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House of Assembly - Fifty-Third Parliament, Second Session (53-2)
2015-07-02 Daily Xml
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Bills

Appropriation Bill 2015

Appropriation Grievances

Adjourned debate on motion to note grievances (resumed on motion).

Ms CHAPMAN (Bragg—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (16:31): May I make a contribution in respect of the budget for 2015, and in particular my concern about the massive increase in probate fees which is proposed this year. It has been announced in the budget that within the courts budget there will be a new regime of probate fees which will result in there being some extra $9 million over the next four years raised toward the general revenue of the state government.

Can I say that, to follow on from particularly the scandalous review of the emergency services levy application to the extent of a restriction on concessions, which has already had a significant impact on the cost of living for so many South Australians, nowhere does it have more impact than in regional South Australia where two things happen: first, there is a very substantial volunteer contribution towards the emergency services, whether that is in the State Emergency Service or Country Fire Service and, secondly, where so much income is generated for South Australia on properties. Hence, the direct cost of an increase in the emergency services levy as a result of the change in condition arrangements has such a high impact.

Following that cruel blow is the state government's revelation that another $9 million is going to be raised from probate fees. The probate fees are charged on applications for a will of a deceased person. Essentially, they will be increased for estates worth more than $200,000. This is nothing more than a backdoor death duty and, as I say, particularly for regional South Australians, where the estate of a deceased person cannot be distributed to the beneficiaries (usually the families) until the will has been approved by an order of the Supreme Court, this is particularly acute when real estate is involved.

Small estates, where there is no real estate, no shares in public companies and the like, can be distributed without probate, but more and more there is an obligation for that to occur, particularly to satisfy operators of retirement facilities by way of nursing homes who may have a substantial bond which is refunded to the family.

Grieving families have already been treated callously with the delays in autopsy and Coroner's reports. There has been a massive delay in not only the right to be able to have victims of crime compensation payments made but also the long-term promise of the government to increase burial payments and counselling for children of murder victims. Now, of course, they face a massive fee increase.

The new fee structures provide that, between $200,001 and $500,000, there will be a fee of $1,500, and this is just the fee to pay to the Supreme Court to open the file, to conduct the probate assessment to determine that there is a valid will, without legal fees that may be involved and/or any other costs of dismantling the estate. Then, from $500,001 to $1 million, it will be $2,000, which is an increase of $921; and over $1 million the fee will be $3,000, which is an increase of $1,912. These new rules will be effective as of 1 January 2016.

South Australians who have responsibly accumulated assets, provided for themselves and reduced dependency on public pensions and allowances will be paying taxes from their graves. Because the government has so poorly managed the finances of the state, it is disturbing to see that the people who are working so hard in our state are the ones who are likely to be punished the most.

A quick comparison around the country tells us that other states are not attempting to harvest from the dead. New South Wales does have a graduated scheme and it is fair to say that, whilst comparable, the equivalent of a $3,000 fee which is going to be charged in South Australia will only apply to estates over $2 million and less than $5 million. Obviously real estate values are different but, again, the government here intends to harvest $1,500 even for estates less than half a million dollars; even in New South Wales, that fee is $949, so just over half the fee that applies in New South Wales.

It is a great situation in Victoria. For a very minor estate of $1,000 it is $116.50, but for any estate over $1,000 it is $297.90. In round figures, it is about $300, whereas for estates in South Australia they are going to be paying $3,000. The other aspect that is concerning in South Australia is that, in recent years, it has taken up to three months to be able to get probate processed through the Supreme Court, whereas the comparable time in Victoria would be three weeks. It is a far better situation in Victoria.

In Tasmania, they pay $750 for an estate of $250,000 or more. In the ACT, it is $1,997 for a million dollars or more. In jurisdictions where there is just a fixed fee, Queensland is $615.80, Western Australia is $271 and Northern Territory is $1,210. Why is it that this government should punish the people who are going to be the most vulnerable? A deceased relative is then hit in their estate with such a substantial payment.

This government operated in this state over a long regime of death duties. On our side of the house we consider that that has been unconscionable. This is far more than a recovery for cost. Regional people are used to paying a cost recovery fee for services provided by the Department of Primary Industries. In fact, there are significant costs of compliance for fishing, agriculture, biosecurity and the like.

The current probate office in South Australia, which sits down at the Supreme Court, as I understand it, already receives something like $6 million a year from its revenue from probate fees. The cost of doing their job for the processing of these wills is about $2 million a year. So, the government already makes a profit out of this. It is not the usual cost recovery: it is already a profit-making enterprise, so it makes it all the more unconscionable that the government should try to harvest more money from those who have estates which require an order of probate of the Supreme Court.

I think it is unconscionable, it is unwarranted, and, if one were to examine the cuts to courts and other justice services that the government as already inflicted on South Australians, it is all the more reason why there should be some outrage. I particularly raise it today because of those who are living in regional South Australia and the likelihood that they are going to be hit as soon as one of their family members passes away. It is unconscionable and unacceptable.

I suppose the final thing I would say is my disappointment when I read the comments of the chair of Primary Industries SA. He reflected on the budget being quite a good budget; he obviously had not read it.

Ms SANDERSON (Adelaide) (16:41): I rise to speak again regarding the 2015-16 budget. If this is, as the Treasurer says, 'a jobs budget', then why is only 1 per cent employment growth predicted—the lowest growth predicted of all the mainland states? Labor claims that jobs will be created as they have budgeted to spend between $1.3 billion and $1.45 billion per year on capital works in the general government sector. However, the last five years show that they had budgeted an average capital works spending of $1.9 billion per year in the general government sector. So, we are somehow spending less but expecting jobs growth.

Jobs added since February 2010 for South Australia are only 6,651, despite Labor promising 100,000 extra jobs. South Australia's unemployment rate is the highest in the nation, at 7.6 per cent. South Australia desperately needs this to be a jobs budget; however, this budget fails to deliver jobs, with the lowest jobs growth of all the mainland states.

It fails to deliver reductions in payroll tax and fails to deliver new infrastructure projects which would support job creation. It fails to reduce the cost of living for households, with further increases in the emergency services levy and water prices after record increases over the past few years. It fails to deliver a plan for reversing the state's economic stagnation and creating opportunities for the next generation of South Australians. How could this be called a jobs budget? Compared to what, Greece?

The deficit for the financial year of 2014-15 is $279 million, which is an increase of almost $100 million on the December 2014 Mid-Year Budget Review, which estimated a $185 million deficit. The blowout from $185 million to $279 million deficit occurred despite the government raiding $459 million from the Motor Accident Commission. Therefore, without selling the Motor Accident Commission, the deficit would actually be $738 million. South Australians are expected to be shouldered with a record of $13.7 billion in public debt by 2017, paying $1.9 million interest every day on this debt. That is $700 million wasted on interest payments in a single year. Bearing in mind, this is after having already sold the forests, the lotteries and numerous properties.

GST revenue over the forward estimates is $892 million more than last year's budget estimates. This $892 million was unbudgeted, and therefore is a bonus. GST revenue in the 2018-19 year will be $1.66 billion more than the GST revenue in the 2014-15 year, so I look forward to the 'Thank You Tony Abbott' campaign after the government's spending millions of dollars of taxpayers' money with negative campaigns against the federal government. Clearly, it actually ended up with more money.

Stamp duty reform listed in the budget is welcomed, however this follows on from commitments South Australia made back in 2001 as part of the inter-governmental agreement on GST and various commitments made by the Labor government since then having not been implemented—14 years after the agreement Labor finally does something about this. Apparently this will create jobs, yet it will not be fully implemented until 2018-19.

If the government truly believes this will create jobs it must bring this forward as we have a jobs crisis now and something must be done—not in one year, not in two years or three years, but now, before more businesses close and more people lose their jobs. The budget has no relief for households. The Save the River Murray levy has been abolished, which will save approximately $40 per household per annum, however householders are being slugged an extra $205 a year due to the emergency services increases in the last two budgets.

