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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, Second Session (52-2)
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Question Time

MANUFACTURING SECTOR

Mr MARSHALL (Norwood—Leader of the Opposition) (14:08): My question is to the Premier. Can the Premier advise the house how many manufacturing jobs have been lost in South Australia since the 2010 state election?

The Hon. J.W. WEATHERILL (Cheltenham—Premier, Treasurer, Minister for State Development, Minister for the Public Sector, Minister for the Arts) (14:08): No, cannot; I do not have that number with me. What I can say is that we are taking steps to meet the challenges that the global economy presents to us. We know that a high Australian dollar and relatively low productivity in our manufacturing sector is the thing which is threatening the future prosperity of those manufacturing businesses. That is why we are taking the steps that we are taking to invest in our manufacturing sector. It is still a 73,000 person-strong manufacturing sector in South Australia. It still has 10 per cent of our state's economy.

One of the reasons why specific statistics about this matter are difficult to provide is that the manufacturing sector has changed its character over recent decades. Instead of it being confined to just the manufacturing businesses themselves, many of those businesses are broken up now into ICT firms, into design firms; there is much more outsourcing of the particular arrangements for those firms than there ever was. This is—

Ms CHAPMAN: Point of order.

The SPEAKER: The deputy leader.

Ms CHAPMAN: The Premier announced in his opening remarks—

The SPEAKER: What is the point of order?

Ms CHAPMAN: —the answer to the question. He is now going on to an entirely different—and irrelevant to the question—

The SPEAKER: No—

Ms CHAPMAN: —which was how many jobs have been lost.

The SPEAKER: The member for Bragg will be seated. I warn the member for Bragg for the first time. That is a point of order that is not really a point of order. It is a form of obstructing the house. The member for Bragg did not cite any standing order as I heard her, and the Premier is offering reasons that such statistics are not kept, which seems to me to be germane to the substance of the question. Premier.

The Hon. J.W. WEATHERILL: Thank you, Mr Speaker. What I was seeking to do was to explain the changing nature of manufacturing and how many of the jobs that formally would have been contained within a manufacturing business itself—their logistics, their ICT, their design work, a number of those things—are now in separate categories and are described separately in employment categories that are published by the Australian Bureau of Statistics. So I do not think you can get a very fair analysis about the total effect of manufacturing and employment in South Australia by simply looking at the statistics concerning manufacturing and employment, because of the changing nature of the manufacturing workforce.

What we know is that we are taking steps to grow that employment and to sustain that employment. Down at Techport today we were celebrating the fact that we have a 2,200 strong production workforce down there—part of a 27,000 strong workforce in the defence sector. Just to explain to those members how this has grown, back in 2007 I think, all that was down there at Techport was basically sand and brown snakes. Now what we are seeing is an extraordinary, thriving defence sector which is growing advanced manufacturing jobs, which are ensuring that many families have a future for themselves and their children, and this is—

Members interjecting:

Mr Marshall: That's what he said, 'snakes'!

The Hon. J.W. WEATHERILL: That is precisely what the manager said down there a few hours ago, so take it up with him.

The Hon. A. Koutsantonis: Owning Ethelton and living in it are two different things.

The SPEAKER: I call the Minister for Transport to order. The member for Little Para.

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