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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, Second Session (52-2)
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APPROPRIATION BILL 2012

Second Reading

Adjourned debate on second reading (resumed on motion).

Mr PISONI (Unley) (15:33): Prior to the lunch break I was discussing the training facilities that were promised by this government and have not ended up being delivered. I think it is fair to say that there were a number of other promises that are a long way from being delivered. The key one, of course, is the promise of 100,000 new jobs that this government made in the lead-up to the last election. That was to occur over the last six years, and of course we on this side of the house have been very quick to point out that the government is a long way behind in delivering those new jobs. As a matter of fact, since that period only part-time jobs have been created in South Australia.

Since that promise was made, we have seen only around 14,000 part-time jobs created, and in this budget the figures confirm that there will be only 62,000 jobs over the six years from 2010-16—well short of the government's promise. Do not forget that there was also a promise of 100,000 apprentices and trainees, and we learnt quite early on that there was an overlap of those apprentices and trainees and the new jobs. If you look at the net delivery of that promise by this government, in that six-year period we will be worse off than we have been for many years in the creation of new jobs.

In the lead-up to the last election, the government also made an election promise that it would expand four state high schools. This was made on 16 March, just a few days before the last election. I particularly want to remind the house about the promise made about Adelaide High School, that is, that it would be expanded. The government's own press release stated that it would be expanded to cater for 250 more students from 2013 without encroaching on the Parklands.

We know that just recently the government received permission from the Adelaide City Council to encroach upon the Parklands for that development. From the budget papers, we can see that the completion of the Adelaide High School expansion, along with the other high school expansions that were all to be finished by 2013, will now not be finished until the September quarter of 2014.

So, not only did the government break its promise in regard to the Parklands not being encroached upon to expand Adelaide High School but it also promised the people of Prospect and others in the northern suburbs that their children would be able to attend that school in the 2014 school year. We now see that 2015 will be the earliest, and there is still no news from this government about the rezoning. We know that the school itself is about 250 students over capacity, yet the expansion will only allow for 250 more students; maybe that is a clue as to why this government is refusing to announce the new zoning.

Parents need to plan. Those parents with children in primary school need to plan for their children's education. We know that surveys that were done in 2009 in local primary schools in the Prospect area all said that only 4 per cent of students intended to go to a high school in their zone. Parents need to know whether this option is available to them, yet this government is not sharing that information with them.

Ms CHAPMAN (Bragg) (15:37): This year, fresh in the wake of the May federal budget, South Australians have been hit by a bus—or I would probably normally have said that, except that in this state it is more than likely that it would not have turned up on time, if at all. The May federal budget was delivered to us after a period of, I suggest, fiscal irresponsibility by the Rudd and then Gillard governments. We have the legacy of a government which has borrowed $100 million a day and which is paying $22 million a day in interest on the debt it has accrued since coming into office.

It has imposed a carbon tax which, as I understand it from the federal estimates, is to impose on Australians, including, obviously, South Australians, about $38 billion in revenue cost in this forthcoming year, and just to add salt to the wound it is in the middle of a $36 million advertising campaign to tell us how fabulous it is. South Australians, reeling from this enormous financial burden they have inherited now under the federal administration, had the state budget.

In South Australia, over the last 10 years we have learned the importance of sustainability, as probably many Australians have. Some would argue that it is a 21st century concept, and it is certainly a threshold that is applied to many precious resources. Whether it is in environmental protection, food production, home building, or energy consumption, the idea of ensuring that we apply our resources in a measured and moderate way is at the forefront of many decisions and certainly a principle applied by many of the leaders and decision-makers in our community. It does not really matter whether it is people, energy, water or wildlife, these are just a sample of what is important for all of us to appreciate, in whatever leadership role we have, that we act in a financially prudent and responsible manner.

However, with the advent two years ago of the Sustainable Budget Commission initiative of then treasurer Kevin Foley, after we had gone through the state election (notwithstanding they had been in office for some 10 years at that stage and he needed to have someone else tell them how to fix up the mess that he had created), we had an assessment done of what was necessary to bring the state back into order.

However, the government has pursued a reckless fiscal approach and has just continued its irresponsibility in the last 10 years, which is evidenced by the spending of all the surplus funds the government has received, the hundreds of millions of dollars that it received each year above its anticipated budget, usually from GST revenue, which it would year after year squander on projects.

I will just give some examples. The refit of the headquarters of SA Water I think is one of the most obscene, spending some nearly $50 million to refit a new headquarters for one of its instrumentalities when the state was in the grip of drought. That was followed by the $403 million pipeline that was ripped through the eastern suburbs to support the desal plant. These are initiatives they would say they stand by with pride, but I suggest they are symptomatic of their failure.

They have sold just about everything out there that they can. In the latest round, of course, is the administration precinct in Victoria Square, the heart of government, which is about to go onto the market, including the SA education building, and the Lotteries Commission and the forests were in the last wave. Before that, we saw wave after wave, notwithstanding the 2002 promises of then premier Rann that he would not be selling the Lotteries Commission and the forests; the list is quite extensive.

I think there are only two things left on that list. There is some $7½ billion worth of housing trust (I am sure they will be on the market as soon as they can) and also one of the finance institutions that was operated through the former South Australian housing trust could also go on the market—just about everything has been sold or is in the process of being sold. Then we have the continued spending every year of more than what is earned. The deficit is really a situation which we are now used to.

Interestingly, I was reading the auditor-general's and treasurer's report from 1972 (40 years ago). I picked it out because it was at the commencement of the Dunstan regime. At that stage, there was a $1,066,000 deficit in an annual budget of about $450 million. That was seen as really quite irresponsible. That deficit was 0.23 of 1 per cent of his budget. Now, we have 5.44 per cent of the total budget in this forthcoming year with an expected deficit of $867 million, and the Treasurer just dismisses it as though it is of no consequence, and as though that is being fiscally responsible.

Notwithstanding that there is an expected significant reduction in the income stream, the government has decided to proceed with projects such as the Royal Adelaide Hospital, the stadium and the footbridge, just to name a few, when, clearly, the government says they have not got enough funding to even provide basic services. We just heard about the Cadell ferry. I note from the Sustainable Budget Commission that the Lyrup ferry is also under threat, so I expect next year will see the demise of other country infrastructure and services.

The key themes, therefore, of this decade of government have been rampant overspending, gross wastage, spiralling debt and a continued failure to hit budget saving targets, because, of course, the Sustainable Budget Commission recommended that there be some reining in of expenditure. The government promised this year, as they have in many years in the past, that it would deal with the reduction of the Public Service, that there would be a 1 per cent efficiency measure and some 1,000 jobs would be lost. This is their initiative. They promise this type of initiative every year, so what concerns me is that they promise one thing and then they simply do not achieve it.

Just on 3 June, I noticed a published record from documents obtained through FOI from the government. It was an excess employees list showing that some 360 public servants earning up to $118,000 a year were still being employed by the state government despite there being no need for them and yet the government kept them on the payroll. Something is seriously wrong when the government insists that it is acting responsibly, responsively to economic conditions internationally, and yet just today we have the Premier stand up and tell us how well we are going economically in this country.

They have to be consistent; they cannot have it both ways. If they are going to say, 'We do need to exercise some restraint and we do need to be more disciplined in our expenditure,' then clearly they need to be consistent and they need to explain to the people of South Australia why they are still going to build a footbridge and why they are still going to incur what will be a total of about $4 billion in the cost of a hospital during its lifetime, when there are so many other services in need.

I think at this stage they have utterly failed and if the Treasurer was undertaking a degree in sustainability, then he would have absolutely failed in trying to suggest to us this year that he is going to steer us out of these difficulties. If it is not bad enough that we have his promises, we have the very glossy multiple-volume documents that we now receive to indicate how well off we are, but it is also concerning to note that, when they say they are going to do something like arrest the explosion of actual expenditure—they told us just three years ago that in this forthcoming financial year we were going to have a $304 million surplus—we find that they have published this year's budget and in fact it is going to be a $1.2 billion turnaround, so that we are actually going to end up with a deficit of $284 million.

How can we possibly believe them when they tell us that we are going to go through a few hard years but all is going to be wonderful when we reach 2015-16, when we are going to have a $512 million surplus? They cannot be believed. They cannot be trusted on this because they have demonstrably failed year after year after year and it is a cruel twist to place on the people of South Australia an almost aggressive support for the federal government's announcement that it will impose a carbon tax. Daily, the Premier or members of the government stand in the public arena and talk about how proud they are to be supporting the federal carbon tax and yet they have utterly failed to provide us with particular data as to the burden that is going to be transferred to the people of South Australia.

I think it is going to be like quicksand. All these things sound good, they look good—they look pretty, even—but once you get stuck in them, you get sucked down, dragged down and suffocated with an extraordinary expense. I think the government does need to explain to us how the cost is going to be met just from the government alone, let alone the private sector. In the $38 billion estimate of revenue that the federal government thinks it is going to get in this first year out of the carbon tax, just on the assessment of our 8 per cent share, I think we would be expected to be providing about $1 billion.

It may be that overall we have more efficient production of energy, fuel and the like which might reduce that, but we are still talking about hundreds of millions of dollars that South Australians and the South Australian government are going to have to come up with. We hear the government today persist in saying that we have a $10 million exposure as a government towards costs, but it just seems to me that we need more detail, including how much of the total carbon tax bill consumers will be expected to pay in increased fees, taxes, etc., to cover that.

I also note that the government really has developed a master's degree in secrecy. The Treasurer has clearly graduated from the school of spin. His opening line in the budget this year was to assure us of the wonderful, strong foundations that we are going to have with the development of the BHP Roxby Downs venture, and yet we have daily reports in national newspapers of the concern that has been expressed by BHP about the operating conditions in Australia and particularly, I think, about the development of major infrastructure in other parts of Australia which have not been advanced.

When you couple that with the Treasurer's own decision in this year's budget not to already advance an announcement in 2009 to build 14 homes in Roxby Downs for public servants to facilitate this great venture, one is very suspicious about his confidence in the project. This is all about spin, but the reality is that if we are to have a sustainable budget—as we do have an expectation in other aspects of life in South Australia—and if the public, who are the shareholders in South Australia, are to have confidence in that precious resource of money, public money, and the efficient use of public asset, they are entitled to have more from this government.

We previously had an era when premier Rann said, 'I'm going to allow cabinet documents under freedom of information.' What do we find in recent times? We find that the shutters are down and we do not have access to those cabinet documents. We have the lobbyist register which aims to make people honest about any former conflicts of interest. Recently, I noticed that the former treasurer of this state, Kevin Foley, has become a lobbyist on the register. I raise this question: how is it that he can be a lobbyist for the Australian Submarine Corporation when, less than two years ago, he held portfolios as the minister for defence and treasurer of this state?

How is it that he is able to do this when the code of conduct with respect to lobbyists requires that a minister must be retired for more than two years? These are basic standards with which we expect our current and former administrations to comply and which are consistent with being an open and accountable government. Of course, they are caught out. Today, they have done a backflip on the licensed premises for small operators to try to get out of that extraordinarily embarrassing, high-cost and unreasonable take on that community.

Last year, we saw a turnaround on The Parks Community Centre but with no money; the government was caught up with that in the previous year, and it was embarrassing. Previously, Monsignor Cappo and the current Premier and Attorney-General all stood up and spouted their support for The Parks Community Centre, saying that it was an important social place for this state. Now, two years later, they are going to convert it into a sports facility with only half the area.

Until they are caught out, until they are caught like a rabbit in a spotlight, they do not budge from what they insist on. We have the carbon tax. Just to give an example, we asked a question about the carbon tax of the Minister for Transport Services in early April, as to what knowledge she had of the modelling in the transport department that would affect the cost of fares and the like, and she had no idea. She did not know, was not aware of it, did not have a clue.

Within weeks, a memo is being sent around, now disclosed and published on the weekend, and provided under freedom of information. Within weeks, there were memos to senior members of her department, identifying that there would be a $15 million impost as a result of carbon tax on capital works and operating works.

Sure, the minister for transport stands up today and says, 'Yes, but we are going to be charging more fares.' Well, we know that. Fares are going to go up to over $5 a trip, multitrips are going to become much more expensive. We know that they are going to claw that back off the public, but here we have a situation where, until they are caught out, they do not disclose anything. It is just not acceptable. The people of South Australia are the shareholders in this entity. They are the payers, it is their money and they are entitled to have some information about that.

All I am asking is that the government tell the truth. If they were directors of a public company, this budget, as a prospectus to shareholders, would be against the law. It would be inadequate, it would be deceptive, it would certainly not be transparent and accountable and I would goes so far as to say that, under our company law in Australia today, under our Corporations Law, there would be directors of that company, sitting across in that bench, who would be in gaol today with the statements they have made in the provision of information or misinformation, or concealment of information, to the people of South Australia in explaining to them how they have spent their money and how they are going to spend their money.

The government just continues to be unaccountable and recklessly irresponsible with other people's money. If it was their money, it is fine; but we are talking $15 billion budgets now. It is a lot of money. It is other people's money and the government has an obligation to spend it wisely and not like reckless ratbags, as demonstrated by this budget.

Mr HAMILTON-SMITH (Waite) (15:57): I want to look back over the last 10 years of this government for signs of life in my address to the Appropriation Bill. Others have gone over the budget detail. Others have talked about debt, wasted years and lost opportunities, but I really want to question this government's policy credentials over its journey to date because there has been—and it may not be lost on some in the media—a remarkable turnaround in this government's direction in recent years.

Can I say that, from the outset of this government in 2002, I was depressed at the complete lack of policy substance coming from a newly elected government. It collapsed into government, I think, not really expecting to win and without a clear agenda. They had spent their entire eight years in opposition ripping down the ideas of others as the then Liberal government tried to fix the chaos of the State Bank and put this state back on its feet.

If there is one defining achievement of the Brown and Olsen governments, it is that they dealt with the state debt and they put this state back into a bankable position. They set it up to regain its AAA rating. They set it up to again have dignity and pride in itself, after Labor delivered absolute ruin. If you ask for a legacy from the Brown and Olsen governments, that is it—they put this state back on its feet. In all that period, that eight years from 1993 through until 2002, there was nothing of substance from this government. It was a policy-free zone.

They came into government under the then member for Ramsay and it was all about bread and circuses. We had glossy report after glossy report. We formed an Economic Development Board. We put leading business people in there. We started to talk about infrastructure plans and we got everyone talking amongst themselves.

Of course, it was a hung parliament with a speaker who, some may say, delivered similar stability and cogency to the current federal speaker. It was a shambles. The only guiding central principle of that first four-year term of Labor was to win a second term, and they did. Nothing of consequence was achieved. Nothing of substance was achieved. The people of South Australia, frankly, were conned. Thanks to a vibrant federal government under the Howard prime ministership, it was a world of plenty in terms of tax revenues.

To give the former treasurer some credit, I think his first two budgets were reasonable, in that he did not let go of the belt as quickly as he swallowed the cash, but budgets three and four clearly demonstrated that he had caved in, because the spending started. Then this government tripped over the line into its second term and, again, there was little policy substance. One of the first decisions made was that we would build a tram from Victoria Square to North Terrace; something that had not appeared at all in its infrastructure plan or in any of its EDB utterances.

Mysteriously, shortly after that, there was then this announcement that we would build a new Royal Adelaide Hospital. Again, that had not been taken to the 2006 election. That had not appeared in any infrastructure plan or Economic Development Board utterance. It was absolutely plucked out of the sky. Again, there was no thread, no strategy and no design to their second term, but the money kept rolling in from the GST revenues. They were awash with cash, as the Auditor said year after year. They had burgeoning revenues, well above what was spent.