The Liberal Party remains committed to reinstating the remission to the emergency services levy which will save householders approximately $90 million per year. In 2014-15 the government overspent its own budget by $201 million. The total unbudgeted spending since Labor was elected is now $4.1 billion. What is even the point of having budgets when this government blows them every year and in nearly every government department.

I bet it would be more careful if it had to pay for the blowout itself, or if it came out of its next year's budget, until they learned to live within their means as householders and business owners around South Australia have to. We have all heard the saying 'never spend more than you earn', yet this government overspends year on year, leaving South Australians to pay for its incompetence. I remind the house that $4 billion of taxpayers hard-earned dollars have been wasted on unbudgeted expenditure over the last 13 years.

Despite spending $377.6 million on targeted voluntary separation packages over the last five years, Labor grew the public sector by adding an extra 504 full-time equivalents in the 2014-15 year. Who does this? What a waste of money! Labor has increased the amount of state taxation revenue taken from South Australians this time by $149 million. It has increased the emergency services levy for a second time in as many budgets, bringing the total increase to $205 per year on a $500,000 home.

It has increased the average household water bill to $804; it has increased premiums on compulsory third party vehicle insurance to $378, even as it privatised the Motor Accident Commission. It has failed on its 100,000 people jobs promise, it has scrapped the courts precinct, it has closed police stations (including the one in North Adelaide which affects my electorate), yet it still thinks that $160 million on the O-Bahn to save users 2½ minutes is a good use of public money. Our beautiful state is in a very bad way after 13 years of Labor, and I am afraid that this budget will do very little to rectify the situation.

Sitting extended beyond 17:00 on motion of Hon. S.C. Mullighan.

Ms COOK (Fisher) (16:48): I rise today to speak about some really great work being done in our state and to apply some health and wellbeing context to budget investments we are making in tourism and also in our parks. The 2015 budget shows a total increase for tourism of 30 per cent to $75.5 million in 2015-16. This boost to the tourism budget will see $6 million towards the Tour Down Under, $15 million go towards new major events and conventions, $14 million to grow tourism from international markets, $16 million in maintaining arts activity and $2 million towards the Adelaide Fashion Festival.

In the recent state budget, an additional $6 million was also allocated for marketing campaigns to grow tourism within South Australia, this on top of the $14 million for international marketing. This funding will be used to create more awareness of what iconic products and experiences South Australia has to give. With South Australia attracting 5.6 million domestic overnight visitors in the 12 months before March this year, it puts South Australia ahead of the national growth rate, with SA at 6.5 per cent and increasing. The increasing number of interstate travellers boosts the economy significantly, with $2.21 billion spent in the regions by tourists alone.

This SA tourism industry directly employs 32,000 South Australians and supports 18,000 businesses. With every $160,000 in tourism expenditure a new job is created in South Australia. The $8 billion in tourism expenditure will generate 10,000 jobs for South Australians, taking the total direct jobs to 41,000. These new jobs will be created in areas where young people are able to pursue their passion and career ambitions in the field of tourism in their home state.

Tourism expenditure has brought impacts throughout South Australia with accommodation and food services, transport, retail, cultural and sporting services all benefiting from interstate and international tourists who visit our state. This government will also be continuing to seek opportunities that showcase our magnificent pieces of infrastructure, such as the Adelaide Oval, to the nation and to the world. Adelaide Oval was host to more than 1.69 million sporting and music fans in its first year alone, who generated around $77.4 million in revenue for the CBD. This shows that Adelaide Oval and many of the other great pieces of infrastructure that have been built in this state are a true boost to the economy.

It would be remiss of me not to also mention the multimillion dollar investment that this government is making into our agribusiness. Food industry growth has been recorded for the past 17 years and our international reputation for clean, blue-sky product is second to none. This reputation attracts, and will continue to attract, many visitors now and into the future. This tourism money brought into SA in the handbags, pockets, purses, cases and wallets of visitors is much welcomed and is the best type of money, as it is new money to this state. Investment in tourism destinations around SA will also benefit us, the citizens of SA.

The investment in our parks and playgrounds provides us with excellent locations to spend quality family time or, indeed, quiet time to relax and refresh. Healthy parks mean healthy people, with well-documented evidence showing us that communities with well-developed use of green space have definite improved levels of health and wellbeing. This translates directly to improved mental health and, by proxy, then serves as a great investment in the prevention of depression and suicide, and is also a great crime prevention initiative.

Families, in particular, thrive in communities where they have well-planned and useable green space to connect to nature in. These spaces provide opportunities to increase their level of communication and cooperation and, indeed, their bonds. Parks and other natural environments will benefit from investment by this state government, which understands that these spaces are more than fitness or leisure spaces: they are fundamental to our wellbeing.

While I vow to always remain positive and will always promote the excellent work of my fabulous community, it actually has struck me that over the past—

Members interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: I just ask all members to keep the noise levels down. I am having difficulty hearing the member for Fisher, which means Hansard must be, as well. Could I ask you to observe rule 142? Member for Fisher.

Ms COOK: Thank you, that is apt, Madam Deputy Speaker.

Members interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order!

Ms COOK: I will start my sentence again. While I vow always to remain positive and I will always promote the excellent work of my fabulous community, it has struck me that, over the past two days, if a spacecraft from a distant planet had landed in this house and listened to many of those opposite criticising our amazing state and labelling some of the most vulnerable people in our state with awful names, they would have thought that those opposite—some of them, not all—were, indeed, not from this place.

Of course, there are some exceptions to that blanket statement but, over the past five months, I have really been disappointed on a daily basis in this place by the lack of respect shown for hardworking public servants, for example, by those opposite. It is relentless and unfounded criticism by people who themselves show some of the worst and most disrespectful behaviour towards others that I think I have ever seen. My frustration culminated in yesterday's reference by the member for Finniss to people living on one of those jewels in our tourism crown, Kangaroo Island, as deadbeats, and I quote:

What is happening as well is that there are all sorts of deadbeats getting around Kingscote, which we have never had before. There are people who have never worked and who never will work who are lounging around, doing nothing, who have found accommodation on the island.

I think the member may possibly have missed the memo about what language is appropriate in reference to others and that it actually defines a politician as a leader. Many people have missed this memo and I feel it is a bit rich that we have sat here for the past few days being accused of being out of touch when it is clear that it is many of those opposite who are the people out of touch.

And yes, this comment about so-called deadbeats made by the member for Finniss was brought up to me spontaneously by a parent at a function last night who is in despair about the poor example being set to her children by some here on North Terrace. This kind of behaviour and criticism does nothing to support investment in this state. This attitude does nothing for our reputation nationally or globally and serves to undo all of the amazing work being done to attract visitors.

Mr VAN HOLST PELLEKAAN (Stuart) (16:55): I would like to use the short amount of time available to me in this grieve to touch on the aspect of the budget relating to charging royalties to local government to access quarry rubble. There are quite a few more technical terms and there are a range of different materials, but for the sake of this contribution let us just consider it as rubble which is almost always used for road base. That is going to be a very serious impost on local government councils.

The government has allocated a $1 million income to itself from this new move and I believe that is a pretty serious underestimate of the amount of money the government will get. It will not be the sort of income that is going to fix the budget or fix the state's economy, but by being an underestimate of the income to the state the key issue is, I think, that it is an underestimate of the cost to local governments.

When we have approximately 67 councils, I think it is, in South Australia, plus the Outback Communities Authority, which does everything it can to fulfil a similar role in the out-of-council boundaries and parts of the outback of South Australia—I think we have 19 councils in metropolitan areas—that means that the overwhelming number of local government councils across our state would be affected by this decision.

There are a wide range of examples, but let me just start with the smallest council in the state, the District Council of Orroroo Carrieton, which is in my electorate. When I say smallest I mean by ratepayer base. They have just under 1,000 head of population and they have a bit over, or I think approaching 1,500 actual ratepayers, considering the fact that some people own more than one property, etc. Their ratepayer income is currently sitting at $780,000 per year. For the state government that is not a big amount of money, but $780,000 is the entire rate income for the Orroroo Carrieton council. They do everything they possibly can to serve their ratepayers and the people who travel through that beautiful part of the world with that ratepayer base and whatever else they can get through grant and other income opportunities.

