is not prepared to make a call on what it is going to do to support the community of Renmark, the council and all the investment. There is $41 million of state government investment in Renmark and yet the government is not prepared to put up the $800,000 to shore up those institutions.

As I said, the hospital would be the first to be taken out. We then have the town, the businesses and the infrastructure. A large town of 10,000 people is being put at risk through the lack of decision-making by this minister, by this government. It really does concern me that today I get a lame answer from the minister that it is the council's responsibility, an agreement that was drawn up in 1959. I think the agreement was actually drawn up in 1957, but I stand to be corrected.

This is a government that is not prepared to invest in this state. We are looking at money to bail out other institutions, money that is wasted. We have Cartridge-gate; we have Zoo-gate. We have all these scandals going on at the moment and yet we cannot prop up a town of 10,000 people to remediate its levee banks. I think it is absolutely outrageous for the minister to walk away from it and say that it is simply not his problem. To date, he has almost indicated that he is not prepared to lift a finger because it is the council's responsibility.

I say to the minister that he needs to come out and show some common sense in getting the funding up from Treasury and having those levee banks repaired. The federal Coalition, the federal Independents have seen sense; the state Liberal Party has seen sense; now we need the South Australian Labor Party to see sense.

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