However, as quick as it came in, the then premier and the then treasurer let out their belt and fattened up. They caved in to ministers opposite. They wasted it all on bread and circuses. They bloated the public service. They let things go. However, there was no policy substance and no emerging legacy. It was quite apparent that premier Rann would resign, retire or leave the place without being able to point to a single thing that he could say was his legacy, unlike premiers Brown and Olsen. Until they go to their grave, they will be able to say that they put this state back on its feet after the State Bank, put the books back in balance and gave this state back its dignity.

I took over as leader of the opposition in early 2007, and I remember my first address here in which I made many of these points: that this government lacked substance and policy, and we had this rhetoric. The only policy agenda you would ever get from them was, 'We are about police, health and education. Law and order, education and health; that's all we are about. We are not interested in grand plans. We are not interested in any other agenda. It's all about health, education and law and order.' Of course, we had all the spectacular nonsense: we hired 'Eliot Ness', who quickly worked out who the bad guys were, and we had the Nemer nonsense, the spectacular dramatics over law and order, whipping up a lynch mob mentality. There was nothing of substance. Again, no agenda was being set.

What premier Rann did not understand—and I do not think the treasurer then did either—is that you are here to do things and every day you waste is a day you will never get back. That first two terms of Labor government achieved absolutely nothing. It was my view then as leader that we had to change the game. We had to get the game onto ground of our choosing. We had to set a new pathway and a new agenda and we had to get the government out of its comfort zone, and this rambling that it is about health, education and law and order, with all the dramatics. Of course, they were not actually doing anything on those three issues, but they were talking the rhetoric.

At the Press Club in February 2008 I talked about a Liberal vision and a master plan for Adelaide. What I am about to point out to the house is very important, because there was at least one other member in the house who read the document: the current Premier. He read it, because his agenda is now the agenda I set out in that address to the Press Club. I do not even know whether he was there—

An honourable member interjecting:

Mr HAMILTON-SMITH: A bread roll, with a glass of wine having his lunch. If he was not, he was certainly listening because it is very clear what happened within the Labor Party caucus after February 2008—a rift opened up. I know that a rift opened up because a couple of members opposite came to tell me all about it as it was occurring.

I want just to repeat to members what was said in that address to the Press Club. We talked about a need to revitalise the City of Adelaide. We talked about a need to have a new approach in the CBD. We questioned why there were height limits on buildings; why we could not get development happening. We talked about planning powers and the state government playing a greater role and taking planning responsibilities away from local government. We talked about the character of the CBD—preserving its heritage while enabling growth. We talked about needing to look to the river and that the river and the city's interface with the river was now its heart—no longer Victoria Square.

We talked about the need for a City West development. We talked about things like extending the Convention Centre and bringing up the Entertainment Centre from Port Adelaide to the city—perhaps building a new Aboriginal or science museum in that precinct; creating new living spaces that people could enjoy—cafes, restaurants, new hotels and possibly even moving the Casino. We gave lots of examples of what could be done in that place, and we made the point that it was the wrong place for a hospital. The best place for a hospital was where it was. It was a good idea doing something down there; Labor just chose the wrong thing to put there.

Of course, that master plan for Adelaide went on and talked about a whole host of developments that would be possible down there and, of course, then mooted how we might revitalise the city by attracting major events. What did I say in February 2008? I said, 'You know what? We should try to attract the Commonwealth Games to Adelaide. We're the only state that has never hosted it. Why don't we pitch for the 2018 or, in fact, the 2022 games?' which I thought was more viable.

Of course, all this was totally scotched by members opposite. It was terrible. So when I read the Sunday Mail the day before yesterday I had a little chortle. Suddenly, the current Premier thinks that attracting the Commonwealth Games is a really good idea and he wants to have some ownership of it. Well, I look forward to him buying me a beer because he and all his colleagues at the time said that it was a terrible, terrible idea. In fact, I think that at a business lunch the former treasurer called it a B-grade event and belted into it. It was going to cost $2 billion to build the infrastructure. What a shocker of an idea!

Also mooted in that paper was a really interesting idea: why don't we revitalise the city by bringing footy into the city? Why don't we build a city stadium? Both in that paper and in the subsequent policy paper, which I launched at a later time in early 2009, I said this:

Our vision for Riverside West involves a cultural and entertainment precinct that would transform the city. This must include a world-class stadium either by renewing Adelaide Oval or, if this proves untenable, by creating a new purpose built facility. Both of these options will deliver a world-class stadium beside a new and exciting city pulse. Every other mainland state has created such a place. Why can't we?

Does any of that sound familiar? The master plan for Adelaide went further. It talked about a whole host of things that I find are suddenly turning up in Labor Party's agenda—a future for the Parklands. I talked about a whole new approach to the Parklands. Why could it not be like Central Park? Why was so much of it a wasteland? Why could we not get the water in there? Should the state government not have a greater planning power in regard to the Parklands? I even offered the then treasurer legislation to enable his grandstand at Victoria Park to go ahead to call his bluff on Ms Lomax-Smith. Did he take it? No, he did not. He could have had it on a platter but they ran away and hid.

Of course, the master plan talked about ring-roads around Adelaide that are still needed—an inner ring-road and an outer ring-road. It talked about renewing the north-south corridor. It talked about getting the Southern Expressway completed—an expressway that could not be completed in full at the time because of the financial ruin Labor had delivered. It talked about the need to fix road maintenance, to improve our bus services, to electrify and upgrade our trains, and a host of other things to do with planning—all sorts of issues. What was Labor's reaction to that?

I am looking at a press release from 7 February 2008, when the now Minister for Transport and Infrastructure, who thinks all of these ideas are fantastic, said about Hamilton-Smith's vision: 'There's been a lot of talk beforehand, but this isn't so much a vision as a squint.' A squint! He was against the lot. A sporting stadium—'What a silly idea that is.' Electrify the train system—'Don't be mad.' Extend the Convention Centre—'We can't afford it.' Move the Entertainment Centre—'You must be off your head.' Revitalise the city, the Parklands—'God oh blimey, the Libs have just lost the plot. They've sailed off into fantasyland.' The only thing is that he now owns fantasyland. It is his now.

So we now know what was going on in the Labor Party in 2007 and 2008. I have a question here from 26 February 2008 from myself to the then treasurer who, in response, scotches the stadium idea. Of course, on 26 February, it was just terrible, it was a rotten idea. The Hansard then tells us that the treasurer and the premier a few months later could not wait to race down to AAMI Stadium with a cheque for $150 million, offering them a future at West Lakes. That is what they did: they went down there with $150 million. They were so keen to scotch these ideas that they flew down there with a cheque.

What else happened a few months later? All of a sudden there was this amazing announcement on 5 June 2008 (just three months after I had spoken to the Press Club) that a new 2,500 person entertainment venue would be built as part of a $50 million state government plan to revamp the Entertainment Centre where it was. Mr Foley was so keen to lock the Entertainment Centre down there so that our ideas did not develop momentum that he flew down there with $50 million. I know for a fact, because I had talked to board members, that a few months prior they had been told that that was totally and absolutely out of the question. The Convention Centre board was told the same thing: all of these ideas were off the table, out of the question; no, they would never, ever happen.

It was the Liberals that set the agenda and it was Labor that was scurrying to catch up. Guess what? All of the ideas that we set out in 2007, 2008 and 2009 are now Labor's ideas. I just say to the people of South Australia as they look at this budget: if you want a government with some ideas, you may as well have the one that came up with them, not the one that is copying them.

It is quite obvious what was going on in the Labor caucus. The current Premier was running around with his colleagues saying, 'You know what?—the Libs are onto something here, and Mike Rann and Kevin Foley have to go.' Mike Rann and Kevin Foley were running around trying to lock everything down, throw money at West Lakes, throw money at the Entertainment Centre, at the Convention Centre, put out all these bushfires, and the good old member for Cheltenham was running around saying, 'You know what?—we'll get beaten at the next election if we're not careful.' He was just undermining away, and what happened just before the election? It all gave way and we suddenly had the announcement that football would come into the city—'We're going to do it at Adelaide Oval.'

I give the former treasurer full credit for that, because I reckon he would have had to do a bit of headbanging in his own caucus to get that through. I also give credit to the Minister for Transport and Infrastructure because, once he realised, as I think he probably always did, that what we had been saying made sense, he actually convinced his colleagues to deliver.

We would not have football in the city if it were not for the state Liberals. We would not have an extended Convention Centre if it were not for the state Liberals. The $50 million at the Entertainment Centre would not have been spent were it not for us, and this government would not have produced a 30-year plan for Adelaide had we not been pushing for exactly the same thing. You were dragged kicking and screaming into the future and you had to address some of the issues you had not talked about in your first seven years of government.

You can all wander around and pretend it was not so, but where were all these plans in the infrastructure plan you produced? Where were they? Try to find them; not one. They were not there. You produced an infrastructure plan; you did not mention any of these things. Where were they in the Economic Development Board's glossy brochures? Nowhere to be seen. We set the agenda; you followed. The entire agenda now has been designed by us and you have got with the plan because you had to, because these were ideas whose time had come.

The sad thing is, I look for where we are heading now, and as I look at this budget I see we have a budget now which is doing these things suggested by the state Liberals that they had not really thought of. They were not going to upgrade the Southern Expressway; they were not going to do that. They were not going to do any of the things I mentioned a moment ago. They have been made to do it, and of course they are in their third term. The trouble is, they wasted all the money. They wasted all the money on bread and circuses and good times, on extra public servants, giving people an expectation of work and finding later that they could not afford it. They were wasting all the money.

Is our education system any better? Is our health system any better? We hear a lot from the government about how much they are spending but not so much about what they are delivering. I look at this budget very strategically; I am looking for a strategy. I am looking for something that goes beyond the next election, and what I see is a budget that delivers Liberal ideas, not thought of first by them, but suggested to them by us, which they have poached to get them over the line at the next election. I see nothing beyond but a policy desert.

What this parliament has to do is to start to address some issues of substance. We have problems in our economic structures in this state. We have problems with skills development. We have policy challenges from left to right, and yet this government and, to a degree this parliament, is not addressing those real issues of policy substance. We need to; our children and our grandchildren deserve better.

The Hon. R.B. SUCH (Fisher) (16:17): The budget before us is, as always, a mixed bag. There are a lot of good things in it and there are some things which are not quite so good. In relation to debt, a lot of people have a fixation about debt. I think the point is that debt in itself is not necessarily bad; it is what the money is used for. Is it being used for productive investment, for wealth creation, or is it being used on flim-flam and current spending which will not generate wealth?

The first point is that I think people should not be obsessed with debt. You do not want it to get too high in relation to gross state product because you would lose your options for doing things down the track. Given that over time, under both governments, a lot of government assets have been sold off, you do not have a lot of room to move if you create a large debt.

The government says it expects the debt to peak at $8.8 billion in 2015-16, or just prior to that, but I think the lessons of Europe are fairly clear. We have seen what has happened in Greece, Italy and Spain, which have basically been living beyond their means. You can only sustain a high standard of living if you generate wealth in an ongoing way to ensure that happens.

There are lessons to be learned from Germany and places like that, where 10 or so years ago the unions and business got together and said, 'Look, we need to work together to ensure the future of this country.' As a result of that, as a result of cooperation between unions and business, you will find that the German economy is doing quite well. Even though many of their companies produce what are relatively expensive products, they are bought around the world because people know that they are quality. For example, I think it is unfortunate that we lost Mitsubishi here because I believe that if that production facility had switched to producing vehicles that people wanted to buy—more economical, smaller vehicles and so on—then I think that it could have continued on.

Having recently been in France where they are extremely patriotic—but not only that they follow through in terms of what they buy—in their supermarkets and elsewhere (it is not in English of course, it is in French) it says, 'Be responsible, buy French'. You do not see many foreign cars in France, with a population of 62 million people, you will rarely see a car from anywhere else. Across the channel into the UK and they have every car under the sun except for the ones they make themselves which are a fairly small percentage of the total.

The point is that you need to be continually focused on quality, innovation, and business, unions and employees working together to ensure that you produce products which are obviously in demand, but have a quality element to them. That is what I think South Australia should be focused on. We should be a place focused on quality of life, not quantity of life, not having a bigger population for the sake of it but having the best educated population, the lowest crime rate, the best hospital system and so on.

That is what we should be aiming to do, not simply just to have more people. What is the point of that? What does that prove? What does it achieve? You look at the countries in the world which have a very high standard of living, and they tend to be the countries that focus on quality. You look at, say, Finland, which is regarded as having one of the best education systems in the world, and their teachers are required to be trained to the level of a masters degree; and their teachers are highly respected, highly paid and that is what we should be aiming to do in South Australia.

In this budget there are a lot of initiatives, but not many that I can see which will help push us and encourage us towards a state which is focused on the quality of life rather than the quantity of life. Just having a look at a few things in the speech by the Treasurer in the budget paper, where he indicates that health spending accounts for 31 per cent of the state budget. That is a necessity because of the way we are living. You cannot blame people who are sick, and who, through old age and whatever become ill, but we need to do a lot more about what some people call preventative health which is a bit of an unusual term, but a greater focus on improving the health of people earlier on.

The government, to its credit, is trying to do that through encouraging people not to smoke. In that respect, we are well ahead of some countries including France where a lot of people still smoke, but we are sitting on a time bomb in terms of health issues if we do not tackle early enough and vigorously enough the question of a healthy lifestyle for our people, and we have no excuses for not eating wholesome fruit and vegetables and so on.

We are amongst the most blessed of all nations in the world, but I was up in the Riverland in the last week and I think it is a tragedy that we are now seeing horticulturists removing a lot of their productive capacity, and bulldozing healthy valencia orange trees. I have seen pistachio orchards ripped out and we know that a lot of that stemmed from the shortage of water, but now we cannot even produce things like dried fruit in any quantity.

It was not the reason for going up there, but I was asked by my sister who likes to cook, 'Can I get some South Australian dried fruit?' and it was not an easy task. I eventually found some currants and some locally produced sultanas. Dried apricots were pretty scarce as well and, yet, we have fantastic resources here in this country and in this state and we are our own worst enemies. We import about half of our fish products. We need to do better in terms of not just having a vision for the future but actually delivering on some of these things. In relation to health, I think the government's program is a good one. There are some initiatives they could improve.

I always argue that, instead of creating a big Royal Adelaide Hospital on North Terrace, it would have been better to have a smaller, central hospital with a couple of specialties, including accident and emergency, and build up the metropolitan hospitals, Lyell McEwin, Flinders, and so on. Anyway, the government chose not to go down that path. I think we are going to have a fantastic facility but it will be at a fantastic price.

Other positive things in the budget include the electrification of the rail system. That has been delayed in part, but the overall project is fantastic, and I have commended the government in the past, and I commend them again. We need to have a modern public transport system in Adelaide and in this state. The commitment to upgrade the rail system by electrification and expansion of the tramline is good. I accept the reasons for suspending some of it, but I trust the government will remain committed to the overall objective.

Whilst I was in France, I noticed that in terms of many of the city's tram networks there are no overhead wires in the core of the city. They have a jockey wheel under the tram, or some sort of wheel, so they do not have the intrusion of overhead wires. In establishing that system here, or extending the tram system, I am not sure why it was not pursued in King William Street and elsewhere. The technology is there to enable building a modern tram system without overhead wires in the core part of the city.

There is quite a lot of money in this budget for expanding and extending the prisons and also the juvenile detention centre at Cavan, and that comes back to the point I alluded to earlier. The government needs to put more effort into keeping people out of prison, but not those who have committed serious crime because at that stage it is too late. However, not enough effort is put into trying to steer people away from getting involved in not only antisocial behaviour but criminal behaviour. Intervention at the right time can help ensure that we have fewer people going to prison, fewer juveniles being detained.