The District Council of Orroroo Carrieton estimates that in 2015-16 they will have to pay $44,000 because of this new royalty. Again, that is probably not the sort of money that scares the state government or really worries them at all in any way, but $44,000 to the District Council of Orroroo Carrieton, based on their $780,000 rate income in total, is a 5.6 per cent cost to them. So, they have a few choices, a few very difficult choices. Do they just cancel the road work that they were going to do? Do they just not pay the $44,000 to the state government by not doing the road work that they were going to do? Clearly, that is not an option for them.

Do they just add 5.6 per cent onto all of their rate notices on top of the regular annual rate increases that they would be working with anyway? Probably not. That is a very difficult situation too. That would probably double the rate increase that was coming anyway. The reason I use this example is so that the government really does understand the serious impact of this decision upon the people and the councils that it affects.

One thing I say in this place very regularly is that relativity is critically important: $44,000 to the state government budget would not be a significant hit, but $44,000 to the Orroroo Carrieton council is incredibly important. I normally use that example with regard to household budgets and household incomes or small businesses or large businesses. It is the relativity that is actually really important when you are trying to ascertain the benefit or the cost or the penalty of certain decisions.

That is only one of the councils in the electorate of Stuart; there are seven of them, and of course there are nearly 60 across the entire state that will be hit in this way. One of the great frustrations is that there is no time for councils to react. They have already done their budgets. They have done their budgets for the 2015-16 year. They are committed to do the work, they have promised their ratepayers they will do it and they are locked into achieving their budget the very best they can.

The state government is imposing this extra royalty payment immediately, with effect straightaway. What is worse is that they just did not consult. They did not talk to the affected councils and they did not talk to the LGA. They did not consider or they certainly did not undertake any discussion—if they did consider it and decided not to, that is even worse—discussion with councils with regard to what the impact might be so that, for example, they could understand that the royalty they wanted Orroroo Carrieton council to pay was equivalent to 5.6 per cent of their total rate income. That is the sort of information the state government needed to understand.

They probably just looked at it and thought, 'Gee, I don't know. We estimate this might make us about $1 million.' I have no idea, by the way, how the government would have come to that estimate because I am sure they did not do any detailed calculations. They just would not have the knowledge of how many tonnes of rubble each council is taking for this purpose throughout South Australia. They just did not consider that sort of thing at all, so councils all over the state are faced with not doing the work or trying to find the money to pay the bill. Really, the only way to do that, unless by chance they happen to be a particularly wealthy council, and I do not know many of them in regional South Australia, is to charge their ratepayers significantly more.

My purpose here is to implore the state government to support these councils that need the support. I implore the state government to try to understand the impact of this decision. Yes, it is one of the smaller components of their budget, but it will have a very large and detrimental impact upon the councils and the ratepayers that it affects.

This is a year after the state government, without any notice whatsoever, increased the royalties, from 35¢ a tonne to 55¢ a tonne, to those organisations already paying the royalties last year. This is clearly an area where the government thinks it can just scrape up a little bit of money without hurting people, but that is not the case. While it might seem small to the state government, this is a decision that definitely will hurt people.

While I am on my feet on this topic, I would like to highlight the fact that there are occasionally areas of awkwardness, let us say, for earthworks contractors who can get caught up between extracting rubble from quarries where the royalty has previously been paid versus areas where the royalty was previously not paid. That is a different topic for a different day. I recognise that that is an issue, but just to blanket charge all the councils without any consultation, without any notice, is certainly not the way to address that part of the puzzle. I very earnestly ask the government, and the Treasurer and the Minister for Local Government in particular, to find a solution to help those councils which cannot absorb the cost the state government is putting upon them.

The Hon. P. CAICA (Colton) (17:04): It appears to me, at the very least, that the troops are marshalling and those on the other side are not necessarily marshalling behind their current leader. It appears clear to me—and I am not much of a rumour-monger—with some of the stories I have heard that the view is that the leader is not cutting through—

Members interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! I remind the members on my left that the member for Stuart is on one warning and the member for Finniss is on two. I will not hesitate to ask you to leave the chamber under sessional orders if you do not observe standing order 142. I will not engage in any discussion on it. The member for Colton will be heard.

Mr van Holst Pellekaan: I won't hesitate to be kicked out if the member for Colton is about to say what I think he is.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member for Stuart is warned for the second time and will leave us if he continues.

Mr Pengilly interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Member for Finniss, if you move your lips once more you are leaving.

The Hon. P. CAICA: —and his future is doubtful. I would say that I do not believe this at all. I do support him because I look around and think that there are no alternatives—there are no alternatives.

Mr van Holst Pellekaan interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member for Stuart will leave the room for 15 minutes.

The honourable member for Stuart having withdrawn from the chamber:

The Hon. P. CAICA: Maybe the member for Stuart is a legitimate alternative, but I still think—

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member for Colton will stay on task.

The Hon. P. CAICA: What is task? It is a grievance. I am not being disrespectful. There are no alternatives. The rumour I have heard—

Mr Gardner interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member for Morialta is reminded he is also on two warnings.

The Hon. P. CAICA: —is about the member for Bragg, but you cannot be serious really. The member for Bragg—

Mr PENGILLY: Point of order.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: This will not be frivolous, I am sure.

Mr PENGILLY: It will not be frivolous at all. What the member for Colton is doing is imputing improper motives to members of the opposition. It is a complete nonsense.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: I think that is almost bordering on frivolous, and if you do move again I will have to ask you to leave the chamber. Member for Colton.

The Hon. P. CAICA: It cannot possibly be the member for Bragg. It is clearly seen that she has been the most divisive of members on that side of the house, and why on earth would she get the support of those members over that side should there be, as I mentioned, a marshalling against the leader?

That draws me to the fact that what we do need here in South Australia is a good opposition. This is my 13th or maybe 14th year and this is the worst opposition I have seen since I have been here, and I would like to back that up with a few facts. Let's have a look at the class of 2002. That happened to be my class when I was elected. Amongst those were Jane Lomax-Smith—regrettably, she is no longer here—and the Deputy Premier and Premier are still here.

Mr Gardner: She got smashed with a 15 per cent swing.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member for Morialta is reminded he is on two warnings.

The Hon. P. CAICA: Yes, but even, as the member for Morialta said, with her being smashed we are still over here. If you have a look at the class of 2002, there is the member for Kavel—a very good reason why the father and son rule does not work. He is a lovely bloke—I like him very, very much—but he is actually taking up a place that should be available to someone who is going to do something in this place.

The member for Morphett—I know he is a bit sensitive, given what he said earlier today. I am not hurt by what he said; obviously he was by what I said, but of course the truth often hurts. I will not go any further. I know he is under a bit of pressure, given the fact that the shadow of the parachute of Matt Williams is hovering above him for pre-selection but, again, he is someone who has really proven to be through this period of time somewhat, if not totally, ineffectual. The member for Heysen, I do not think she will be here next time. I think she has made a decision to go and why wouldn't she? Because 16 years in opposition by the time she leaves is long enough and I do not think that she would face up again.

The same applies to the member for MacKillop, who happens to be of the class of 1997. He is a good bloke, Mitch, he really is, but I am sure he is fed up too. Four years an Independent and 16 years in opposition, that is enough. Replace him with someone who is going to make a difference here to ensure that the opposition becomes a good opposition because that is what a good government requires. The member for Bragg, I think I have said enough about her. She was of the class of 2002 as well and maybe she should consider going the way of the member for MacKillop and the member for Heysen.

What I think is that the people on the seats over there have found themselves being very comfortable in opposition. They do not mind their bottoms being placed on the green vinyl and the same applies to those in opposition in the other place who find their bottoms on the red leather. They are comfortable in opposition. They are comfortable just being here, and that is not good enough from an opposition. As much as I would like them to stay here because I think it is to our side's advantage, the simple fact is that, if they want to become a good opposition they should—have a look! I see the member for Schubert just coming in and, of course, he is very talented.

