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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, Second Session (52-2)
2013-05-02 Daily Xml
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HISTORY FESTIVAL

Mrs GERAGHTY (Torrens) (17:14): The month of May in South Australia is History Month, so I thought I would recognise this event by picking out a time in the past to examine what was going on in the house. I chose 1903, and it seems appropriate because the premier of the day was John Greeley Jenkins, who was one of the members for Torrens, and he also served as a whip. He was not, however, a member of the Labor Party, but I guess no-one is perfect.

Under the multimember electoral system of the day, Torrens had five members: two from the Labor Party, two from the Conservative Australia National League, and Jenkins, who was an Independent (Liberal). The seat of Torrens did not quite look like it does today. I do not know about having rival members in the same seat, though I know they do in some states, but if you are sharing out the workload it could be interesting and challenging.

Looking at the house debates of 110 years ago, I was struck as much by the continuities over time as the differences over time. These are some of the issues that premier Jenkins touched on during his Address in Reply in July 1903: how to benefit from the natural resources of the Northern Territory, which at that time South Australia still controlled; building railways, including a rail link to Darwin; securing South Australia's share of the River Murray; and accommodation in Parliament House, which I think is quite appropriate for us today.

The comments on the River Murray were particularly enlightening and something we can all relate to. As we know, the states of New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia have a long history of jostling over the River Murray. Until 1903, the Eastern States took the stance that they alone controlled the upper river. Jenkins noted in his speech that the former premier of New South Wales, Henry Parkes, would not concede 'one iota that South Australia had any rights whatever as far as the Murray water was concerned.' However, in 1902, during the long drought from the mid 1890s to 1903, an interstate royal commission inquired into the distribution of the Murray's waters and the equity of its distribution between the states.

The commission recommended some restrictions on the amount of water extracted by the Eastern States that would allow specified amounts to flow to South Australia. These recommendations were considered at a premiers' conference in 1903, and premier Jenkins reported to the parliament on a small concession South Australia had wrung from the Eastern States at the conference. South Australia, he said, had 'obtained admissions as to South Australia's rights that had never been conceded before by either of the other states.' Now the Eastern States had finally acknowledged that South Australia was entitled to a share of the Murray's waters, although the agreement reached on this was for a five-year period and not in perpetuity.

I note that premier Jenkins was not a member of the Labor Party, but one of the other members for Torrens was the great Labor leader Tom Price. In his 1903 Address in Reply he had something to say about accommodation in Parliament House. Again, this is something we can relate to, although in a different way I might say. Tom argued that the government was wasting money by not properly utilising Parliament House, that the building was half empty. His proposal was to move the Legislative Council to the dining room. He should have moved it elsewhere but—

The Hon. L.R. Breuer: Down the road would have been alright.

Mrs GERAGHTY: Yes, right out of the building altogether. His proposal was to move the Legislative Council to the dining room, move the dining room to the 'big unused smoking room upstairs', the library could be moved to the long corridors, and Hansard was taking up enough space for 50 Hansards. The extra space could then be made available to other areas of government like the railway department. The ultimate saving though would be made—and this is the bit I really like—if they were to abolish the Legislative Council, because two houses of parliament were no longer needed now that so much of the government was in the hands of the federal parliament. Unsurprisingly, premier Jenkins disagreed with him. It is quite interesting to have the opportunity to read some of these things. I encourage members to attend some of the History Month events; they are quite interesting.

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