Many members will have seen the police and courts in operation. The police will tell you that a lot of their work comes from people who drink too much or get involved in drugs, and we need to put more effort into dealing with some of those issues. There needs to be a stronger focus in schools on what I would call core values, which might seem a little bit old-fashioned, but they include basic things like respect for others. People say that schools are trying to do that, but I think it needs to be more explicit and pursued in a more rigorous and vigorous way in all our schools, not just the state school system but all our schools.

People say that this is not the job of the school, but the reality is that, sadly, it often does fall upon the school because too many families are dysfunctional and children are brought up to be involved and become involved in antisocial or criminal behaviour. I do not believe criminals are born: I believe they are created by the system, and in one way or the other that results in them going down that pathway.

Through the school system, and support through counsellors, psychologists, mental health programs, I urge the government to target young people who are going off the rails. The police will tell you that a lot of the clients (that is using a polite term) they deal with suffer from a mental illness or some psychological issue. One only needs to look at the statistics for those in Yatala to find that many of them suffer well-known psychological conditions.

Many times the people being admitted into prison cannot read or write. In a society like ours, as affluent as it is, to have people in their late teens who cannot read or write and do basic maths is an indictment on our society. We will continue to have more and more people being incarcerated because many of them not only do not have a regard for the positive values they should but also do not have the skills to ensure that they can have a meaningful and productive life.

If you intervene early in the school environment and in the home environment, you can often steer some of these characters away from doing things they should not do. We see in this budget millions of dollars being spent on incarceration. I would like to see an equal amount spent on early intervention and channelling people away from crime.

That is what will put you on the map around the world: if you have the best education system or the best health system, you can call yourself whatever you like—people around the world will know about you. You do not have to rebrand yourself: what you have to do is be good at doing things and the rest of the world will come and knock on your door. I think the approach should not be rebranding; it should be focusing on being excellent at what we do and ensuring that people have a genuinely well-founded quality of life.

In regard to the oval, I would have to say from feedback from people in my community, they did not want to see that money spent on Adelaide Oval. It is happening, so it is a fait accompli now. I did not see it as a top priority. I think it is a good thing—I love Aussie Rules football—but I did not see it as a top priority. In regard to the Riverbank development, I am not sure that we need to look like Melbourne or Brisbane. Why not just be ourselves? I do not think it is necessarily a bad thing that we may have a bit more lawn than they have on the bank of the river.

In regard to the footbridge costing, I think, $40-odd million, I understand it is going to be designed by people from overseas. I would be amazed if there is not a student at Adelaide University doing engineering or architecture who could not design a fantastic-looking and safe, strong pedestrian bridge for the Torrens. Once again, the cringe mentality wins out and we have to go and get someone from overseas to design a pedestrian bridge. I hope that is not the case, but that is what I have heard.

I think the continuation of the first homebuyer scheme is a good thing, and the stamp duty reduction for people purchasing in the city council area is worthwhile. The multistorey car park at the Adelaide Entertainment Centre makes quite a bit of sense, given that it is integrated with the park-and-ride, and I think that is a very good initiative. I mentioned the rail upgrade. We are going to be paying significantly for our water supply, but I regard it as a form of insurance. You cannot survive without water and the reality is that the desal plant will provide security, so that we can guarantee that we will have water.

In regard to the road projects, whilst the duplication of the Southern Expressway does not have a big benefit for my electorate, I think it is something that needs to happen. Not all upgrades for roads need to be expensive. Even simple things like using some of the European-style cat's eyes at intersections like Gepps Cross and Flagstaff Road can help improve safety and guide people in using the road.

The big projects all make sense to me, but I think there are a lot of other improvements that can be undertaken, including better and improved signage. I have mentioned before in here that New South Wales, where I was last week, makes it quite clear to people that you are leaving an arterial road and going into a 50 km/h default zone. They also give people who are approaching a country town ample warning that there is a 60-k sign ahead. They will have a sign saying '60 k ahead' or '40 k ahead', and I believe the Minister for Road Safety is going to do it here.

In fact, in Victoria, across the border between Renmark and Mildura, there are five sets of 80 km/h signs on each side of the highway. If you are driving on that road, which is one of the few in Victoria that is 110 km/h, and you do not see one of those five sets of dual signs on each side of the road telling you that it is 80 km/h, I do not know which planet you are on.

I am all for punishing people who put their lives and the lives of other people at risk, but in South Australia, we have a long way to go in making people aware of the changes in speed limits, and even information about roads ahead. If you were from overseas or interstate, I do not know how you would get on trying to find your way around if you did not have one of the electronic navigating devices.

I will not be able to go through all of the programs in the budget. One of things I would make a plea for, in relation to the hospital upgrades—I do not want to transgress because I have a motion on it, but I hope the government can find the money to get the next model of the Da Vinci robot for the Royal Adelaide Hospital. It has been a fantastic investment.

I know it costs a lot of money, and I know the company does well out of it and has an artificially restrictive usage on the replacement arms, which experts tell me would last three times as long as the company will allow them to be used, so that the government has to buy new robotic arms every 10 operations, I think it is, when they would easily last for 30 operations. I see in here, under 'Health', there is money for improved mammogram screening, which I think is very important. Women have told me that some of the technology for this at the moment is a little bit stressful and painful, but the modern technology will give a better resolution, and will do it in greater comfort.

All in all, there is a lot of good things in the budget. As I said, I would like to see a focus on some of the underlying issues, like improving the quality of life by early intervention, and focusing on what, as I have indicated, is really quality of life rather than quantity of life. Overall, I think the budget, in these circumstances, is a fair and reasonable one, and we need to avoid going down the path of some of the European countries, which have got into a situation where they live beyond their means. I think bringing back the debt is sensible so that we do not get into a situation where our options are constrained.

Dr McFETRIDGE (Morphett) (16:37): This is my 10thbudget in this place. I am just a humble veterinarian, not an economist or a lawyer; by that, I am boasting, not apologising. I described my first budget papers as the height of prestidigitation—the sleight of hand. Again, we see the budget papers presented in a unique way. Every one of these 10 sets of papers I have looked at has been presented in a completely different and convoluted way so that you have to be an expert in economics to be able to work out what programs have moved where, and you need to have resources and time to go through every page of every budget paper so that you can understand what the government is doing with the taxpayers' money—and it is the taxpayers' money.

Can I just say that I wish this government would do what governments interstate have done for many years now: that is, when they put out their budget papers, they also put out another document that tells you how to interpret the budget papers. So, I am not the only person who has a problem with looking at the complete myriad ways in which the budget papers are presented; there are other people out there who are just mere mortals and not economists. I think there is some sort of devious plan to present the most rosy-coloured picture you possibly can of what, as we will see as I go through the budget papers, is not a very pretty picture.

The fact that you have to balance your budget all the time is something that nobody would disagree with. I think the need to have a surplus is a worthwhile aim, and there is certainly such a thing as good debt. But, we have seen this government, and I think it was minister O'Brien—

Mr Marshall: Minister for forestry.

Dr McFETRIDGE: —the minister for forestry and fisheries at the time, who said that this government was actually borrowing to pay its recurrent expenditure, borrowing to pay wages. When you get into that parlous state, you really need to sit back and think, 'What have we done? Where are we going?'

I have run a small business. I used to borrow, I used to have an overdraft, I had large mortgages in that business, but at all times my cash flow was able not just to pay my wages but also help reduce and manage that debt so that I could build the business, build my practice and employ more people, and that makes common sense.

We have heard the Treasurer in the past say that these are family budgets, and we have seen him trotting out there with nice glossy family-friendly photographs as a man of the people not just trying to thump the crap out of somebody with his boxing gloves on. We try to get the impression from those glossy pictures that the Treasurer understands how budgets have to be balanced.

What do we see, though, in the state budget here? We see ever-increasing debt. We have gone from what was—and we have heard this term before—rivers of gold for many years. When I first came into this place, I was in government for two hours and 55 minutes. I sat on that side for two hours and 55 minutes and, because of the skulduggery that was going on at the time, we forced the vote on the floor of the house and that was it, end of story, we were in opposition. I just think about what could have been had we been in government and of the opportunities that were there because of the money that was coming into the state through the GST.

People ask me, 'Do you enjoy the job of being a member of parliament?' I tell them that I love this job but that it is one of the most frustrating jobs I have ever done because I am in opposition and see wasted opportunities and a government raising expectations and failing to deliver. That is what we have seen, and it is a shame because, if the government were to be true to themselves as well as true to the people of South Australia, they would say that there are missed opportunities.

Just look at what the Auditor-General has said to this government year after year after year, that is, 'You are spending more than you should be, you have to watch your spending, just rein in your spending because you just cannot continue to budget this way.' In 2005, he said:

Given the forecast expectation that such revenue growth may not be sustained, control of expenses will be important.

In 2007, he said:

...the State may have developed a culture of expecting growing revenues to continue to support increasing expenses.

But what happened there? The budget was overspent by $304 million in 2007-08, it was overspent by $670 million in 2008-09, and in 2008 the Auditor-General again—the trifecta, the third warning—said:

...the State has received large amounts of unbudgeted revenues that enabled net operating surpluses...

The warnings were there. They were very, very clear. Having run small businesses, I know that you cannot keep spending more than your income.

What more secure income do you have than from taxpayers? Death and taxes are the two inevitabilities in life. People are paying their taxes. In South Australia, they do pay their taxes. Unlike in Greece and Italy, where tax evasion is the national sport, in South Australia we have people who are paying more and more tax than they ever have in their life. Why? Because this government has not managed the opportunities it has had presented to it. All it has been about is staying in power, and to see the state as it is now just about brings you to tears.

As I say, I am not an economist, but on all three budgetary measures this state is in deep peril. The net lending deficit of $1,901 million, so $1.9 billion in 2012-13, is there; the cash deficit of $1.952 million is there; and the net operating deficit of $867 million is there. So, all three measures—the net lending, the cash basis and the net operating basis—every one of those is in deficit.

How can you stand up as the Treasurer in this place, member for Playford, and be proud of what you have achieved, what you have inherited and where you are trying to take this state? It is just a situation that you cannot be truly proud of. South Australians are paying more tax than ever before. Okay, inflation goes up and CPI goes up, so cost of living goes up and incomes go up. You would expect taxes to rise, but not at the rate they have in South Australia. Under 10 years of this Labor government, tax revenue has increased by 85 per cent. For that to happen is beyond the pale.

As the Leader of the Opposition said, no wonder we hear stories of people packing up their goods and chattels and moving interstate. A fellow who lived down the road from me at Somerton Park came to see me and he said, 'Duncan, we are selling the houses and businesses we have in the Northern Territory. We are reorganising the business, but I can tell you we're not coming back to South Australia with those houses and businesses because it just costs too much. We are going to Victoria with them.' I thought that was an absolute tragedy, because this guy was a proud South Australian, as am I. The fact that he just could not make his businesses pay by bringing money back from the Northern Territory into South Australia is really quite sad.

I do not know how the heads of departments and the chief executive officers are going to be able to manage the savings measures that are being imposed on the various government departments by this government to try to prop up the budget. In my portfolios of police, corrections, emergency services, volunteers, road safety and Aboriginal affairs, these people have been doing their darnedest to make sure the budgets balance and that every cent has been used for the best advantage of the taxpayers.

In particular, the police now seem to have to spend more time looking for ways to make savings than they do looking for criminals. That is not something that can continue. There is a point at which you just cannot squeeze any more blood out of the stone. The Commissioner of Police, Mal Hyde, has done a fantastic job for 15 years now and is leaving us shortly. On 6 June on FIVEaa he said:

It's going to be hard to find ways in which to preserve the operational side of the organisation. I can't forecast what might happen. All I can say is that it will be hard.

This is what he said when he was asked about the budget savings that are being imposed upon him. In the same portfolio of police, the head of the Police Association of South Australia, Mr Mark Carroll, was interviewed on FIVEaa about the cuts to the police budget. He said:

Yes, it's over $110 million now over the next four financial years...which makes it very difficult I think for police to actually return that efficiency dividend when we're already so stretched...There's been a whole range of savings initiatives...SAPOL have reduced their motorcycle fleet...full cost recovery for police over dimensional escort fees...there's been a delay in recruiting against temporary vacancies of up to 12 months...they don't replace temporary vacancies for up to 12 months...we've been quite public in our commentary in relation to the broken election commitment of 2010 to recruit 313 police above attrition over the parliamentary term.

Mr Carroll goes on:

There is no doubt in my mind that it will affect frontline services. I think anybody who believes it won't have got rocks in their head.

I repeat that:

There is no doubt in my mind that it will affect frontline services. I think anybody who believes it won't have got rocks in their head.

Mr Carroll apparently has written to the police minister to ask what services will be cut. I look forward to seeing the police minister's answer on the government's imposition of these cuts to the police budget, because there is no doubt that it will have an impact on frontline services. Mr Carroll finished off this radio interview on 5 June, a matter of days ago, by saying:

Well senior police have told me that as far as the efficiency dividends go they've done everything they can under the sun and the only way they can achieve this will be through labour reductions.

In other words, frontline service delivery and general service delivery to the people of South Australia. If you go to Budget Paper 6 and you look at the savings measures that are being required, you will see that in 2013-14 it is about $4.5 million from the South Australia Police and in 2014-15 it is $9.1 million, but then in 2015-16 it leaps up to just over $14 million. So, over the next three budgets a total of $27.7 million is being cut from police. Now, how can you do that without affecting frontline services? I believe Mr Carroll and I believe the commissioner that it will affect frontline services, so the minister really needs to ask herself how she is going to explain this to South Australians and to the victims of crime that we hear about everyday.

We hear about the statistics. We saw the minister today get up in this place and read out some statistics. There is a very good quote from the Minister for Police on 7 June this year:

If you look at the broad context you've got to be very careful of the data. The statistics can't always tell the complete picture.

And that is what Commissioner Hyde said. Looking at the statistics, you cannot just say, 'We've got more police. We've done this, we've done that. It is more than when Robert Brokenshire was the minister 10 years ago.' Minister, you and your government have been here for more than 10 years now, and look what you have done. You might have achieved some things in some areas, but the pain that is being imposed on South Australians is just horrific.

If you look at corrections there is a savings over the next three budgets of $9.2 million. I do not know how Mr Peter Severin, the head of corrections, is going to be able to achieve those sorts of savings. Peter Severin is a fantastic bloke. I was listening to him on the radio this morning talk about the very difficult case of the woman with severe psychological problems and how he is managing that. You see that the guy has integrity. He wants to do the right job, but being put in a position of having to find these savings, well, I do not envy him at all.

Sure, money is being put into the infirmary at Yatala and money is being put into the expansion of the Port Augusta Prison, but, as the member for Fisher said, I think that we should be keeping people out of prison. It costs $194 a day, I think, to keep a prisoner incarcerated in South Australia, which is a significant amount of money. When you add in the particular difficulties that up to 50 per cent of our prisoners have got with mental health problems and the medication they need there is a significant on-cost to the health portfolio as well.

I have the emergency services portfolio, and it is one of those portfolios where it is either police or emergency services leading the news bulletins most nights. Our emergency service workers do a fantastic job. I have known Mr Grant Lupton, the Chief Officer of the Metropolitan Fire Service, for a number of years. He does an exceptionally good job. He is a highly professional Chief Officer and a very qualified firefighter, but over the next three years Mr Lupton is going to have to find over $4.5 million in savings—about $750,000 next year, $1.5 million in 2014-15 and $2.3 million in 2015-16.