Mr GARDNER: Point of order!

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: He should not reflect.

Mr GARDNER: It is entirely unparliamentary—

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Sit down.

Mr GARDNER: —for this classless person—

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Okay, I understand.

Mr GARDNER: —to reflect on a member's place.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: I understand. I have already said he should not reflect. I do not need the full chapter and verse.

The Hon. P. CAICA: Reflect on his birthplace?

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: You don't have to—

The Hon. P. CAICA: Is that what you said?

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! I am on my feet. You do not reflect on what members are doing in the chamber. Just keep a grip of it: it is Thursday afternoon. Member for Colton, you do not have to reflect on him walking in.

The Hon. P. CAICA: I'm not reflecting on him, Deputy Speaker.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: No—don't!

The Hon. P. CAICA: The simple fact is this: every member of the parliament is always in this place—

Dr McFetridge: You're just bitter and twisted.

The Hon. P. CAICA: The member—

Dr McFetridge: You hate the Premier—

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: I'm standing up.

Dr McFetridge: You hate the Premier. We know you do, because he cost you $130,000 a year. That's why you hate him.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member for Morphett is called to order.

The Hon. P. CAICA: The truth hurts, Duncan.

Dr McFetridge interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: I am on my feet.

Dr McFetridge interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: You are warned, member for Morphett. You are warned.

Dr McFetridge: You're better than this, Paul.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: You are warned for the second time, while I am on my feet.

Dr McFetridge: Well, there you go.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Member for Morphett!

Dr McFETRIDGE: I apologise, ma'am.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: I would hope so—to the house, not to me. It has nothing to do with me. If the member for Colton would like to continue his remarks.

The Hon. P. CAICA: Yes, I will. I would say that I understand that every member of parliament is always here. My point was that I have just taken a view of the member for Schubert. I just saw him as he passed by in a fleeting moment.

I think the class of 2014 is a very good class. I have a lot of time for the talent that has been brought in—the member for Bright, the member for Schubert, the member for Hartley and the member for Mount Gambier. My friend the member for Kaurna might question some of that, but it is refreshing. It is refreshing their party, and that can only be a good thing.

Those people who have been comfortable in opposition should go. That is up to them to decide and I make no comment about that other than that it is for them to decide. If they really want to be legitimate, if they really want to be regarded as legitimate, it is time for some people to go and be replaced by people like those I have just mentioned.

If you have a look at the class of 2006, we have the member for Finniss. I was disgusted this morning, listening on the wireless, to hear him say, 'Why drop these people on our island?' Most country areas, like we do in the city, have some social problems.

Mr Whetstone interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, the member for Chaffey!

The Hon. P. CAICA: This is the—

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. P. CAICA: I'll get to you—

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! Sit down. The member for Chaffey is reminded that he is on two warnings. I want the debate to continue, observing standing order 142. Member for Colton.

The Hon. P. CAICA: Probably the best performer of the opposition in my time here was Iain Evans. He chose to go. Could that have been because he saw no future, being resigned to a life in opposition? You have lost probably the best operator you have ever had here and you can judge yourself why that occurred.

Going back to the member for Finniss, if I can, just for a minute, that interview this morning was absolutely disgusting. He should be ashamed. This is the person who called the prime minister a dog. This is the person who attacked, in a misogynistic way, the former member for Bright. This is the person who has said something, which his mayor this morning refuted, about the people of Kangaroo Island and the fears of those who are too scared to walk down the street in Kingscote. It is just outrageous.

He said today in his contribution that the fish shop is now closed. Why wouldn't it close if he says, spreading the story, that no-one will go down the main street at night? As I remember, the fish shop was in the main street of Kingscote. They are too scared to go there because you have made them too scared and it is just ridiculous.

There are others from the class of 2006 who I think have some talent and should probably stay here anyway—the member for Hammond and the member for Goyder—but, as I said, those who came on in 2014 are hungry. Their hunger can only be fed if those people who are occupying seats, feeling comfortable where they are without wanting to get to this side (because oppositions are meant to live for nothing more than to get to this side of the chamber) are replaced. I think they are all comfortable being where they are, and we, as a government, require and want a good opposition.

I think I have held the house probably a little bit longer than I had intended. As I mentioned the other day when I said to the Speaker, 'I'm frustrated,' what frustrates me is not the people on my side; it is sitting here in question time, week in and week out, listening to the most inane comments, the lack of thrust and the lack of strategy. A prime example was an article in The Advertiser today where the leader said, 'I have sent this to the police,' only to be refuted by the police. It is embarrassing; you cannot get away with that. I say that the party ought to collectively get together, get rid of the dead weight, get rid of the people who are dragging them down, and replace them with people who are going to be hungry about getting to this side of the house.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member for Finniss—and I am sure that members will accord you the same courtesy and listen to you in silence.

Mr PENGILLY (Finniss) (17:15): I will resist the urge to make any comment on the last two speakers on the government side, particularly a political fossilised dinosaur. There are two issues I would like to talk about, and one is the Repat Hospital. I do not think the government have any idea of the impact of what they are doing with closing the Repat Hospital. It is biting and biting, and that is only evidenced by what is going on out the front of this building. I think yesterday it was 90,000 signatures; they are getting 500 a day. They are still getting signatures.

The people of South Australia hate the South Australian Labor government over what they are doing with the Repat Hospital. It is biting deep. I cannot understand why a couple of members, like the member for Fisher, the member for Elder and those who are down around that way, are letting this absolutely destroy their communities. I am well aware that the communities down there are totally disgusted. It is just a sad thing that what happened to the late Bob Such happened and that he is not still here being a decent and honourable member for Fisher. He was a good man and he is sadly missed.

The government has failed to understand the difference between the various users and the various veterans groups. They have failed to understand the difference between the RSL and the Vietnam veterans. They are two quite disparate groups. Yes, there are numbers of Vietnam veterans tied up in the RSL and, yes, they are in leadership roles in the RSL. They jolly well have to be, because many of the World War II veterans are disappearing rapidly, sadly, through the process of time. Some 45 to 50 are disappearing across the nation every day, and that is just their advancing age that is catching up with them. The Vietnam veterans have made the Repat Hospital their home. They have made Ward 17 their home. They feel comfortable there and it is no good the government prattling on and trying to convince everybody that it is such a terrific idea to close the Repat.

I can tell you that these people out the front are not going away, and it is impacting heavily. I have some 700 vets on the Fleurieu Peninsula and a whole lot less, of course, over on the island side just by virtue of the population, but I have not have any one vet from that area, whether it be World War II, Korea, Vietnam, Iraq or Afghanistan, tell me that it is a good idea to close the Repat. If the government choose to go down this line, woe betide them. It is a sad indictment on this government that they were given a hospital like the Repat and they intend to close it. You can rest assured that the people of Elder, Fisher, Ashford and those surrounding seats with Labor members will be reminded well and truly of it in 2018.

The other matter I wish to raise briefly is the issue of water on Kangaroo Island and Middle River dam. Middle River dam supplies the towns of Parndana, Kingscote and the area of Shoal Bay and it is trucked to Emu Bay and American River. It is also used on a number of properties for stock water in dry years.

I want to know what minister Hunter's fallback position is and what he will put in place to cater for what is looming as a disaster for water on Kangaroo Island. Normally Middle River dam fills up six weeks after the first rain. It only started running last week and now it has not rained again. The dam is 35 per cent full. The predictions are for little or no or very light rainfall leading into the end of winter and into the spring. If that happens, we face an absolute disaster regarding water on the island.

Last time the dam ran low they were able to bring water through from a property owned by Mr MacGill. There was a pipeline put through there and that dam actually had more water than Middle River and they were able to use that and it was an absolute lifeline. However, this time around, that dam is now used for irrigating potatoes. It is absolutely bone dry. There is no surplus water in that—no water—and Middle River has 35 per cent. I also understand that, by reason of necessity, they drain water out of Middle River dam through the base of the dam to flush out the salts and other nasties that are in there. My understanding is that it was still draining out in November; indeed, it may still have been running in.

