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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, Second Session (52-2)
2012-05-16 Daily Xml
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VOLUNTEERS

Dr McFETRIDGE (Morphett) (15:30): I continue on the volunteer line. As the member for Light and the member for Mawson have just said, this is National Volunteer Week, from 14 to 20 May. We have been to a number of functions at the Campania Club, at Northern Volunteering and yesterday at the march in King William Street and Victoria Square with the Governor. It has been a great week.

Volunteering is a very important part of the South Australian economy as well as part of our fabric of society. It is amazing that over six million Australians volunteer and, on a per capita basis, South Australia is punching well above its weight. Volunteers in South Australia provided the equivalent of 87,000 full-time jobs in 1992, rising to 107,400 jobs in 2006. In dollar terms, in the 15 years from 1992 to 2006, the average increase of donating volunteering time and associated costs increased by 86 per cent from $2,156 to $4,020 per annum.

Of all the age groups, the 55 to 64-year-old group has the highest contribution of $1,618 per adult in 2008 and that has gone up to $1,754 in 2010. Overall, women in South Australia contributed an estimated $734 million of time and other inputs in volunteering organisations in 2006. In comparison, the donation of South Australia's males was a little bit less at $616 million, so we blokes have got to lift our game a bit there.

In regional South Australia, it is great to see the volunteers fulfilling many roles in many communities there, sometimes with the CFS, SES and SAAS—it depends on the job which set of overalls they pull on; it is the same people going out there. In regional South Australia, contributions were approximately $408 million to their community, in terms of organised volunteering. In 2006, the volunteering through organisations of those living in Adelaide was about $943 million.

This is from the 2011 Volunteering in South Australia report—a report commissioned by the Office for Volunteers in South Australia. Those figures have increased dramatically since then. I understand that the total input for volunteering in South Australia is about $4.8 billion. It is a significant amount and, as other speakers have said, there is no way that the governments could replace that. It is not replacing full-time jobs: it is filling in gaps where full-time employment is not available or is cost prohibitive. We thank all of our volunteers.

I will speak about one particular group in my electorate that I have had a close association with. I did have two surf lifesaving clubs in my electorate until they moved my boundaries north. I do not have the Somerton surf club in my electorate anymore, but I do have the Glenelg Surf Life Saving Club in my electorate.

When it was first established down there, it was known as the surf club with no beach because, as we know, our beaches are very fragile and, for a while there, there was no sand on the beach at Glenelg. There was a series of rocks and boulders and things and the surf club, in its foresight, to protect their community, built the surf club down there. If you go down there today, you will see the renovated surf club. It is just a fantastic community facility, staffed by volunteers and some paid employees. It is providing a wonderful facility, not just from the surf lifesaving point of view.

The president of the surf club, Shane Daw, has been around for a long time. He is working with the surf lifesaving central office. Shane has been a dedicated worker down there. He is the current president and has been for a number of years. I am looking forward to going to the presentation night this Saturday night, I think it is. The captain at the moment, Susan Barnes, has been doing some great work. We have seen members of the surf club go on to state and national titles and also represent Australia in the Olympics in canoeing.

The South Australian surf lifesaving input into our economy is valued at $86 million and the return on the investment is at a ratio of about 48:1. So, for every dollar that the government puts in, surf lifesaving is returning about $48 in kind and in value. This is a massive return on your investment.

Governments all around the country, and particularly in South Australia, need to make sure that we are not neglecting our volunteers. That has not been the case. We need to make sure we are supporting them, because without them our community would be far less of a society than it is. Certainly, the Glenelg Surf Life Saving Club is a small part of my electorate, in as much as I have many volunteers down there, but it is a part that I would like to celebrate today as a particular note with National Volunteer Week.

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