The need to make sure that we have our emergency services as well equipped and prepared as possible is something that we need to be very careful about. Being put in a situation where the money is not there for training, for support and for equipment is something that we just cannot tolerate. The thousands and thousands of volunteers in the CFS are out there providing millions and millions of dollars worth of in-kind support to this government. I am a member of the CFS, so there is no conflict of interest here at all because I am very interested in what happens to the CFS.

I know the guys I work with and, once the job is on, once the pager goes, you are in just exactly the same frame of mind and attitude as a paid firefighter. You are doing a fully professional job to the best of your ability, and so you do need to have the best equipment and the best ability to be able to train and to be resourced that you can, yet we are seeing, again, hundreds of thousands of dollars in this case being pulled out of the CFS budget. You cannot do that. You cannot keep cutting these budgets because you have made a stuff-up somewhere else in your budgeting process. It is just not fair on the volunteers. It is not fair on the South Australian taxpayers.

The SES has really copped it. It has actually had a budgetary cut this year. If you were to keep up with inflation, instead of having a $196,000 cut it should have had about a $300,000 increase in its budget. I understand that the SES volunteer association is so concerned that there will be a number of units disbanded, they will fold. There will be volunteers who just will not continue on because they are sick to death of the battle to try to get the resources and to get the training. It will really hit the fan in South Australia when we get a big bushfire, a flood or an earthquake and the SES is not there because this government has just squeezed and squeezed them. We cannot keep taking our volunteers for granted.

In my other portfolio areas of Aboriginal affairs, road safety and volunteers, there are so many other issues, and we will talk about those. I am certainly looking forward to estimates, because the need to make sure that we have answers on the record for not only volunteers but all South Australian taxpayers is imperative.

Road safety is an interesting area to look at. We are told that all the money from fees, fines and expiation notices goes into road safety, and I have no reason to disbelieve that. If that is the case, the $295,000 that is in the budget this year seems an extraordinarily low amount of income considering the total fees and fines being levied in South Australia.

The good people of Coober Pedy have written to me and the Leader of the Opposition just recently about a police campaign up there involving some fairly unusual stops and checks. I just hope that the fees, fines and penalties that were being imposed in that case were not influenced by this government in any way, because we get the message all the time from this government that the police and their operational procedures are completely independent.

What we are seeing with this budget is cost pressures all the time that should not be there, that should never have been forced upon the taxpayers of South Australia. We should not have the double whammy of paying more and more taxes—an 85 per cent increase in taxes in the last 10 years—and now a greater burden with increased fees, fines and levies by this government. I think over 300 pages of fees, fines and levies were gazetted just recently, most of them above the CPI. The CPI, according to the budget, is 2½ per cent, but most of these increases are about 3 to 3½ per cent. So, above CPI increases are not good enough. The government really should be shaking its head and saying, 'What have we done here?' The people of South Australia are at last starting to say, 'What the heck is going on? Where are we going?' Well, in 2014, it will all come home to roost.

Mr GARDNER (Morialta) (16:57): On 31 May the Treasurer handed down Labor's 11th state budget. It delivers record levels of debt and deficit, even surpassing the State Bank disaster levels of the early 1990s. We are looking at a deficit of $867 million in the coming year, the largest in South Australia's history. The debt of $8.4 billion, set to rise to $13 billion in the 2015-16 year, will no doubt be left to future generations—the young people of today and their children—to pay off.

We are looking at the loss of the AAA credit rating, meaning that the interest on future government borrowings will cost more. Work done by the Financial Review suggests that that is going to be at a cost of $22 million a year extra in interest for South Australia and South Australia's long-suffering taxpayers. The interest bill is set to rise to $2.3 million a day, and growing. This, of course, does not include the $1.1 million a day for 30 years that we are going to be paying to deliver the infrastructure surrounding the new Royal Adelaide Hospital and does not include a doctor or a nurse or the treatment of a patient.

We have had the suspension or deferral of projects, including the Gawler and Outer Harbor line electrification, the QEH redevelopment and the Modbury Hospital inpatient unit, and we still, of course, see no upgrade in the eastern and north-eastern suburbs for the Paradise Interchange, which we hope to get at some stage.

The cost of all this is borne by all South Australians. The flow-on effects are borne by all South Australians through the increased cost of living and by South Australian businesses through the increased cost of doing business in South Australia. The flow-on effects and the ripples are continuous and immense. We know that the Australian dollar has had some effect on the cost of living across Australia, but this is compounded in an incredible way in South Australia.

I note that just today the Mercer group of human resource consultants released its survey on the cost of living in major cities around the world. All Australian cities, it is fair to say, have gone up in this survey as a result of our dollar, but none has gone up anywhere close to the way that Adelaide has. We have seen Brisbane move seven places up the leader board to 24th and Canberra move 11 places up the leader board to 23rd.

Adelaide has gone up 19 places—an extraordinary figure—to become the 27th most expensive city in the world in which to live: it is the first time Adelaide has ever been in the top 30. We have always been Australia's cheapest mainland capital in terms of our cost of living, but increasingly that is clearly not going to be the case.

In this survey released today by Mercer, for the first time Adelaide is now a more expensive city to live in than New York City in America, which comes in at 33rd on the list in 2012. It was 32nd last year, but it has been displaced from that spot by Adelaide, which is now the 27th most expensive city in the world in which to live. Although the figures were released today, the survey was conducted in March 2012, so it does not include any of the cost of living increases that are included in this state budget, nor does it include the cost of living increases that are going to be caused by the introduction of Labor's carbon tax.

God knows where we are going to end up on next year's Mercer survey. We will be looking closely at this because it is fundamentally important. We want the sort of society where people can afford to pay their utilities bills, to pay for the things that they have come to expect in life from a First World developed country, and this government is making it harder for them to do so.

We know through the net migration figures that our young people, particularly those in the 20 to 34 age group, are leaving South Australia at a much greater rate than the national average, at a much greater rate than they did in the 1990s up until the election of this Labor government, because they see that the opportunities for them to pursue careers are greater interstate, because they see that the opportunities for them to raise their families will in many cases be more convenient interstate.

We know—because the demographic research and anecdotal stories from anyone in this age bracket tell us—that if we do not get those people back to Adelaide, to South Australia, if they do not see the opportunities for career and lifestyle development being better by the time they have their first kid interstate and make arrangements for that child's education, it is going to be very difficult to get them to come back and contribute to our state economy and consequently their productivity is lost.

Adelaide is the 27th most expensive capital city in the world. It is a remarkable figure. That is what we have after 10 years of Labor. What are the driving forces behind these costs of living? Many of them—most of them—are driven by increases to the cost of living by state government decisions, including those in this budget. A small example is the 20¢ per single trip increase to public transport prices, or $1 per multitrip. Water prices have increased 25 per cent from last year. I will come back to that because there are some more significant increases based on previous years.

We have had consecutive increases to driver's licence fees. Motor registrations are up by more than CPI again. Compulsory third-party insurance standard premiums are up by 4.7 per cent. Liquor licensing is up, although we have seen some movement from the government on that today, and we will look to see the detail of that. Fines from the Environment Protection Authority are up 35 per cent in the budget, and the solid waste levy that councils have to pay the state government has increased significantly.

We know that across South Australia councils have increased their rates by about 5½ per cent. It is the easiest thing in the world for state governments to bash councils. We see it happen on a regular basis but, frankly, the carbon tax coming in is going to have an extreme effect on a number of councils, along with the solid waste levy going up, and all the other impositions, taxes and charges that councils are having to deal with as a result of this state government. It is amazing how those things can grow. The state government must do more than just look at councils and say, 'They shouldn't be putting up rates by so much,' when it is their decisions that are causing these rate rises that are affecting all South Australians.

Other increases: sewerage bills, electricity bills, gas bills, all up; the Emergency Services Levy, the NRM levy, the Save the Murray levy, all up. In his speech, the Treasurer made a great deal of how there are no new taxes but those words ring hollow when just about every single tax that you can get your hands on already is increasing at a significant rate over and above the cost of CPI.

We saw the 300 pages of fees and charges gazetted on budget day and, of course, all of this comes before the Labor federal government's carbon tax, which, we heard in question time again today, the state government—through the Minister for Transport and, on previous times and on many occasions, the Treasurer and the Premier—continually defend. They have as much responsibility for this carbon tax as Julia Gillard because they provide the political cover to do it. We do not even know how much it is going to cost the South Australian government and the South Australian taxpayer because, unlike governments in New South Wales and Victoria, our state government has refused to release their modelling, if they have even done any.

I want to spend a moment on water bills because they have more than trebled since 2002, up by 249 per cent, and they have risen by 176 per cent since the desalination plant was announced. At the time the Liberal Party proposed a 50-gigalitre desalination plant, which was costed at less than half a billion dollars when the Liberal Party and members of parliament went to Western Australia and got figures. There was a delay, and we were told by the Labor government for more than a year that it was unnecessary and, when they did announce it, they decided to double the size of the plant to 100 gigalitres.

Then they said that that was okay because the federal government was going to come in and provide a grant to pay for it. What we have learnt now is that the $328 million federal grant to double the size of the desalination plant was almost neutralised because, as a result of that grant, we lost $302 million of GST revenue. So, for $26 million from the federal government, South Australian water users have been slugged an incredible extra 176 per cent on their water bills. Every South Australian who lives in a house that uses water has had to face these incredible hikes.

This is the result of 11 budgets and 10 years of a government living beyond its means. We know that from 2002 to 2011-12, the government will have collected $5 billion in unbudgeted revenues—$5 billion more than they expected. What a wonderful thing it would have been if they had been able to pay off the debt completely because, when they arrived in government, state debt was under $3 billion—in fact, $2.7 billion in 2002-03—and they have received $5 billion more in revenue in that time. Of course, over that time, they have spent billions and billions of dollars over budget and, every year, the Auditor-General (as other members have said) provided the warning that we could not continue to live beyond our means and beyond our budget.

What would we have been able to do in areas such as disability, housing, families and communities, and youth (which I have responsibility for and which I will talk a bit more about later) if only we had had that debt paid off? On that matter, going to the interest, which I talked about before, the $2.3 million a day, $700 million a year in interest payments that we are making dwarfs the size of our budget for disability and child protection. More than $700 million a year in dead money is going to pay off interest on our debt.

The Commonwealth Grants Commission has confirmed previous reports by the IPA that South Australia is the highest taxed state in the nation. The 2012 report on Relative Fiscal Capacities of States from the Commonwealth Grants Commission identified that land tax in South Australia is 40 per cent above the national average and the worst of all states. Stamp duty is 27 per cent above the national average, the worst of all states; and insurance tax is 53 per cent above the national average, the worst of all states.

Since the Labor Party has come to power, other taxes have gone up, too. Payroll tax is up 85 per cent or 40 per cent in real terms—and I will use the real terms figures because the fact that they are so high, identifies just how incredibly grabbing this government has been. Conveyance duty up 26 per cent in real terms; land tax up from $140 million to $582 million, up 215 per cent in real terms; and other property taxes, up 21 per cent.

Gambling taxes have had a mild increase, up 11 per cent in real terms; insurance tax is up 38 per cent; and motor vehicle tax is up 24 per cent. This is what has led to South Australia's increased revenue, along with the GST revenue, which in 2001-02 was less than $2.5 billion, which in 2012-13 is forecast to be over $4.5 billion, going up to over $5.5 billion in 2015-16.

The government has a lot more money than it used to. And what has it spent it on? We have a public service increase of 20,000 full-time staff, only 2,000 of which were budgeted for, and more than two thirds of which are not those front-line public servants such as nurses, teachers, doctors and police officers that we so often hear the government talking about.

The economic mismanagement of the Labor Party has seen interest reach $2.3 million per day. That is money that cannot be spent on health, education, law and order, transport, infrastructure or, indeed, the portfolio areas that, since the last budget, for which I have had the honour of being given responsibility, for the Liberal Party, and they of course being families and communities, disability, housing and youth. A number of these issues I want to get back to after the estimates process, because there is a good amount of detail that the budget papers provide. There is a good amount more that we hope will become clear through the estimates process, and I look forward to having the opportunity after that stage.

However, there is one issue that I do want to talk about in the time I have left to me today, and that is disability services. The government had some reasonable input of new money into disability, and I commend them for that in this budget, as indeed the leader and the shadow treasurer have on other occasions. I heard the shadow treasurer immediately in his budget response talking about many of these figures and noted that disability spend is an important spend and the opposition has welcomed it.

It is important, because in over 10 years of government the proportion of the state's revenue that is spent on disability services, care, accommodation and support had dropped from 2.82 per cent to 2.36 per cent. The spend this year goes some way to redressing that, so it is welcomed, but it was needed. We spent 15 per cent less than the national average, according to the Productivity Commission, on disability support services. The Gonski review showed us that we spent far less per student in our public schools on disability than every other state by a long way, compared to most states.

The unmet need figure for category 1 supported accommodation had grown considerably just since the last election. The December 2009 figure had 306 people on that waiting list; it had grown to 523 in the most recent April figures. That is for supported accommodation category 1, people with immediate or urgent risk of homelessness or urgent risk of harm to themselves or others—523 people.

Also, the category 1 list (but not just for accommodation, but all types of support, including therapy services, behavioural intervention and respite) had grown from 663 to 1,109. The increased funding in this year's budget was not past time, I can assure you. We hope that it will make a dent in those waiting lists. We hope that it will give support to many of those who need it.

Part of the budget included a $20 million announcement for support for the National Disability Insurance Scheme. This was something the opposition had been calling for. Indeed, in the federal budget on 8 May $1 billion was put aside for the National Disability Insurance Scheme, but not much of that was for services. I identified that $154.8 million of that $1 billion was to employ local area coordinators, to provide an individualised approach to care and support for people with a disability, so developing the approach; $58.6 million to assess the needs of people with a disability in the four launch locations that are going to be set up early; and $122.6 million over four years to start preparing the disability sector for the new way of delivering services and increases in capacity.

There was $240 million, of a total of $243 million over four years, to build and operate an NDIS information technology system; $53 million over four years to establish a new national disability launched transition agency; and $342 million over three years for individually funded packages for people with significant and permanent disability. That was $340 million for on-the-ground services.

The South Australian government, rightly, wants a piece of that package and we called on them to do what they could to negotiate with the federal government to put some money in this year's budget to ensure that we get that and they have come up with $20 million over three years, so $3 million in 2013-14. I quote from Budget Paper 6, which says:

The detailed operations of a launch in South Australia are subject to negotiations with the commonwealth government.

We look forward to that, but it is worth noting that this is $20 million that we hope will be enough to get us one of those four launch sites. Those four launch sites are due to help 10,000 Australians across Australia so, if it is done evenly, for the cost of $20 million over three years, we will get a quarter share in that $342 million worth of services from the federal government. It will be great for South Australians with a disability, so long as the details meet the expectations that have been raised through these announcements.

The Liberal Party, at a federal and state level, has been unambiguous in its support for a national disability insurance scheme. I want to quote from a speech given by Tony Abbott on 13 April. He said:

...the national disability insurance scheme is an idea whose time has come...It has to be done responsibly but it does have to be done. The Coalition will do what we reasonably can to make [it] happen [as soon as possible] and would accept a government invitation to be jointly responsible for this vital national project.

It is important that that is understood. Even as recently as last Friday, the point was made again by Tony Abbott, and I quote:

There has to be a national emphasis on productivity lest ever more people end up receiving ever more benefits paid for by a shrinking workforce.

The National Disability Insurance Scheme recommended by the Productivity Commission is an important productivity measure for Australians as much as it is an important service delivery measure for Australians with a disability who have been on waiting lists or under-serviced or requiring extra services for too long. It has the potential to be a transformative project—a nation-building project—but it has to be done right. The opposition has suggested at a federal level that the best way to do this is to have a bipartisan committee that would span more than three elections, potentially, from now until the final delivery when everything is up and running that would include consultation with stakeholders, individuals with a disability, and the service providers that will see their models having to change.