However, given that its current level is at 35 per cent, given that the runoff is negligible, given that the forecast is atrocious, what are the minister and SA Water doing to put in place a plan regarding the water needs of those areas that I mentioned? Fortunately, Penneshaw has a desalination plant which was put in by the Liberal government, and that will get around that, but there is no way known that the plant will supply enough water to supply all those areas I am concerned about.

I am worried about it. Not only am I worried about it because of the town people but I am also worried about it because, on present indications, there will be numbers of farmers who are going to have to cart water for their stock. I will be contacting the minister as a matter of urgency about this to see what indeed, if anything, they plan to do, and for heaven's sake, if anyone mentions to me that the commissioner will fix it, I am going to laugh in their face; it will be a complete joke.

This is nature at work, and it is a lack of planning in my view. I understand that they intend to put in turkey nest dams on top of the plateau to provide additional water supplies, which could also water the proposed golf course. We rejected the additional supply that was proposed for the town of Kingscote some years ago because simply it was in the wrong place but they have gone on to do nothing. They said we have adequate water, which in most years we do. I raise those concerns on that water.

Fortunately on the Fleurieu, the Myponga dam is still in a very healthy state and I hope it stays that way, and there are other ways to shift water around on the mainland through the pipes and various systems and the desalination plant, but the supply of water to those island consumers is at risk and I would like to know what they intend to do about it.

Mr SPEIRS (Bright) (17:24): I rise to give this grieve following my budget reply speech and follow up on one item that I canvassed yesterday when delivering that speech. At the time I tried to focus on a range of things that the state government could look at that might not necessarily have an impact on the state budget's bottom line but would be legislative reformist measures which would enable South Australia's economy to be developed and to have the boost that it needs at this time.

One of the matters I mentioned was my desire and anticipation for the planning reform that the government, through the Deputy Premier, is going to bring in to this house later in the year. I mentioned yesterday what I thought was the significant need for our planning legislation in South Australia to be given the ability to fast-track projects of economic merit and, in a more general sense, for it to be much easier to get non-controversial development projects, both large and small, through our planning system. In particular, I feel that rezoning is so convoluted and so unnecessarily bureaucratic within local government at the moment that I believe it is something the state government really needs to have as a major focus of its updated planning legislation.

Related to the local government space, I also want to talk in more detail about my desire to see local government reforms brought into the house. I am very pleased that the Minister for Local Government is here at the moment and yesterday was able to present the government's proposed updates to the Local Government Act through his second reading explanation of that bill. Yesterday in my speech I raised some concern that I felt that the broad outline that we received from the minister might be a bit more pedestrian than what I was hoping for and a bit more process focused rather than real reform to local government in South Australia. However, I am pleased that the government has got something on the table and I hope that the opposition can work alongside the state government as we look at the third tier of government and what we can do to make it more productive and to give it some economic imperatives.

I have often said that local government has the potential to be the most functional tier of government. It is the tier of government closest to the people, so it can do a lot for them and it can have a very immediate impact on local communities. However, far too often local government is the most dysfunctional tier of government and really is not what it could be here in this state. I think it is a stale sector and it is suffering from many years where reform, driven by the state government into the local government sector, has been lacking. I really hope this term of government is one where the state government takes up local government reform with some zeal. Although I am not part of this government and it is the Labor Party that has formed government here, I would still like them to take the lead on this now. I do not think we can wait for a potential change of government in 2018 before we take local government on, because it is crying out for reform.

I am very pleased that the state parliament's Economic and Finance Committee has taken the opportunity to investigate how any future move by state government to impose a rate cap on South Australia's councils might impact them. I think it is worth having a really open-minded discussion about rate capping. This is something that has been in place in New South Wales for many years and has been in place in Victoria on and off. It was in place during the Kennett years and, after a period of not being in place during the Labor and Liberal administrations of the 2000s, it is now in the process of being reintroduced by the Labor government, led by Daniel Andrews, in Victoria.

It will be quite interesting to look at the process through the Economic and Finance Committee that the Victorian government is going through as they reintroduce a rate cap on local government based around CPI. Not all of these local government rate capping procedures in other jurisdictions are based around CPI. In Victoria, they are going to link local government rate raises to CPI rises. In New South Wales, a body similar to our Essential Services Commission sets a local government rate rise which then has to be used by local governments there, and they can only not use it and have an extra increase by making a submission to an independent panel.

My interest in exploring rate capping comes from personal experience. I spent three years at the Marion council, two years as deputy mayor, and learnt a huge amount during that time. It was a time which I guess could be seen as an apprenticeship for my current role. I enjoyed my time on council, particularly the leadership of Felicity-ann Lewis and some of my other now retired council colleagues. However, what did frustrate me about being on council was the way in which that council and many councils spend other people's money without any respect for what they are doing with that money. That is my personal view.

The council budgeting process was just one of the most incredibly backward processes that I have ever seen at work. What councillors did was come up with a wish list of the things that they would like to do in a particular financial year—maybe a local park, an upgrade of some local environment initiative, or maybe new council decor. I remember some of the things on the list at Marion council were multicultural programs, arts programs, often things out of what you would traditionally think was the jurisdiction of local government.

They came up with this wish list and it would be on the whiteboard during one of our workshops and, once that wish list was put up, we would tally how much it would cost. Let's say it would be $1.1 million to do those additional items above the budget of $70 million or so that the City of Marion had in a given year. We would then turn to the finance people and ask, 'Well, what rate rise do we need to put in place across our city? What do we need to take from ratepayers in order to deliver that wish list?'

Inevitably, the figure would be brought up and the finance officers in council would say, 'You'll need to go with a 5.5 per cent rate rise in order to fulfil that wish list.' That is how rate rises would be delivered. They would be delivered by looking at your wish list, working that out and then raising the money accordingly, as opposed to asking, 'How much money do we have to work with?' and working out what we could deliver for the amount of money that was already in the bank. That backward process does council no favours because it results in a situation where rate rises occur year on year, in and out.

Just this morning, I was speaking to a Hallett Cove resident (who happened to be my mum) and she had kept a copy—being of Scottish heritage, she keeps copies of all her bills—of her 2005 council rates bill from the City of Marion: it was $1,500. Theirs is a fairly average house in Hallett Cove and probably worth about $500,000, and they were paying $1,500 in 2005. Their last rate bill was almost $2,500. That is a rise of almost two-thirds, about 60 per cent in a decade.

This has occurred during a decade of record economic instability, very low wages growth and contraction of many private sector industries in South Australia as a consequence of the global financial crisis. Many of the small businesses, the tradies, the sole proprietors, have seen their business growth plateau or decline in recent years; yet council rates continue to soar. The City of Marion's long-term financial plan was predicated on an annual rate rise year in year out of 5 per cent.

This year the City of Marion is trumpeting a rate rise of 2.8 per cent and they are trumpeting that as a record low, but it is still more than double the rate of inflation. It is still higher than CPI and it is still higher than the special LGPI-created local government CPI, so it is still eating into people's discretionary income. You just cannot do that forever. You cannot continue to eat into people's discretionary income. That is why I believe in local government rate capping and that is why I am pleased that the Economic and Finance Committee is taking a serious look at this policy.

Time expired.

Sitting extended beyond 18:00 on motion of Hon. G.G. Brock.

Mr GOLDSWORTHY (Kavel) (17:34): I am pleased to continue my remarks from my Appropriation Bill speech. I was getting on to issues in relation to the Modbury Hospital. I think I was saying that the northern part of my electorate, the southern part of the member for Schubert's electorate and those north-eastern suburban seats obviously all use the Modbury Hospital, so it is important to a significant part of my constituency that the Modbury Hospital operates at a very high level and offers a comprehensive range of services.