We need both sides of politics involved so we can get a model that will survive changes in government. When we are trying to do a national social change over the course of three federal elections, that is why it is so important. Again, I encourage the Labor Party to talk to their friends in Canberra and encourage them to ensure that the National Disability Insurance Scheme is something that will work well and will be supported by all sides of politics and will include the views of all of those involved.

Mr PEDERICK (Hammond) (17:17): I rise today to make my contribution to the Appropriation Bill 2012. Initially, I want to talk about some of my portfolio areas, including agriculture, in which (as is usual and as is the wont of this government which does not recognise what agriculture puts into this state with up to $15 billion annually of finished food product coming from agriculture) we see more cuts. This was forecast several budgets ago where there were cuts inflicted on the sector, on the department, of $80 million ($20 million annually) and some massive staff reductions.

We have seen up to 400 staff leave the department of primary industries and, from what I am told, the morale of those who are there is getting lower and lower. In fact, recently a very good friend of mine left because they had just had enough of seeing a department that was getting absolutely gutted and lacking the support it needs to help drive the food bowl of this state.

It is really disappointing because, as much as we here support both mining and agriculture, we saw that, in the old primary industries and resources, before DMITRE turned up, the resources sector of the department did not have to make any efficiency gains. As I said, we appreciate on this side of the house that mining is important, but why is agriculture not important? In fact, it produces enough output for this state to triple what mining produces at the minute, because we are waiting for mining to ramp up, as the leader indicated earlier today, and we are still waiting to see what is going to happen up at Olympic Dam.

We know that BHP Billiton is very keen to get that project underway, but I understand that they are thinking about whether or not to progress at least eight other projects on a world scale around the globe. In the current financial climate, it is difficult, and it is also difficult for people like BHP Billiton to go on with these major projects with the federal mining tax, the carbon tax and the threat of essentially taking away the diesel rebate from off-road use.

That is the whole reason that both mining and farming are getting the 38¢ rebate—they are not on the road. The biggest issue is that whatever we pay in fuel tax and registration does not get put back into our infrastructure anyway. Our roads are so sadly lacking right around the state, yet here we see cash-strapped Labor governments at both a federal and a state level doing what they can to—

Mr Pengilly interjecting:

Mr PEDERICK: I think you can: it is just how big a deficit they want to have. These Labor governments just want to do what they can to make it hard for people who are employing thousands of people right round this country and minimise the chance of growing more wealth in the state and this nation.

Overall it looks like in the forward three years in agriculture we will see about $24 million being cut from the state Labor budget and it is interesting to note that, during the Treasurer's budget speech, there was no mention of the clean and green food bowl, although this was clearly outlined in the Governor's speech. This is not a reflection on the Governor: the speech is written by the Labor government. It was clearly outlined that this was going to be one of the seven strategic priorities in the 2012-13 budget. Well, I am sorry: where is the priority? I have had a pretty good look at the budget and I cannot see any priority for the clean and green food bowl.

An honourable member interjecting:

Mr PEDERICK: Yes, lip service. There are some small funding applications there which I will talk about shortly, but all we see over time is a government that does not believe that it is impacted by cutting funding to agriculture because it has only one seat in the region, which is that of the Speaker, the member for Giles and, apart from that, they seem to think that their food turns up in cryovac packs and cartons or bottles in the supermarket.

What we have seen with agriculture is these full-time equivalent cuts across the entire portfolio. We see fees, fines and penalties across the whole sector continue to rise. In the Agriculture, Food and Fisheries program, the 'Fees, Fines and Penalties' income for 2012-13 is projected to increase to $3.24 million, which is an increase of $900,000 from the previous financial year. In straight-out funding cuts, apart from the full-time equivalent cuts, there is a reduction of expenditure of $15 million from 2011-12 to 2012-13. As I mentioned earlier, when I was talking about the full-time equivalents, we are seeing another 98 jobs being taken from agriculture, and this is part of the total government savings initiatives.

In the cost recovery measures, there has been outlined in the budget a $250,000 reduction to revenue due to delays in introducing the biosecurity cost recovery fee. This is all very interesting. The government has appointed Dennis Mutton to do their so-called inquiry into whether or not they will introduce this fee. When the Livestock Act was open recently in this place and the other place, all of a sudden that proposed fee disappeared.

I can understand that the government would have received a lot of angst over the property identification code fees and, to be fair, we agreed with that $38 a year levy on farmers as part of a biosecurity arrangement for the primary industry sector. We thought, on this side, 'Yes, we do need to have proper management of biosecurity in this state.' But where does it end? The Environment, Resources and Development Committee is looking at that fee as well to see if the government is going to bring it in or not. I will be interested to see, if it does happen, what double dipping there will be against the recent federal announcement of several hundred million dollars going into biosecurity.

I note in the budget that there is a proposed expenditure of $5 million for minor capital works and equipment for 2012-13, which is essentially ongoing maintenance and updates of vehicles and machinery, etc. I guess we should be thankful for that—that there is some maintenance being carried out and some updates of vehicles—but this is ongoing costing that should happen anyway. I do not know why it has to have a special budget line. We notice that the operating expenditure for the 2012-13 budget is $175 million which is a decrease of $50 million from the 2011-12 budget.

As I indicated earlier in my speech, there has been some money put into agriculture. There is $780,000 which I acknowledge is going into the Australian Centre for Plant Functional Genomics for wheat breeding, but this is one of the small lights, and a very faint light, in this budget in regard to agriculture in this state. We look at fisheries and aquaculture and ever-increasing fees. We see that there has been almost half a million dollars for structural and environmental enhancements to fishing industry facilities but there has also been an increase in cost recovery and associated fees in 2012-13 to a total of $400,000.

Because we have seen the end of the exceptional circumstances interest rate subsidy in this state, there is quite a decrease in expenditure—and that adds up to $12.8 million—but there is also a decrease in the income side which is now $9.4 million extra due to lower commonwealth funding for the exceptional circumstances interest rate subsidy.

Reflecting back on biosecurity, we see a reduction in expenditure to the tune of $8.7 million, and $4.8 million of this is the winding-up essentially of the branched broomrape eradication program which will finish at the end of this month. We have seen the national body make recommendations to both the federal and state governments saying that branched broomrape cannot be eradicated. I think we should have stuck to it. It has been costing $4.5 million annually between federal and state funding for this program: $2.6 million of federal funds and $1.9 million of state funds.

Over 10 years we have seen $45 million of government money, and it is reported that an estimated $70 million of farmers' money has gone into this program. As we move into the new financial year we move into a whole new era as far as the management of branched broomrape where, basically, the quarantine area will be opened up and we will just go to a containment program. I will be keeping a very close eye on it to see that there are not any trade restrictions placed on farmers in the broomrape area. I note the presence of the member of the Schubert in the house—it goes across his seat, my seat, into the seat of Chaffey and there may be a bit elsewhere. I will be very concerned if there are any problems, and I will certainly bring it to the attention of this place if compensation is needed for farmers in that area.

Forestry is an interesting one: this is where the Hon. Michael O'Brien, former forestry minister, said, 'Well, we had to sell the forests to keep the AAA credit rating.' Well, the AAA credit rating has gone out the window, so I would have thought we would have automatically ceased the forward sale. When you add those statements and what has happened over the matter of time, you can see why the reckless spending of this government has left us so far in the red.

We see there has been a reduction in expenditure of $0.3 million due to a rationalisation of service delivery, and we are seeing that it is programmed that, instead of making a net contribution to government of around $40 million annually, which Forestry SA has been doing, it is estimated that it will cost the government $3.8 million by 2012-13. This is because this government is hell-bent on selling one of the biggest assets in this state, and they will give it away for something to the tune of $600 million just to help fund the $9 billion of infrastructure spend in the city.

We see this is already hitting the budget, where the net contribution to the government from Forestry SA is estimated to be $18.9 million in 2011-12, which is a significant decrease from the budgeted $38.6 million the government was hoping to make from Forestry SA this year. Surprise, surprise: this has been blamed on reduced timber sales and planned forward sales of forest rotations in the South-East. So, this is going to be a once-off. If the Labor government sells three rotations of forestry, that could be up to 111 years. None of us in this house will be here in 111 years and, if you are, good on you, but—

Mr Venning: Speak for yourself!

Mr PEDERICK: No, I do not think even the member for Schubert will be here in 111 years' time. I know we talk about 111 years and the fact that none of us are likely to be here: this is how long it is; this is something that will not just affect our grandkids, but our great-grandchildren, without having this asset, will be pouring money back into state coffers.

It is interesting to note that the 2012-13 investment program for Forestry SA is targeted at just under $16 million for land acquisition, equipment, maintenance and technology, and it will be interesting to see whether that is spent as time goes on. I think the government has forgotten that there are all of these other areas of forestry which will need to be managed, such as up towards Jamestown and Kuitpo, and Crawford Forest in Mount Crawford.

I think, just on that level, let alone the foolhardiness of having this forward sale option, that they have not had a good look at what it really means for the cost to government into the future. We have already seen that with the significant decrease from the budgeted net money coming into government coffers.

The South Australian Research and Development Institute (SARDI) has a total of $0.9 million in expenditure—$900,000 coming out of the budget, down from $31.47 million in 2011-12, to $30.96 million in 2012-13. This obviously sees a reduction in research and development activity of around $1 million. What really concerns me about what is happening in that research area is what is going to happen with the $70 million plus of assets that are in government hands operated by SARDI, whether it is at West Beach, Turretfield, the Minnipa research station, or the many other centres that have been places of excellence for research for many years in this state.

The good oil I have on this is that the government just wants to walk away from agricultural research and technology in this state, and this will be transferred over to Adelaide University. I guess the caution I have with Adelaide University taking over this is that it recently sold several properties in the Mid North, and it has, I think, $50 million, which it is setting up to be spent just on agriculture. That is a good thing, but I hope that is what happens, because we have seen families make bequests to the university for these properties to be used for agriculture and then, 40 years down the track, they are sold.

What really worries me here is that, essentially, when Adelaide University takes over, and it will come to a time when Adelaide University takes over (I think it was supposed to happen by the end of this month, but it has not happened because negotiations are still ongoing), what will happen with all the assets? I have been told that the government will help fund the university into these assets, but then I have also been told that, essentially, the government will forgive the debt. Why would a government that is cash-strapped give up at least $70 million (and possibly a lot more) and give it away? I find it hard to believe. As I have indicated, you see this with the forest sale and we see it with the sale of the Lotteries Commission for $80 million, with the commission providing $20 million annually to the state coffers.

In my mind, another issue is the $6 million that is being saved by this government by ripping it out of schools, and this is affecting schools in my electorate. Murray Bridge North Primary and Murray Bridge North Junior Primary have been running as two schools—but, no, the government has decreed that they will be amalgamated, and that is that. The government spent significant money (I think it was about $300,000) allegedly consulting on this amalgamation, and the government came out with a result that it wanted. Surprise, surprise!

What we will see across the state is diminished funding resources for schools, whether it is for special education or libraries or whether it is for student officers to assist with children's education, and I think this is a terrible outcome for the children of this state. I will add some more points later on when I get to grieve in regard to the Appropriation Bill. What we have seen is another budget come out where the regions are pillaged for their growth and for the benefit of the urban areas.

Ms SANDERSON (Adelaide) (17:38): It is my pleasure to speak in relation to the budget. This budget takes us from what was a AAA to a DDD—we now have debt, deficit and downgrade. The state debt will be $13 billion in 2015-16, which will be our biggest debt ever. The 2012-13 deficit will be $867 million, which is also our biggest ever debt. We have now been downgraded from our AAA credit rating to AA+, with a negative outlook. I remind the house that Kevin Foley said that losing our AAA credit rating would send us spiralling into an abyss of debt.

This government has had six deficits in seven budgets, with the election year being the only year to record a surplus, if that happens. We can see from past history that, in the 2009-10 budget, the 2012-13 estimate was an actual surplus of $304 million, remembering that now we are up to a $867 million deficit. By the Mid-Year Budget Review in 2009-10, that was recalculated upwards to $316 million surplus.

Then, in the 2010-11 budget, it was downgraded to $216 million surplus, and then downgraded again in the Mid-Year Budget Review to $127 million. It was then again further downgraded, as of the 2011-12 budget, to $114 million surplus. Then, in the Mid-Year Budget Review of 2011-12, it surprisingly went to a deficit of $458 million, which has now been re-estimated in the 2012-13 budget as a deficit of $867 million. We can only wait in anticipation for what the Mid-Year Budget Review will recalculate that figure to be.

As has been mentioned in the paper and in several locations, had the Adelaide Oval not been changed from an expenditure into an investment, that would have been a deficit of over $1.2 billion. So, who can really trust any of the figures that are here?

To quote from the Treasurer's budget speech, 'South Australia will be a very different place in a few years.' All I can say is, let us hope it will. Hopefully, we will have a Liberal government and we will actually be returning surpluses once again and getting our state on track. There was also a quote in the budget that government borrowing would never exceed half our annual revenues. If you look at a whole of government point of view, our total debt is actually around 68 per cent of our revenues, which is a pretty bad position to be in.

I do commend the government on their disability funding. I think that was one highlight of the budget for me. Whilst there are no new taxes, which is always a good thing, there are 300 pages of increased fees and fines which were gazetted last week, hitting many families where it hurts, in their top pocket.

Bringing it to a more local point of view regarding Adelaide High School, in 2010 we were promised $60 million for the expansion of four of our major public schools, providing 250 extra places at Adelaide High School to allow Prospect and Walkerville in the zone. This budget shows that just $2.1 million of that $60 million has been spent in two years. It states that $15 million has been budgeted for this year, but last year the budget was $20 million and only $2 million was spent, so who can really tell how much will be spent on the schools?

Just to also remind the house, the expenditure on Adelaide High to expand by 250 places was a last-ditch attempt at saving the seat of Adelaide and was a bandaid solution. Even if it goes to schedule, the school will not be taking any extra students until, at the earliest, the beginning of 2015 and, at the latest, the beginning of 2016.

Remember that, by 2015 South Australia will be the only state without year 7 in high school, so to spend $60 million to upgrade high schools that, by 2015, when every state in the nation goes to year 7 being in high school, is quite short-sighted and, I would think, quite a waste of money. We really need to realise that we need a completely new school and second campus of Adelaide High School to support the extra population that will be moving into the city, as well as when we eventually come into line with all the other states and have year 7 in high school.

Small business takes a hit again with this budget, with the watering down of the payroll tax exemption scheme for apprentices and trainees, which eased the pressure and made employing these people a more attractive option. I note that our youth unemployment rate is around 32 per cent, which is incredibly high. The apprenticeships and traineeships are exactly where these people would be employed, so we need to do everything we can to support small business to employ people. It is worth considering that 93 per cent of businesses in South Australia are small businesses that employ less than 20 employees, so funding targeted to them would be very beneficial in increasing our employment and we should do everything that we can to help.

In the last two years, funding to the opportunities for small business program has been cut by 53 per cent, and all of its subprograms have also been cut. There are now just eight people employed to support the 135,000 small businesses in South Australia and the total funding for that area is less than one day of interest repayments.

Turning back to state taxes, we all know there is difficulty in our real estate industry with the high prices of all our stamp duties and conveyancing tax, and I note that the change in conveyancing duty since the Labor government came in in 2001-02 is a 66 per cent increase, which is 26 per cent above the CPI for conveyancing, so that is stamp duty on houses. Land tax is even worse. The change since the Labor government came is 316 per cent, and that is 215 per cent above CPI, which is incredibly unaffordable and explains why people cannot afford to buy houses and why there is an affordable housing shortage. It is not worthwhile investing in property in this state. If you have money you take it interstate, otherwise you are losing a lot of your money just in state duties—taxes and stamp duty. I have doorknocked many people who have indicated that they are taking their money elsewhere.

I have also met several business people who are taking their business elsewhere because the cost of doing business in this state is not worthwhile. To quote again from the Treasurer's budget:

Our investments over the next four years will put the centre of Adelaide on equal footing with other state capitals, and will make our city a more attractive place to live, work and do business.

The main things to help business would be to reduce all taxes, in particular payroll tax, not cutting help to trainees and apprentices but actually supporting small business. If you want to make Adelaide vibrant you need two things: you need job opportunities for young people and you need a vibrant city.

I am happy to hear that the Deputy Premier is now reconsidering all the licensing for clubs and pubs. I have had probably about 80 emails to my office from business owners who felt that that was very unfair and would certainly lead to the closure of many small bars and clubs in the city, which goes against the vibrancy we are trying to create in the city. I was very happy to read the minister's statement today, and hopefully we will have some good results and help small business that are struggling.

Just like spending, waste has become an addiction with this government. 'Smaller public sector needs to be more productive' was a quote from this year's budget. Labor has blown out the public sector in its 10 years, and the cutting of 1,000 jobs pales into insignificance when compared with the 20,000 who have been employed since 2001-02. It is quite astounding the hard work that went into shoring up our economic future by the Liberal government after the suffering caused by the State Bank collapse. They got public sector numbers down to 66,933, and the Labor government have that right back up to 86,888, noting that that is after we no longer have the staff numbers to be included in those figures for things such as the TAB, ETSA and the ports authority. We actually have fewer places in which to employ people in the state, yet the figures are still blowing out.

Of the 20,000 or so extra public servants, around 13,000 of them are employed outside the core areas. They are not nurses, teachers, doctors or police—they add up to 6,535. They are paper shufflers, bureaucrats and people in different government departments. I am sure they are doing a very good job, but can we afford a blowout like this? Can we afford to have borrowings to pay our wages? It is just not good business.

We had $445.7 million paid to contractors and consultants for departments. Whilst we have increased the public sector by 13,000 we are still employing outside that. If we had the true figure, we would be even more astounded. There has also been a lot of waste: things like the $5.9 million paid for the cancellation of the Newport Quays contract, just after it was re-signed only days before, which would have saved any payment. This conveniently coincided with the by-election in Port Adelaide—another incredible waste of money.

We had the payout of $5 million to Marathon Resources so they would not mine at Arkaroola, even though we had worked out a way to do that for nothing, and it was Liberal policy. It astounds me that an exploration licence would have been given out, renewed and then withdrawn. It just beggars belief. I cannot believe some of the things this government does and the waste of money. We also had the $10 million in compensation to builders in the wake of another broken contract, this time for the Murray Bridge prison failure.

We had the $168,000 golden handshake to former premier Mike Rann. We also have Shared Services, which was supposed to save us $60 million a year, but has today cost us $120 million, and cannot even perform its basic functions like paying bills to the private sector on time, leaving businesses waiting hat in hand. It is an unmitigated disaster.

Mr VENNING (Schubert) (17:51): We have certainly heard some pretty negative speeches today. I am sorry, but I cannot add anything other than more negative comment about this budget. I have been here for a long time and I do not think I have seen a budget quite like this one. In fact, nowhere near it. There is nothing positive that one comment about, apart from some funding to mental health and disabilities. I made that comment in my local paper, because I always believe in trying to be positive. Apart from that, it is a tirade of negatives.

This budget has delivered nothing but bad news, I believe, for South Australia. This is Labor's 11th budget. The 2012-13 budget will deliver the biggest deficit and the biggest state debt in South Australian history. To go from a AAA+ credit rating to 3D or AA+ is an indictment indeed. In fact, it is a pretty horrific judgement. Of course, we are told that the AA+ could slip further. As a person that has been in business for years, I know what happens when things go bad in business. You have to really work hard to stop the slide, particularly when the bank and all the people you owe money to get onto your wheel. In this instance, it is the government.

A $867 million deficit for the 2012 financial year is the biggest in South Australia's history. The forecast three years ago, as we have heard today, was for a $304 million surplus. This is a $1.2 billion turnaround. I wonder, if treasurer Foley had still been here, whether he could have achieved that and been able to hold the line. We will never know. No doubt ex-treasurer Foley will have some comments about it, but we certainly miss the strength that he had now that he is not here. However, the rot certainly started 10 or 11 years ago.

Far exceeding the debt levels seen in the wake of the State Bank disaster, this budget forecasts a massive $13 billion debt by 2015-16, and that does not include the liabilities of WorkCover and the superannuation scheme. $13 billion by 2015-16 is the biggest debt in South Australian history, and I have put a positive spin on that, because I believe it is much, much more. This means taxpayers will pay at least $2.3 million every day in interest alone.

If this is not bad enough, as a result of Labor's budget mismanagement, the state has lost its AAA credit rating and there is a strong indication that this will be further downgraded. This will worsen the state's already dire financial position, as it will cost the state more in interest payments on its debt. Since Queensland lost its AAA credit rating, also under a Labor government, they have paid over $700 million extra in interest payments. It is estimated it will cost South Australia somewhere between $22 million and $30 million per year. Whatever the exact cost, it will be the South Australian taxpayers who foot the bill, and how can you keep taxing people when they are already the highest-taxed people in Australia?

You have heard this ad nauseam, but I have to say it in my contribution because I will be circulating this to my people: on his first day in the job on 8 February 2011 the Treasurer made this profound statement: 'I will not allow the state to run up a credit card debt which will be left to our children to pay.' This budget leaves little doubt that our children will be paying for Labor's budget mismanagement. It is an absolute crying shame. Forget the politics: to some degree we all share this shame, even members on this side of the house, because we are the opposition and this has happened on our watch. It is our job at the moment to tell the people, as we are doing right now, what we think about this budget because history will blame us all for it. We will get the blame for it. So, the opposition has to get in to bat strongly and try to do what it can to right these terrible wrongs.

This government had the highest revenues in the state's history for the first seven years it was in power, averaging about $500 million a year over and above the budget. It has not only spent it all, with nothing to show for it, but it has given the state a debt of more than $8 billion. Back in 2002, when Labor came into power in South Australia (this government), I went onto the Public Works Committee for four years just to keep an eye on the projects the Liberal government had in the pipeline, and there were some big projects. Once those projects were finished, there were no new projects listed, none, for about three years, nothing. All this money from GST payments coming in and we had no major projects whatsoever. What was happening to the money?

Now we are seeing a mad rush to build all of this infrastructure at hugely inflated prices and we do not have the money to pay for it. What were we doing back then? It is a great abyss. It has evaporated. We know, Madam Speaker: the Public Service started to grow out of control—jobs for mates. I cannot understand what all of those people were doing, or what they did. How can you put on thousands and thousands of extra public servants? How can that be? As I said on the Public Works Committee, I got out of it after four years and went back to the ERD Committee, because I was so frustrated at the total lack of major developments over $7 million.

The Hon. P. Caica interjecting:

Mr VENNING: You were there. You were chairman of the committee. I enjoyed the committee, but if you have a look at the minutes you will see that I am on the record as saying, 'Would you mind, please, letting me know of any new projects?' In fact, the government then tried to change the rules so that the projects had to be over $10 million, I think, so we did not have to do them anyway, but the parliament rejected that and projects in excess of $4 million are still examined by the committee. So, I was there and saw firsthand how the public works programs and the infrastructure programs did not happen. Now we are seeing a mad scatter on projects (but very few in the country), trying to do this catch up. I have to say that I do not believe the South Road extension is a fair use of government money, because it is so expensive.


[Sitting extended beyond 18:00 on motion of Hon. J.M. Rankine]


Mr VENNING: I am so pleased that we will break the record just to listen to me to go past 6 o'clock. My apologies to Hansard, but you will get your dinner break later on, as we all will. So, I am speaking strongly about the lack of public works back then. The question is—and we will all be condemned—what happened to the money between 2002 and 2010? What happened to the money? It just disappeared. All of a sudden we woke up and we started to rein it in, but it was too late. We had huge outlays of money—and we all seem to know where it went—and the waste went on and on and on, and we only know the half of it.

We have a debt of more than $8 billion at the moment. What hope do we have for a new hospital in the Barossa? There was not even a mention, anywhere in the whole of the budget papers, of the Barossa. I tell a fib, there was one word. It talked about the few dollars extra spent on finishing off the Northern Expressway going to—you guessed it—the Barossa. It was the only mention of the Barossa in the whole of the budget papers; there was nothing else. Very few country regions featured at all.

Coming down this morning I was late for a meeting because the road from Clare down to Tarlee and on to Adelaide is a disgrace. How we do not lose more people on that road I will never know. It is not my electorate, but if you get stuck behind some slow vehicles you sit there. This morning it was a couple of grape harvesters and a truck and we sat there. People were taking crazy risks around those blind bends. The road needs urgent upgrading. There is a good public work for you, but, no, all they do is patch it up. Even a couple of passing lanes would be jolly handy.

There is no hope now for a new Barossa hospital because of Labor's economic mismanagement and wastage. There is no money to build a very much needed new facility despite the government's own business case recommending that a new facility be built. Country Health SA services in the Barossa region are currently operating from three different sites: the Angaston and Tanunda hospitals and the Nuriootpa site, which provides the administration support and community health services. Merging all three on one site would be far more efficient and save operational costs and inefficiencies.

However, there is no money for a new hospital in the Barossa but, in the past year or so, this government has found $186 million over three years for government spin doctors—enough to build 2½ new facilities in the Barossa. I cannot believe this, and no-one comes out and says anything about it. Members on the other side are going to lose their seats over this. I would say that six to 10 of them are going to lose their seats. All this austerity and you still are spending $186 million over three years on a spin team. You cannot justify that and nor can we. I can assure you that in government we will not be spending that sort of money. Even though I may not be here, I will be having plenty to say if they go anywhere near it.

If it is half as much as that I will be having a fair to bit to say. I warn these young members who are here: when you are in government, when you are on that side, you had better be cutting that down by two-thirds.

Mr van Holst Pellekaan interjecting:

Mr VENNING: Absolutely, because good governments do not need to be promoted like that. Your good works should settle the story. Also, you spent over $1 million on printer cartridges purchased by government departments at inflated prices in exchange for personal benefits. In addition, $70 million was spent on government advertising. Former premier Mike Rann's golden handshake was $200,000.

The Barossa region has been absolutely duped. The Barossa Valley generates more than its fair share of revenue for the state government, and what do we have to show for it? We have two aged hospitals well past their use-by dates. Tourism has been cut. We heard today that SA Tourism has had its budget pruned again. It is not surprising that our visitor numbers have fallen 10 per cent in the last five years, and we are certainly feeling this in the Barossa Valley.

I cannot understand why, when we have these cruise ships come to Adelaide—I think it was 12 or 13 of them this year—our numbers crash like that. These ships can drop off 3,000 to 4,000 people, yet they are not coming to the Barossa because they do not know how to get there. We have a train just waiting to get on the rails, but the government just has not got the courage or initiative to say to Mr John Geber, 'Well, you run your train. We'll cover your insurance costs, the rest is yours. It will cost you effectively nothing.' But, no—no help, no assistance, no encouragement, nothing. And what happens? The train is still there. I am lucky that Mr Geber has not sold it. It will end up as a crew van on a freight train, and that would be sad, indeed. We have the railway line running right past our best tourism attractions. We have the wine train ready to go, but, no, nothing at all. Not a sound. No encouragement whatsoever.

The government assertion that we are receiving a once-in-a-generation renewal of the state's infrastructure is simply not true. We are not fixing our failing water pipes or our ageing energy infrastructure and the planned electrification of our rail network is not proceeding. There are rusty SA Water pipelines across the state (and I have raised this in here before), particularly between Spalding and Burra, and burst pipelines in metropolitan Adelaide. Our sewerage structure everywhere is wearing out. Not enough money is being spent on replacing it. Suddenly it will all be packing up together and then where will we be? Imagine if the Morgan-Whyalla pipeline springs a leak all over the place, Madam Speaker, where would you be? Where would Whyalla be? It is its lifeline, absolutely.

If you drive along the road between, say, just to the east of Spalding, have a look at the pipeline. It is rusty. They tell me it is rusty on the inside as well. What has been done about it? Nothing. We have the flashest building here in Victoria Square, the palace, yet you cannot paint your pipelines. I cannot understand why that is. I am told the inside is cement. Well, I was told by a good source who works with them that they are rusting inside, so I will check that one out and I will stand corrected. I thank the local member for that because he would know.

I am very concerned about these rusty pipelines and the general rundown of our infrastructure. It should have been that when times were good we spent the money; that is when you should have renewed your sewerage here in Adelaide and stopped the leakage into the aquifer, but you did not. We still have this cast iron sewerage that leaks like a sieve. If the rusty pipes are not bad enough, the state's water quality program budget has been cut by $11 million since 2010-11. I cannot believe that this could be the case, as SA Water is forced to contribute more and more into state government coffers.

The electrification of the Gawler and Outer Harbor lines has been scrapped. The wastage of this government continues. The concrete poles that form part of the infrastructure needed for the electrification have already been installed on the Gawler line and they will now stand as a monument to this government's mismanagement. At least you could probably hang your election posters on them. I do not think you would even have the courage to do that. It is more expense that taxpayers will have to wear for infrastructure that is not being used.

If it is not bad enough that 66 electric trains have been ordered by the government, too many just for the Seaford line, what will happen with the others? Will they be discounted off? Just as we bought those trams at a discount, will we be doing the same with those trains? More wastage! On top of that, once the Seaford line electrification is complete, when the electric rail cars need servicing, they will have to be towed to the depot located at Dry Creek. You have to be kidding. Surely, we will have these beautiful modern electrified trains and then we will have to tow them all the way up to the north of Adelaide to have them serviced. Tell me this is a joke. I cannot believe that could be the case.

We are going to be the laughing stock. You spend the money on beautiful rolling stock and then you have the ignominy of having to tow it out there with an old diesel locomotive for servicing. It is ridiculous. I cannot believe that when the government makes these decisions, when you decide you are going to cut these projects, you have the electrification to the south, the electrification to the north, and also the duplication of the freeway to the south, I would have thought it would be fair and equitable and reasonable to say to the southern people, 'Okay. You will get your freeway, the two lanes both ways, and we will give the electrification to the north.' That would have been fair. But no, guess what? There is only one seat for the Labor Party in the north at Gawler and they are going to sacrifice that because he is not a mate of theirs, but there are four down in the south and they are all vital seats, so guess what? They get both and the north gets nothing.

I would have thought that Gawler was a fantastic opportunity to install one of the best park-and-ride schemes in Australia, with all the Barossa, all the Mid North, all the Clare region, all of Port Pirie and all those from the northern cities who could have come down in their car, parked at Gawler where there is room, and get on the train and come into the city on the beautiful electric railway, into the railway station, no car parking and no congestion on the roads. Common sense—but, no, we do not seem to take a single trick, do we?

The Governor's speech at the opening of the session stated that one of the government's priorities would be a clean, green food industry, yet the budget continues to cut funds to agriculture. The Treasurer did not even mention the word aquaculture in his budget speech. As the member for Hammond said very well a few moments ago, it is an absolute disgrace that you are cutting a major department like agriculture down to the bone. Every budget you have had, every one of them, you have cut the agriculture budget, and here we go, you are doing it again. There is not much left of it. As the member for Hammond said, what do you think the morale is like of those people who work in that department? There is nothing left of it.