A couple of weeks ago, I asked the Minister for Health a question relating to what services would be kept in place after the Transforming Health reforms were put through, and we did not really get any straight answers. The minister hedged around the question, looked to lay some blame on some of our federal colleagues and the like, but really did not get to the tin tacks of the question at all. We want some accurate, truthful answers to those questions. I know it is against the rules of the house to actually display material, but I have some—

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Then you won't do it, will you?

Mr GOLDSWORTHY: No, I won't.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Put it down, then.

Mr GOLDSWORTHY: I will just merely use it as a reference, Deputy Speaker. I have a DL flyer, I think put around your electorate, Deputy Speaker, because it has your name and your nice photograph on it—it is quite a youthful photograph, if I may say—listing 32 services that are currently delivered—

The Hon. S.W. Key: You're very brave!

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: I feel Speaker Bishop welling up inside me. I am having trouble.

Mr GOLDSWORTHY: I understand the member for Newland put out a similar DL flyer into the Newland electorate, with his photograph across it, listing 32 services that the Modbury Hospital currently provides to communities. We want to know, on this side of the house, how many of those 32 services will be retained at the Modbury Hospital after the Transforming Health reforms are carried out.

That is a very important issue for a significant section of my electorate, obviously a significant section of the member for Schubert's electorate, and no doubt for the electorates of the member for Florey, the member for Newland, Wright, Morialta, and probably even some of the member for Hartley's electorate. These are very important questions that need to be answered.

Going on in relation to the health services that are provided to South Australians, we have had a series of questions, particularly in question time today, about the EPAS debacle—the hundreds of millions of dollars that are being shelled out to actually smash the EPAS into some sort of shape that will fit our current health service.

Initially, it was meant to be rolled out in the current RAH, but that has all been canned, and we are talking about it going into the new RAH. We were quite legitimately asking questions of the Treasurer (who I understand has the control of the budget for EPAS) and he was all at sea. The Treasurer could not give any clear answers on pretty much any and every question that was asked in relation to EPAS. So, if there is ever an example of how to mismanage a project, I think EPAS is right up there with the best of them.

Another issue I want to touch on is that of the Treasurer also spouting off this week, talking about the fact that the government aspires to have this state known as 'the mining state'. I am going to contact the senior departmental people in relation to this, but I have some constituents, two brothers, who have mining leases up in the Far North, and they are having all sorts of trouble working through the bureaucratic maze that has come about by a heritage listing that has been placed on the some of the land covered by their mining leases. There is a whole bureaucratic maze that these constituents of mine have to try to find their way through to get their approvals for a particular site.

So while the Treasurer, the Minister for Mineral Resources, says that they are doing everything they possibly can to foster a productive mining sector, the reality I am finding, through the concerns passed on to me by my constituents, is something quite different. They still have this massive process that is bound up in red tape. As I said, I will be contacting the senior departmental officers with those concerns in an effort to have them resolved.

However, I do not want to be totally negative, even though the member for Colton, in his contribution, was totally negative. Obviously we are touching a raw nerve, particularly with the member for Morphett raising issues with the UFU and so on. We know that the member for Colton was the national secretary of the UFU, so I think we are touching a bit of a raw nerve there, and we got a response from the member for Colton in his contribution this afternoon.

I want to turn my remarks to something positive, some positive news that has come from the electorate of Kavel, and that is the recent announcement and the event we attended on the weekend. The federal Minister for Infrastructure the Hon. Jamie Briggs, the state Minister for Transport and Infrastructure the Hon. Stephen Mullighan, myself, and the Mount Barker mayor Ann Ferguson attended the first official sod-turning ceremony for the construction of the second freeway interchange at Mount Barker, an historic event for the district. We will see that project progress and, if things stay on track, if the engineering work stays on track, that project—the full interchange with the four sets of ramps—will be completed in approximately 12 months' time.

That was a very pleasing announcement that was made on the weekend, and it is something I have worked very, very hard for for over 10 years in this place. I have received very strong support from my colleagues on this side of the house for it to be in our election policy in 2006 and again in the 2010 election transport policy and again in the 2014 election transport policy. So I thank the leader for his strong support as well as previous leaders for their strong support, and all my colleagues on this side of the house for their support for this project. Without that I do not think it would have been achieved; without my support and the support of my colleagues I do not necessarily think it would have been delivered.

Mr KNOLL (Schubert) (17:44): I have always wanted to attend a sod turning. The question I have—

Members interjecting:

Mr KNOLL: I think I could be a good sod turner; I just want to know where the shovels come from. Maybe I will ask that in the estimates stage.

I want to talk about my electorate but before I turn to that, I want to have a chance to, on the record, correct some of the comments the member for Kaurna has been making on Twitter with regard to the greatest ever South Australian Sir Thomas Playford. I made comments in the house during my appropriation speech about the fact that Sir Thomas was an extremely frugal character and he kept government spending very much in check over his time in office.

It has been suggested that because they ran a high debt to GSP ratio during the fifties and sixties that that is somehow the definitive measure of government spending. I did propose an argument that there was a little thing called the Second World War which may or may not have had some deleterious effect on the debt levels of all the state and territory governments and federal governments across, basically, the entire world, but leave that little event aside.

The Hon. T.R. Kenyon: An unfortunate circumstance.

Mr KNOLL: That is right; a blip on the radar. The member for Kaurna tried to suggest that somehow the GFC was of an equivalence with the Second World War. I am not much of an apple eater, but that was not comparing apples with apples.

What I would like to do is use a much more accurate measure of government spending discipline; that is, government spending to GSP. The wonderful people in the parliamentary library quickly knocked together some information for me. It says that in 1954-55, in that budget, the government expended $102 million on a gross state product of $802 million for an expenditure percentage of 13 per cent.

A decade later, in the 1964-65 budget, the government spent $217 million on a GSP of $1.973 billion, or 11 per cent. So, that was 13 per cent progressively over that decade, down to 11 per cent by the end of that decade. The thing that strikes me most about that is that the GSP over doubled, in fact, it is almost two and a half times the size that the state's economy grew over that decade. Can I tell you that growth is a fantastic way to keep a government in check.

What I enjoyed very much is the fact that not only were levels of government spending maintained, they were actually lowered as a percentage of GSP. I think that is the definitive measure and on this score I would like to put this issue to bed with the member for Kaurna because I feel, again, Sir Thomas watching me and I feel very much that I am the one in this chamber to be able to hold up his legacy.

We move on to the beautiful electorate of the Barossa Valley. Sorry, hold on, I did not finish my point. Let us have a look at what government spending levels as a percentage of GSP are today. It alters somewhere between 16 to 18 per cent. At the moment I think it is sitting at about 16.8 per cent over the course of this year. Here we are, we have the member for Kaurna who is saying that somehow this current Labor government is the virtue of fiscal discipline, and I have spoken previously about blowouts and the like, when his government, the government he belongs to, or the party he belongs to, is presiding over 17 per cent as opposed to the 11 per cent that Playford was able to get down to. I think that is the definitive stat that we should look to. I would like to claim victory in this debate. No other correspondence will be entered into. I am vacating the field with Sir Thomas's trophy in hand.

If we move on to the beautiful electorate of the Barossa Valley. It is frustrating that there is no mention of the Barossa or Schubert in this budget. It is extremely upsetting. My electorate does include some of the Murraylands and there may be some expenditure in Schubert through the riverine recovery program at $4.6 million. There are a couple of projects which are technically not in my electorate but are very close to it and that is the provision of two new steel hull ferries along the River Murray. For that, I am extremely grateful and on behalf of the Mid Murray Council I am extremely grateful. Also, I did find out today that there was some money with the school maintenance program that the Minister for Education spoke about yesterday in the chamber. It seems that the Mannum Community College has received a bit of money, and for that I am also extremely grateful.

The Barossa region, as defined by the RDA, only received $6.2 million in spending in this budget and the two projects they talked about are the Gawler regional dialysis service and the Evanston Gardens Primary School. While I am extremely grateful for those projects, they are not in my electorate. What disgusted me more is that $6.2 million in the Barossa is the lowest spending in any of the RDA regions—the lowest spending in any of the RDA regions.