It was a very proud department in the past with a huge record. I have to say that in all of our success, and mine included, the department of agriculture has been a large part of that with the research they have done over the years where they have taught us to be better farmers, to grow the best food in the world, and now what are you doing? You are closing it down. You are going to hand it over to the overseas multinationals who will screw us, the farmers, and screw you, the people of South Australia, because that is what they do in business. Their research will always be commercially based—dollar driven for them, not farmers or consumers. I am very concerned about that.

In this budget $24.2 million has been cut from agriculture, despite the sector bringing in record returns for the state over the past two years. On top of the 400 jobs already slashed from primary industries, another 98 will go. SARDI is to lose $1 million in funds research and development activities. I wonder what the Hon. Lynn Arnold, who set up SARDI in the first place, thinks about that. He was a great leader. I wonder what he thinks about that.

The total operating expenditure for Primary Industries and Regions has decreased by $50 million. Biosecurity expenditure is reduced by $8.7 million, with the winding up of the Branched Broomrape Eradication Program contributing to $4.8 million. That is a disgrace. All that money will now be wasted. Fees, fines and penalties are to increase by $1 million. It beggars belief that this government can list the food industry as a priority and then cut the agricultural budget staffing levels to the bone. What this government has done to the economy of this state is a disgrace, and we will all go down in history, as I said earlier, when South Australia has lost its way.

If I ran my own affairs like this, I would consider putting the business up for sale. It would be just like having seven or eight bumper years on the farm and wasting the money on sports cars, speedboats, extended holidays, aeroplanes, you name it—

Mr van Holst Pellekaan: Tractors, trucks.

Mr VENNING: Tractors, whatever—but tractors are useful and essential. The crunch comes when it stops and there are no financial reserves, no grain or hay reserves, so I start by selling off the back paddock. In other words, you are selling off your capacity to earn. We have done that here with the forests and we have done that with SA Lotteries. My banker would warn me. My overdraft rates would increase and I would eventually have to go bankrupt and sell the farm. That is where we are. We have learned all these rudiments ourselves as we have grown up in this place. What principles do we see here? I do not know what we are going to do, but we have another 18 months of this government. See if you can get out of this, because we will be here to help you if you can.

Mr VAN HOLST PELLEKAAN (Stuart) (18:11): I rise to make my comments about the budget on behalf of the people of Stuart. I will start by saying that there will always be a different focus on different priorities in this house, particularly between the Liberal and Labor parties. Independents have their say as well. We can argue about the priorities, and we probably always will have a different view, but what we do not have any opportunity to argue about is the mismanagement of the state's finances.

Liberal or Labor governments should always try to manage finances to the very best of their ability. They should manage taxpayers' money to the very best of their ability and then, once that is done, use the money in the way they see fit. However, nobody can argue that that is not happening at the moment. We see in the current budget that the current estimates period will conclude with a $13 billion debt. When you add that to the government's unfunded liabilities, it is in excess of $20 billion. So this current government has got the taxpayers of South Australia—every man, woman and child—in debt for in excess of $20 billion. That is the official debt, plus every other cent that we are actually committed to pay or repay. That is outrageous.

Probably the most alarming component of the whole process for me is the fact that, for the last several years, both the current and the previous treasurers have forecast deficits for the next two or three years and then surpluses for a year or two after that, but we never, ever get to the surpluses. Another year rolls on and there will be deficit for another two or three years, but promised surpluses are a year or two down the track. They just never, ever eventuate, and that is the greatest concern.

If we had enormous debt—as sometimes families, businesses and organisations have to go into—and we had with that a good plan, a reliable plan, a track record of repaying debt, a track record of meeting commitments, a track record of using that debt efficiently and for good purposes, I could live with it. However, the fact is that we are never, ever going to repay that debt or even make a dent in it under the current government. The Auditor-General pointed that out a couple of years ago, as the Leader of the Opposition made very clear this morning.

A couple of years ago the Auditor-General said, 'You have to cut your spending; you're going down the tubes,' but the government has not listened. Instead, what we get is the non-stop blaming of international conditions. International conditions do not make you overspend. International conditions make times tough, they make some income predictions not turn out the way you would like, but they do not make you overspend. You cannot blame international conditions when the reality is that, right now, Australia's national growth rate is seven times larger than South Australia's state growth rate. That is because of the state government, not because of international conditions.

I now turn to waste and mismanagement. I would like to talk briefly about the exorbitant increase in the Public Service. Before I do so, I would like to say very clearly that we need a good Public Service. I am not opposed to the Public Service, I am not opposed to public servants and I am not into bashing them for the sake of it. We need a good, strong, efficient, productive Public Service but we do not need a bloated, oversized, overweight and inefficient Public Service which is what we have at the moment.

There has been an increase of 20,000 jobs in the Public Service since this government came in in 2002—20,000 extra public servants on the taxpayers' payroll in the last 10 years. Every year, on average, another 2,000 jobs, while, at the same time, the government says it is the international conditions that have been causing us all this grief. We have 360 public servants who do not even have a job. They get paid every day, every month and every year but they do not even have a job: 360 people costing $27 million per year just to pay them but they do not have a job. It is inconceivable and unsustainable and the government cannot blame anybody else for the fact that that is the case.

Public Service conditions must be more closely aligned with what is available to the general public in the private sector. We do not need to pay people to do nothing. We do not need to pay people with exorbitant conditions and wages in excess of what the private sector would offer the average man or woman on the street. We need a good Public Service with good people getting paid fairly and doing a good job, not the sort of waste that we have in place at the moment.

Private enterprise is where real jobs growth can and should be created. In our state, small and medium-sized businesses make up most of that. Right now, youth unemployment in South Australia is at a staggering 32 per cent. It was 32.6 per cent for the month of April and it is even higher in regional South Australia. That is a disgrace, an absolute disgrace. It is not creating thousands and thousands more Public Service jobs that is going to fix that—they are not hiring young people; they are hiring older people. Youth unemployment will be fixed by supporting private enterprise and by allowing the private sector to create jobs. The only way they can create jobs is by being successful.

Why I am so supportive of the private sector and why I am so supportive of small business is that small business creates jobs. Successful businesses create secure employment and that is at the heart of any economy. What we have, though, is the government increasing taxes and charges all the time, which is a disincentive, and killing small business with land tax, stamp duty, electricity and water.

Madam Speaker, I would like to read an email from a constituent of yours. You may well have received it; it was sent to me last week by Robert Coro of Coober Pedy. An excerpt about electricity prices says:

When asked by District Council of Coober Pedy, Energy SA opined that the 18% rise is only attributable to low volume consumers.

Please open the attachment and you will see that the town's [Coober Pedy's] biggest supermarket has had their power increase from $122k in 10-11 year, to $172k (est) 11-12 year, to $230k (est) for 2012-13.

For the same power consumption a business in Adelaide would pay $103k.

So our local supermarket who supplies fresh food, meat and vegetables has had a 88% or $108k power price hike in 2 years. This Coober Pedy business pays 123% above Adelaide for the same power consumption.

The Coober Pedy Water Desal plant will also have a 33% increase in power charges which means there will be another increase in price of water from $5.75/KL (2010-11) to $6.27/KL (2011-12) to $6.55/KL (2012-13).

The most expensive water in South Australia.

I respect what Mr Coro has sent me and I appreciate the information but clearly he is not aware of the towns on the Barrier Highway, in the electorate of Stuart, where you have to pay $11 a kilolitre for water and that is water that you cannot even drink. You cannot even drink it and you pay $11 a kilolitre for it! That is disgraceful.

I turn to SA Water for a moment. We all know that we are in the driest state in the driest continent and water is a scarce resource. We understand that. We would expect water to be a relatively expensive commodity in our state. That is the reality. But what we have at the moment is SA Water taking advantage of its monopoly position, making a $258 million profit last financial year. I understand it is a scarce resource that will be expensive, but what on earth are we doing jacking up prices outrageously to homes, businesses, factories, everybody who pays for water from SA Water, so that it can make a $258 million profit?

Mr Griffiths: The money goes to Treasury, that's why.

Mr VAN HOLST PELLEKAAN: It's a tax. Exactly; it's a tax. It is unfair. It is a tax; $258 million is taking advantage of a monopoly position. The government is going to sell the South-East forest rotations. It is going to sell the Lotteries. It is going to sell Fleet SA, we have just discovered, and I would not be at all surprised if down the track they get themselves into the situation where they have to sell SA Water too. It is quite possible that we are all paying outrageous water prices to jack up the profitability of SA Water so that the government can then just sell it at a profit in order to keep spending money recklessly.

As well as talking about selling assets—and we all know you only sell good, stable, profit-making assets when you have your back against the wall, not because of the international conditions but because of your own overspending—I move on to shared services. I have spoken here many times about shared services and I say every time that I understand we need efficiency, we need rationalisation, we need our government departments to be as lean and mean as they possibly can be, because at the end of the day we will all pay for it otherwise.

I understand the fact that it may well be good to amalgamate human resources, to amalgamate purchasing, and to amalgamate payroll and other services that government departments provide, but they do not need to be amalgamated in Adelaide. They do not need to be centralised in Adelaide. Exactly the same technology that allows all those services to come in from the regions, to sack people in regional South Australia and bring the jobs to Adelaide, could allow those same jobs to be spread around.

Port Lincoln could do human resources for the whole state. Berri or Renmark could do procurement for the whole state. Mount Gambier could do IT for the whole state. Exactly the same technology, exactly the same efficiency gains, could actually support regional South Australia rather than trashing it and taking the jobs out.

I understand that this program has actually been so ineffective, has been so wasteful and so destructive, that the Treasury department has opted out of participating in the Shared Services department, which I believe it started. That tells you how well this program is going; it is just another example of government waste and mismanagement.

It is no wonder we lost the AAA credit rating. Before I hear any calls from the other side about the AAA credit rating, let me just say that the government needs to make up its mind about whether it thinks it is important or not. When it had one, it was something that could not ever be lost, could not ever be wasted. The fact that it got it back was the saviour of the state. Now that the government has lost it, it is not that important anymore. The government needs to decide: is this important or is it not important?

Today we had Treasurer Snelling telling us that he disagreed with former treasurer Foley. Former treasurer Foley thought it was a great thing, and I am sure that Treasurer Snelling voted with him. I am sure that, when Foley was the treasurer, Treasurer Snelling would have been sitting there nodding and cheering and saying, 'Yes, yes, that's fantastic.' Now that he has lost it, it is not so important. Treasurer Snelling, I would like you to make up your mind, please. Come and tell us, is the AAA credit rating important or not important? It will be interesting to see when a Liberal government is reinstated and we win it back whether he thinks it is important then or not.

As I said, the government's role is to fill the gap where the private sector does not provide: to provide services that the private sector does not provide, important jobs on behalf of all taxpayers and all South Australians; to provide a health service, which is very important, as the private sector will not provide the complete health service that we all deserve; to provide really good quality public education; to provide police and law and order, also very important.

I was amazed today to hear the Minister for Police tell us—in a statement or in an answer to a question, I forget which—what a wonderful job the government is doing, in that crime rates are falling everywhere. It is interesting: crime rates are falling if you exclude murders. The shadow minister for police, the member for Morphett, makes it very clear in information he has provided that the number of murders in South Australia has significantly increased over the last year, according to ABS statistics released yesterday—so that would have been about a week ago.

In 2011 South Australia had the highest number of attempted murders per capita in the nation and the second highest number of kidnapping and abduction cases per capita in the nation. I tell you what: there is something to look into there. It is not all squeaky clean, the way the Minister for Police would have us believe. Recreation and sport is another very important area of service provision, for the government to provide facilities for the people of our state to use that the private sector would not be able to provide on its own.

I was told just the other day that the Marion aquatic centre—a wonderful pool, a wonderful piece of infrastructure, but who knows what it will cost to run every year, because the government will not provide that information—did not have a business case done on it before the money was spent. I have written to the minister asking for that, very clearly saying, 'If you have one please hand it over; if you don't please explain to me why that was not the case.' I look forward to the minister coming back and clarifying that, but I was told very clearly, late last week, by a person I believe would know, that no business case was done for that extremely expensive project.

When it comes to providing all these services, why is it that the regions continually miss out? Why is it that when the government needs to save money it always rushes straight to regional South Australia to find the savings? Why is it that when there are opportunities for growth or expansion they are always in Adelaide and not regional South Australia? We miss out both ways, and that is just not fair. That is not governing for the whole state.

I turn now to regional development funding. There are seven Regional Development Australia offices, or organisations, based in regional South Australia. They are a very good model, proffered by the federal Labor government—and good on them for doing that. It is a three-tiered model where local, state and federal governments all contribute in core funding so that, regardless of who is in government—Liberal, Labor, state, federal; it does not matter—all three tiers of government contribute funding so that the RDAs can do good work in regional South Australia.

But guess what? The state Labor government said it did not want to play any more; the state Labor government has withdrawn its core funding. I cannot understand how any good-spirited person in cabinet could possibly have supported that decision, a Labor government decision to provide this three-tiered model, and as soon as it is put in place say, 'Oh, by the way, we are actually going to pull out of that model; we don't want to pay a share.' It is disgraceful.

Just last week we had the Minister for Regional Development trumpeting a new $3 million program supporting regional development. But guess what? That $3 million has only been taken away from another existing, very good regional development program. You know what? That is the government's prerogative; if the government says, 'We've got $3 million in regional development being spent one way, and we have decided to spend it in a different way in regional development,' it is the government's prerogative to make those decisions.

The crime here is that we now have $7.1 million of government funding going towards regional development. The minister, while spruiking the $3 million program, sort of quietly said, 'Oh, by the way, it replaces an existing $3 million,' but he completely forgot to say that it would not replace any of the $4.1 million that currently exists for core funding for RDAs. It is a double whammy. Not only are we going to lose $4.1 million out of regional development, but there will now no longer be any core funding going to regional development from the state government.

Core funding is ongoing, guaranteed funding commitments for years into the future so that you can plan your work. It is very straightforward. It is not possible to plan long-term projects if you do not know whether you will have the staff to undertake them. How would you like to hire good people to stay in a region and work in your RDA, or to come to a region and work in your RDA, when you cannot guarantee their wage for more than a year? No good staff, no good programs, no good results, and then, guess what? If you do not get good results, how do you get your next tranche of funding to perpetuate the work you are doing?

Just like urban planning, these development programs take a long time—some of them are six-month projects, some of them are six-year projects—to really get the benefits. What we have here is another example of the government trying to wear down regional South Australia with stealth and attrition. It is no different from the country health plan from a couple of years ago, which we have not forgotten and will not allow to come back. Effectively, the government is saying, 'We're not changing anything; we will just slowly wear you down, water you down, not give you any funding and suffocate you slowly until you ask to be put out of your misery.' That is what the government is trying to do to regional South Australia through these RDAs, and I think it is disgraceful.

There is no support for Aboriginal affairs in the budget. There is some money for electricity production; I think that is terrific, but it is not going to change. We need some self-help capacity building programs. There are still people in the Aboriginal lands living in poverty, and that is unacceptable.

Earlier today, I spoke about the Cadell ferry—disgraceful. There is $40 million available for the footbridge over the River Torrens so that people can walk to and from the football and the pubs over the of the river, but they cannot afford $400,000 for people to get across the River Murray at Cadell; unfortunately, that will hurt that town like you would not believe. We have to do everything we can to replace that decision.

Mr BROCK (Frome) (18:32): I also rise to speak on this bill. I would like to mention some areas in my electorate of Frome that are struggling with the ever-increasing costs that are facing the rural areas of regional South Australia. Whilst I and other members of this house understand that there has been a vast reduction in the GST moneys received by this state due to the uncertainty not only in South Australia but across the world, it is an issue we all need to face.

I would also like to break my comments down to cover a couple of areas that affect not only the electorate of Frome but all of regional South Australia. In terms of transport and infrastructure, the road systems across Frome require a vast amount of work to be carried out to bring them back to a suitable level. The member for Schubert discussed earlier the road from Clare to Tarlee. We understand that it is a unique road; it is not very wide and it is through a winding area. However, the minister knows, as would other members here, that those sorts of roads need to be improved as much as possible to reduce frustration and, in that regard, reduce the opportunities for a road accident.

Whilst I am very grateful that moneys have been allocated to the redesign and completion of the Clare and Spalding road intersection, and also the reconstruction of High Street in Bute, there are still many roads that have reached the end of their life. This did not just happen in the last year: this is the result of many years of non-allocation of moneys for the maintenance of these roads by consecutive governments. This has been going on for many years. As I said earlier, a road does not deteriorate in just five minutes.

These roads have had a lot of extra traffic in the last couple of years, including grain vehicles. As a result of the great harvest, and also the fact that farmers were not receiving what they considered the correct classification for their grain, farmers chased different sites to obtain a more realistic result in their grain classification which would result in more money for the grain industry. The savings would go towards better access for our products and also reduce the opportunity for accidents.

Regarding education, whilst there has been no mention of amalgamations of schools in my electorate, I will fight very strongly to ensure that that does not happen unless it is with the approval of the students and parents. We must continue to ensure that we have first-class schools to teach our future generations and that there are adequate facilities and resources so that youth who require special education receive it.

It has been mentioned in many avenues that there are sufficient funds to provide these services for these people with special learning difficulties. It is not the funds that are the cause of not being able to provide these services for the children but it is the actual people on the ground, and that is an issue we all need to face—being able to get the people out there in the regional areas, even though we may allocate money in the budgets.

Not all children are the same. There are many children out there with disabilities that require that extra attention to be able to achieve the required outcomes in their lives. There is a need for students who suffer from Down syndrome and autism, plus other illnesses, and there are many students out there who also may suffer from deafness. Again, we hear that there is so much funding in the system but, again, it is difficult to actually carry out the service for the lack of the actual people on the ground. These youths with learning difficulties deserve to have the same actual attention to their progress as those who do not have these learning difficulties. We must ensure that we remunerate teachers in this state to ensure that we do not lose them to the Eastern States or to another employment.

Regional school buses have been reduced and, in some cases, larger buses have been replaced with smaller buses. This affects the ability of rural students to get to their relevant school and, although there were places on the buses for non-public students to get on the same community bus as the public students, these non-public students were not given access. We all pay our rates: we all pay our taxes. The Snowtown Area School, when the bus was reduced in size, elected to finance a bus themselves to ensure they did not lose any more students. The savings from this would result in our youth getting the opportunity to achieve better results and to obtain employment opportunities, again resulting in more productivity and social service savings.

Regarding health, it is great to see, finally, the construction of the GP Plus facility which will be built at Port Pirie Regional Health Service. This facility has been in the budget for some years and, finally, tenders have gone out for the construction. I hear from some on this side of the house that this facility may be deferred until the next budget. I would state very clearly that this facility has been on the promise list for far too long and now is the time to build the facility for the people of Port Pirie and also the surrounding areas.

I will mention another concern of mine, and the Minister for Health is very aware of this. He has had me in his office on many occasions stating that the PAT scheme is not adequately compensating patients from regional South Australia who need to travel outside their areas to receive the required specialised services. The people in the health system may, in actual fact, see these people at the specialists in Adelaide and many think it is okay, but let me advise the members here today that UnitingCare Wesley Country SA has already allocated in excess of $46,000 in micro-loans to people in my region, and mainly in Port Pirie, to allow them to receive dental and medical services.

This may not be evident to those within the health system but we in the actual front lines do know and understand. My concerns are that there are many occasions on which the patient cannot afford to travel to see the required specialist for their illness and this acute illness could become chronic and require hospitalisation. The question is then: where would the saving be—prevention or hospitalisation?

Another area of concern is people who have an illness requiring a constant temperature to maintain their comfort. The member for Bragg and a member on the other side whom I cannot think of at the moment were instrumental in talking to a group of people and, to the credit of those people and the government, there are concessions now in place. These concessions are for those who qualify. However, with the ever-increasing power costs, they are now struggling to pay their power bills and, at times, are turning their air conditioners off. I would like to see these concessions increased and indexed.

Emergency services are very important to the people of regional South Australia, for without the volunteers there would be no services for firefighting, accidents and other areas. We must not only provide the required protective equipment and firefighting units, but we must also make it attractive to volunteers and ensure that we have sufficient numbers to prevent any burnout of those who may be left carrying out these voluntary services.

We must also ensure that we provide training and equipment to our paid emergency services personnel and not downgrade the services that are already in operation. We should, in actual fact, be increasing these services to allow for the ever-increasing opportunities for people to reside in regional areas. The savings will be in the area of not having to provide full-time personnel to cover these areas that are currently operated or undertaken by dedicated volunteers. Again, let me just state that volunteers are very appreciated in country areas. They do it as part of their life, and it is something that we should all be very thankful for.

Regarding water, this commodity is something that we may all take for granted at times and we must ensure that we have sufficient not only for human consumption but also to be able to achieve employment opportunities, especially in regional areas. Another area of concern to me—and I have spoken to the minister on numerous occasions—is the pricing of water to the grape growers in the Clare and Gilbert Valleys area. These grape growers are facing ever-increasing costs for their water and are competing with other wine regions—the Barossa Valley and Langhorne Creek—which have the ability to bulk-purchase water.

The Clare and Gilbert Valleys wine grape growers association paid in excess of $1 million to have the system put in place. However, they do not have the ability to bulk-purchase water. I have had discussions with the minister on these matters and these discussions will continue to ascertain and endeavour to get a better result for the growers in the Clare and Gilbert Valleys.

We must ensure that the price of water is adequate to ensure that infrastructure is maintained and improved. I heard the member for Stuart say that SA Water made a $286 million profit, and we should put some of that profit back into ensuring that infrastructure is maintained. However, we must also ensure that industries such as viticulture are maintained and viable to compete with other wine regions that may have alternative sources of water. A reliable and sufficient supply of water would result in more employment opportunities in the regions.

Police and justice: having sufficient police in the regions is something that must be maintained and improved not only to ensure the wellbeing and safety of the current residents but also to be able to attract future residents to regional areas. I also note that there are no funds in the budget this year for a resident magistrate in Port Pirie. This is an area that I have been promoting with the minister and his department. I will be campaigning strongly for an allocation in the next budget.

Having a resident magistrate in the city would eliminate the necessity for judges visiting our region on the circuit and would also assist in expediting the hearing of cases, especially with child support and the like. Savings would result from quicker and more efficient outcomes and people being able to get a result instead of being frustrated, which may result in more drastic outcomes or actions by those people concerned. Let me say that there are many issues, especially with child access and such things, that are very frustrating for our community. Having to wait for the same magistrate to come on the circuit is very frustrating, and some of those people have been near suicidal.

We have heard comments from many today regarding the budget expenditure and potential income. We all understand the ever-increasing challenges with the Australian and the world economy. However, when we expend moneys to ensure our growth with our mineral resources and grain, we should be able to achieve the required outcomes. We need to expend our budgets on infrastructure in regional South Australia. We must also ensure funding for regional development. The member for Stuart has indicated that he is disappointed—and I am disappointed—that there is no guaranteed funding past June 2013.

Regional Development Australia has key people out there in the regions. They know the areas and they understand what we need. We must, even if it is with federal government funding, ensure that there is guaranteed funding for them so they have a guaranteed future and know where they are going in the next two or three years. State governments need to have a blueprint not only for Adelaide—we hear this quite often—but, more importantly, a blueprint for regional infrastructure plans in regional South Australia. Any alternative government needs to place on record its blueprint, its plan for the future of this state and, in particular, regional South Australia.

Mr MARSHALL (Norwood) (18:45): I rise to speak on the 2012-13 budget and the forward estimates which have been presented therein. May I say at the start that this is a particularly innovative and creative budget. In fact, if this was a year 12 SACE project it would get 10 out of 10 for presentation. Never before have we seen the budget presented in such a slick, glossy, heavy and beautiful stock. There are some fantastic innovations in this document.

For the first time we see colour presentation. Of course, treasurer Foley just had his budgets always done in his favourite colours, black and white. I was wondering whether they should be done in red and blue in the Norwood colours, but he always did them in black and white. However, that is not good enough for this Treasurer, that is not good enough for this Premier. They have gone all out with a very slick presentation with glossy photographs on every page.

We have photographs of happy families. We have a message not from the Treasurer, the Hon. Jack Snelling, member for Playford, we have a message from Jack. That would have been workshopped by the media team on exactly and precisely what the readers needed to see. We have photographs of happy families with the great bold headlines 'Helping the Family Budget'. Of course, we have the obligatory shot of our mounted policeman surveying the beat and keeping law and order.

We have photographs of our State Emergency Service workers and then, on the final page, we have a fantastic photograph of our Premier, the Hon. Jay Weatherill, surveying the city, looking out across it in a Colonel Light-esque manner, with a vision (which was obviously very staged and workshopped) for South Australia. Unfortunately, this is not a year 12 SACE project and, despite the impressive presentation, the substance of this budget is found extremely wanting.

This budget is nothing more than an absolute catalogue of complete and utter economic mismanagement by this government over a 10-year period. It is a budget which very clearly demonstrates that the government has completely lost control of its budget. In its simplest form, we see expenditure significantly larger now than income. We are seeing this now not as just a once-off but becoming a pattern.

This year's deficit is $867 million. That is $867 million that we have spent more than the money which is coming into the budget. You can understand that, from time to time, given the cyclical nature of the economy, you could have a situation where income does fall below expenditure. However, I put it to you that this is not just a once-off; this is not just a cyclical adjustment; this is now something which is happening each and every year. In fact, this government has spent more money than it has accumulated in six out of seven years. That is something which is becoming undeniably structural.

This is a budget where the Treasurer has been at pains to point out that we are the victims of the global financial crisis. He has painted a picture that we in South Australia are the victims. We have had this once-in-a-lifetime write down of our income which is coming into the state. Of course he fails to highlight the fact that Victoria, faced with the same global financial crisis—the same underlying manufacturing base that we have here in South Australia—actually promised to its people that it would produce a surplus. Indeed, when the budget came around, that is precisely what it did.

A good Liberal government in Victoria, facing a global financial crisis and facing the write-down of their GST revenue, went out and actually delivered a surplus in its very first year. In fact, today we have the New South Wales government bringing down its budget. What did it do in its budget? It actually brought down a smaller deficit than we were able to manage here in South Australia. So, a state which is many, many, many times larger than our state has been able to post a much smaller deficit than our Treasurer has been able to place here.

There are many reasons why income is falling. One of the very obvious reasons for this is downturn in economic activity. So, what is the government's response to the downturn in economic activity? The government's response has been to actually increase the handbrake on the economy. We have a government which acknowledges that the revenue is falling because economic activity is falling, and GST revenues are therefore down.

We know that stamp duties are down, we know that tax collection, in terms of payroll tax and land tax, are all down because of this slowdown in the economy. The genius Treasurer has decided that the very best course of action that he can take is to further put a handbrake on that economic activity.

Let us have a look at some of the areas in which this government has really excelled itself. Let us have a look at small business. Now, a lot of people come into this parliament and they talk about the importance of the small business sector. In fact, we have had speech after speech after speech where the government has said unequivocally that this is the backbone of the South Australian economy. It talks about very large numbers, like 135,000 small businesses in South Australia and how we need to support them.

Let us take a look at the budget, which was only released in the past few days. What has the government done? Well, it has slashed expenditure and support for the small business sector. In fact, over the last two years, there has been a 53 per cent decrease in expenditure in this important area. At the same time that they are talking about the importance of the small business sector, they are taking away support for small businesses.

One of the centre points of the cost-saving initiative of this budget was to actually take away the payroll tax concession to businesses employing trainees and apprentices: what an outrage! So, at the time it is wanting to increase economic activity to drive up its income, it is putting the handbrake on South Australia.

Let us have a look at some of the programs that have been cut recently. We know that the government has taken away all of the funding for the BECs, we know it has taken away the funding for the Youth Entrepreneurs Scheme, we know that the Small Business Emergency Helpline has gone, we know that Small Business Month has been cancelled and we know that the SME Investment Development Program has been completely and utterly cut.

If we actually look at the size of the budget for this current financial year, it is $1.98 million. If we divide that by 135,000 small businesses, that amounts to $14.67 expenditure for each and every one of the small businesses in South Australia. I put it to you, Madam Speaker, that that is not a figure which really indicates strong support for the strong business sector: $14.67 is what this government is allocating per small business in South Australia. This is a government which does not understand the importance of this sector. This is a government which has turned its back on this sector.

Let us take a look at manufacturing, because this is another area where this government's media department—its spin department—has absolutely and unequivocally excelled. It has basically put out press release after press release in the last three months; it must have done some polling which told it that manufacturing was all of a sudden the flavour of the month. What it has told us is that it has brought out a new green paper on the future of manufacturing in South Australia, it has established a new Advanced Manufacturing Council for South Australia and it has established a ministerial task force to specifically look at this area.

We know that the Advanced Manufacturing Council is just a rename of the manufacturing consultative committee. We know that the work of Göran Roos on the green paper was actually funded by industry itself. Ten South Australian companies put in $10,000 each; $100,000 was put in to bring Göran Roos to Adelaide for him to do his work to come up with a manufacturing green paper. This was not something that was done in government, no siree. Of course, the hilarious part is this manufacturing ministerial task force with four members, none of whom had ever spent a day in the manufacturing sector.

But to add insult to injury to the manufacturing sector in South Australia, the government, in the lead-up to the budget, announced that it would be spending $8 million to support manufacturing in South Australia. Let's take a slightly closer look at that. It turns out that it was $8 million over a four-year period, so it was $2 million a year. I took the opportunity to take a look at how much the government was spending 25 years ago in manufacturing and, guess what? We were spending more on the manufacturing sector 25 years ago than the government is spending going forward in the budget.

In 1987, it was the Bannon Labor government that set up the South Australian Centre for Manufacturing. It understood the importance of the manufacturing sector, and it invested in what became the leading manufacturing transformation centre in the whole of the country. It was based down on the Woodville site of Holden's. It basically worked with a number of leading organisations throughout the world, predominately in Japan and Germany, and it put programs in place to help manufacturing companies which were struggling with this transformative environment where we had reduced our tariff protections and we had opened up our borders. We were helping companies address the challenges of operating in a global environment—and, let me tell you, it was world class.

When the Liberal government came to power in 1993, the Liberal Party continued to support this excellent initiative and, under the stewardship of John Olsen, that grew to become the principal manufacturing institute in Australia. In fact, when I met with Göran Roos recently on his trip to South Australia, I made the point to him about the South Australian Centre of Manufacturing, and he said, 'Do you know, I was recently up in Queensland, at the Queensland Manufacturing Institute, and they were still talking about how advanced the South Australian Centre for Manufacturing was. It is a huge problem for the government, this area of manufacturing. The government has no credibility. Its $2 million a year does not even cut it with expenditure that this government was putting into manufacturing 25 years ago.

Let's take a look at trade. This is another area where this government has performed extraordinarily poorly. If we look at the March quarter statistics in terms of exports from South Australia, it produces a very, very sad picture for South Australia. The March quarter exports this year versus the March quarter last year are down 10 per cent. We have had the minister and the Premier coming in here, question time after question time, with Dorothy Dixers. They cherrypick one single solitary statistic out of the export data, and they do not want to actually look at the—I seek leave to continue my remarks.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.

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