I do not want to stand here and pit region against region but I would like to go through the strong economic benefits that my electorate brings. The member for Goyder the other day went through a list of towns in country South Australia and their unemployment levels. I would like to go through the towns in my electorate that were mentioned. Bar one—being Mannum, having an unemployment rate of 7.7 per cent—all of my towns are under the average of South Australia. Angaston has an unemployment rate of 3.9 per cent, Lyndoch 3.2 per cent, Nuriootpa 4.2 per cent and Tanunda 2.5 per cent. This is the sign of a strong and growing region, and I would implore this government to reinvest in a region that is doing well, because that is what is going to help bring greater prosperity and growth to South Australia.

Over the course of this year, I am going to be pursuing the cause of the Barossa hospital with vigour. The business plan should be put out this year by the country local health network and, as part of that, I am going to present some options of how we can get this project off the ground. The Barossa Council is the 10th fastest growing council in this state, and I would love to see some road infrastructure spending, but also school infrastructure spending. I have high schools and primary schools that are bursting at the seams, literally bursting at the seams, with no more room—

Mr Gardner: Literally?

Mr KNOLL: Well, literally bursting at the asbestos-riddled seams then—

Mr Gardner interjecting:

Mr KNOLL: Figuratively at the seams. It is just disappointing that one of the premier regions of South Australia that continues to deliver, and has continued to deliver over such a long period of time, continues to get ignored. It is something that I take quite personally. It is just upsetting that the Barossa region keeps on keeping on and delivering for South Australia but keeps getting knocked back. I find that an extremely upsetting situation.

With my last three minutes I would like to turn to a couple of projects that are happening, or should happen, around my electorate. The first of those is what I think we are now calling the Gawler East Collector Link Road. This project has had more name changes than the artist formerly known as Prince, or whatever his name is now. Anyway, in the budget we announced that we had a new name for it, and it is the Gawler East Collector Link Road. I am grateful that the government put $55 million on the table, but what I am not grateful for is the way the government has gone about trying to bully the council and the local community into accepting what is the inferior road option here.

After the announcement in the budget, I assumed that a deal had been done for the Gawler East Collector Link Road. The truth is there has not. There still is no deal for the Gawler East Collector Link Road. The fact that they have put money in the budget for it does not mean that we are any closer to getting this road built. I implore the government to get on and negotiate in good faith with the local council so that we can actually get this road built, because the southern areas of the Barossa are screaming out for a bit of a rebalancing after Gomersal Road was bitumenised 12 years ago, I think.

I find the way the government has gone about this process deplorable, standing there and suggesting, 'This is the deal, take it or leave it', 'Yes, we are going to impose a reasonably significant burden on the local community, but tough luck. This is what you want, we have to get on and do it and this is our final offer.'

The other project that I would like the government to get on with and deliver is the Northern Connector. Port Wakefield Road and the Northern Expressway would be the premier way for the roughly billion to billion and a half dollars worth of wine to leave my region to ports to get out of this country but also to move to interstate markets. The Northern Connector is a great piece of that puzzle. Can I say to the government: let's get on and do this thing. I understand that it has huge benefits in terms of cost benefit analysis. I understand that it is a very worthwhile project.

In a budget that pretended to have an increased infrastructure spend but in reality had an average budget spend over the next five years of $1.3 billion compared to the last five years of $1.9 billion, I would contend that this is exactly the type of project that we should bring forward. This is a project that will bring in jobs and greater productivity gains. It would help regions like mine to expand further so that we can create more jobs and more economic growth so that we can actually deliver more taxes to this government that it can fritter away in what is sometimes wasteful and unnecessary spending.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Member for Hammond.

Mr PEDERICK (Hammond) (17:54): Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. Earlier on tonight, I was almost having images of the Speaker of the House of Representatives, the Hon. Bronwyn Bishop.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hang on, I am going to sit higher in the chair.

Mr PEDERICK: I was just getting a bit of feedback of you ruling up there with an iron fist, which you do, but be that as it may.

Mr Knoll: We don't want to suggest 'iron lady'.

Mr PEDERICK: No.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: I thought you liked Thatcher.

Mr Knoll: I do, Deputy Speaker, but I was in deference to you.

Mr PEDERICK: Thank you. I will keep going, Madam Deputy Speaker, because we need to make our valuable contributions to the Appropriation Bill grievance motion. Certainly, at the start of the speech, I want to talk about a positive thing that has happened in my community. Sadly, it is one of those issues where you often wonder why, as a local member, you need to get involved before something happens.

An issue I brought up in this place in the last month or so concerned the internet service at my home school of Coomandook Area School. It was causing children to go home and be truant, essentially, and do their education from home where they had better internet service. I just had a phone call from Mark Bolton at Telstra, the Southern District Regional Manager, and they have fast-tracked the upgrade of the tower which is about six kilometres down the road at Yumali to 4GX.

It was going to happen but, with this discussion going on, Telstra fast-tracked that service to full wireless broadband, so it has 40 megabyte download and 10 megabyte upload. For the techno wizards in the place, that is pretty good, I am told, so I am really appreciative that Telstra and, I must say, the Department for Education got together and sorted this vital issue out.

It is pleasing to see that things can happen. It always worries me why it has to get to this level before it happens, but at least it happens, so that is a good thing. I appreciate the work that everyone had to do with this. Whether it was Telstra or the department, it is really appreciated by the children and the teachers at that school. I think they launched it today, so that is a great thing.

Moving on from that, I want to talk about some of the issues in regional South Australia with the black spot mobile funding for this state. As much as I have a lot of time for the Minister for Education who is responsible for this matter wearing her public sector hat, I just wonder why we are seeing only 11 of the 499 new mobile phone base stations.

Essentially, the minister has been saying in this place that that is the federal government's issue. This state government may as well all get on a boat and head out, because everything is the federal government's fault. It looks like we are heading away from federalism towards nationalism, and going to where we may as well just not have this state government. If they want to walk out anytime, we will move over on the right-hand side any day of the week.

Members interjecting:

Mr PEDERICK: Come on, Bronwyn! Anyway, I think it is disgraceful when we have these black spots for phone towers on our regional highways. I know some of it is not in my electorate now but, when you go out through to Karoonda and Mindarie, where the Mindarie mine was operating, there were certainly very good spots for two towers: one at Wynarka and one at Mindarie.

It is not just for the people and the farmers working in those areas but for people travelling those roads. I know people talk about whether it is viable for the amount of transmission and that sort of thing, but I am talking about equity for country people. Why can't country people have this equity? It is just so wrong.

I know Telstra runs these things, as well as Optus and other companies, and it comes at a great cost. I know they spend millions and millions of dollars putting these mobile towers in for phone networks, but these base stations are coming out of the federal government's $100 million Mobile Black Spot program. South Australia is getting 11 of these phone base stations.

This compares to 144 in New South Wales, 130 in Western Australia, 110 in Victoria, 68 in Queensland, 31 in Tasmania and five in the Northern Territory. The Northern Territory is getting nearly half of what we are getting but, when you look at the gross misrepresentation across the rest of the country, we are just so underdone. Quite frankly, I think it is just because the Labor government has no reflection to do with anything in regional areas. I wonder what would happen if they were in a broken down car one day at Wynarka—and it would be good for the transport minister to go out and assess the roads out there because they are going to need a lot of work with the closing down of the rail service for the Viterra grain operations—or if someone were to break down at Mindarie in that region. It is about equity and it is about safety.

You look at the commitments that other state governments put in alongside this federal funding—$32 million from Western Australia, $24 million from New South Wales, $21 million from Victoria, $10 million from Queensland and $350,000 from Tasmania, along with $1.7 million from local government, businesses and community groups. As I said, minister Close said the prime responsibility for the telecommunications sat with the federal government and with commercial operators in the sector. I guess there are plenty of phone towers in Port Adelaide, but that is the way it is.

I want to speak about the screening check inquiries in the final few minutes of this grievance debate. These are five longstanding ones, and my office has dealt with a lot more than these in the Hammond electorate. As I have often said to the minister when we have had a quiet meeting face-to-face or when interjecting across the chamber, screening checks are self-funding. You could employ 1,000 extra staff and it would not matter because it is not a cost to the government. The charge that is made for the screening check all comes back and more. It is just holding back so much business in this state. I know we have to get it right but it has just got so out of control.

People are losing their jobs, people are not able to do their job and feed their family. I look at this one, for instance, which is someone trying to be a taxi driver and his has been outstanding since December 2014. We have others, including a lady who is a Families SA carer whose check has been outstanding since December 2014; a family day care provider, outstanding since February 2015; a bus driver, outstanding since February 2015; child related employment, outstanding since September 2014.

So, what do these people do in the meantime? I will tell you what happens, Madam Deputy Speaker, when these people cannot get their preferred choice of work, whether it is in child related operations or with being a taxi driver where obviously they need a high rate of clearance, they go and get another job. It impacts directly on all of society because if you cannot get drivers and you cannot get people to look after our children when we need them in child care—and we used to use child care a lot—it impacts all the way down the line. Late last year I had discussions with the minister and one of her senior staff who was supposed to tidy this up, but why are we having so many problems with these checks? It is just crazy stuff, especially when it is self-funding and there is probably a bit of profit involved in it as well.

Sadly, I am running out of time at this late part of the day. I would like to say there are no major infrastructure projects in this budget for Hammond, and what really annoyed me with the budget was that the government turned their back on $25 million for our river communities right the way through the state in the diversification fund. For a government that is receiving close to $1 billion of unbudgeted GST, I think that is absolutely disgraceful, and it would not have happened if it was $25 million being funded into a city seat. That is politics played at its worst, but if the Treasurer and Premier want to play that way, then good luck. Let's see when we are on the other side.

Mr WILLIAMS (MacKillop) (18:04): Hopefully I will not use my full 10 minutes, but usually when I say that I use the whole damn lot. I am only going to talk about one issue tonight, although there are plenty that I could talk about. It is about this government's handling of the emergency services levy over the last couple of budgets. We all are aware that in the last budget the government removed the rebate paid out of the Consolidated Account. I went back and read the debates from the late 1990s when we first introduced the legislation to create the emergency services levy to replace the old fire insurance levy and some other areas that used to fund our emergency services.

I remember at the time the Labor Party complaining bitterly and stridently suggesting that the Consolidated Account should fund a substantial proportion of our emergency services and that we should look after all South Australians such that the burden of the emergency services levy was not too great. That is why, when that legislation went through the parliament, we had the rebate. I am not sure whether that is the right term.

The Hon. G.G. Brock: Concession.

Mr WILLIAMS: We had the concession paid from the Consolidated Account. Last year the government removed that and put an extra $90 million cost on emergency services levy payers ostensibly because there was a reduction in the allocations from Canberra to South Australia.

The Leader of the Opposition, in his address on the budget, put the lie to that whole argument and I will repeat the numbers that he put on the record then. In the financial year that has just completed (2014-15), South Australia received $273 million more from the federal government than was indicated for that year in the last of the Wayne Swan budgets. That is $273 million more in the last financial year than what Wayne Swan would have delivered to South Australia if he had still been in power. Yet we had this argument that there were huge cuts and we had to increase taxes here, including the $90 million slug on the ESL.

In the financial year that we are just entering, South Australia will receive some $671 million more from the commonwealth than Wayne Swan would have delivered, according to his figures in his last budget. Yet we still have this lie that there are massive cuts from Canberra that are causing all these problems. In the next financial year it will be $1.256 billion more than what the last Wayne Swan budget predicted. The Treasurer said, 'We have these massive cuts. We have to increase taxes. We have to remove the concession on the emergency services levy and that is going to cost South Australians $90 million.' The whole lot is based on a pack of lies.

It gets worse because South Australians were told that the impact on individual households would be in the tens of dollars. I, and a lot of my colleagues on this side of the house, represent the farming community where they hold large tracts of land with high values. They do not make much money out of it, but they have high-value properties which are rated under the emergency services levy because it is a capital tax and instead of paying a few tens of dollars extra, by and large, they were paying hundreds of dollars extra. We have had the lie perpetuated again this year with a further increase in the emergency services levy and again it will impact most unfairly on rural and regional South Australia.

The other thing I want to point out to the house is that I did some analysis of the amount of money that was collected under the emergency services levy in various parts of the state. The state is divided into four zones. Basically, region 4 is greater metropolitan Adelaide and zones 1, 2 and 3 represent the major towns in rural South Australia, the farming area of rural South Australia and region 3 is the outback areas. The figures that are provided from Treasury to the Economic and Finance Committee each year on which they then report to the house are very illuminating.

Those figures give a breakdown of the expenditure on emergency services, attributable to the fixed property component of the levy. Last year, for the regions outside metropolitan Adelaide—regions 1, 2 and 3—expenditure on emergency services attributable to the fixed property component of the levy was $26.4 million. The revenue raised from those same areas was $39.1 million—$39.1 million raised, $24.6 million expended.

There is a huge cross subsidy occurring from regional South Australia to metropolitan Adelaide through the emergency services levy, yet we have a government that refuses to even look after it is own assets in places like my electorate (and I have talked about the drainage system and I will continue to talk about it). This government goes out, and we have ministers saying, 'Look, they're your electors down there, we're not paying for it, you go and get the money, allow us to impose another levy.' Regional South Australia is already paying.

When I looked at the information that Treasury provided to the Economic and Finance Committee this year, I found an amazing anomaly. Lo and behold, these papers, if you can believe them, would suggest that $42.7 million is being spent in regional South Australia on the emergency services attributable to the fixed property component of the levy, and the revenue raised, lo and behold, is $42 million.

These figures would have us believe that, in region 1 last year the expenditure attributable to the fixed property component of the levy was $16.2 million, but this year it will be $24 million—$16.2 million to $24 million. That is a 50 per cent increase. In region 2 last year it was $9.4 million, this year $16.1 million. That is about an 80 per cent increase. In region 3, the outback areas, $800,000 was spent last year and budgeted to be spent this year is $2.6 million.

I bring this to the attention of the house because I just do not believe those figures. I do not believe that on the emergency services there will be an expenditure increase of 50 per cent, 80 per cent and several hundred per cent in those three regional areas of South Australia. This is a sleight of hand to try to disguise the fact that there is a huge cross subsidy being perpetrated via the emergency services levy from regional South Australia to metropolitan South Australia. This, again, is the hallmark of this government and highlights why South Australians at the last two elections have voted for a change of government. That is another story I will leave for another day.

Motion carried.

Estimates Committees

The Hon. G.G. BROCK (Frome—Minister for Regional Development, Minister for Local Government) (18:13): I move:

That the proposed expenditures for the departments and services contained in the Appropriation Bill be referred to Estimates Committee A and B for examination and report by Wednesday 29 July, in accordance with the following timetables:

APPROPRIATION BILL 2015

TIMETABLE FOR ESTIMATES COMMITTEES

ESTIMATES COMMITTEE A

WEDNESDAY 22 JULY AT 10.00 AM

Attorney-General

Minister for Justice Reform

Minister for Industrial Relations

Minister for Planning

Minister Assisting the Minister for Planning

Minister for Housing and Urban Development

Minister Assisting the Minister for Housing and Urban Development

Courts Administration Authority

Attorney-General's Department (part)

Administered Items for the Attorney-General's Department (part)

Electoral Commission SA

Administered Items for the Electoral Commission SA

Department for Planning, Transport and Infrastructure (part)

Administered Items for the Department for Planning, Transport and Infrastructure (part)

Administered Items for the Department of Treasury and Finance (part)

Department of the Premier and Cabinet (part)

Administered Items for the Department of the Premier and Cabinet (part)

THURSDAY 23 JULY AT 9.30 AM

Minister for Agriculture, Food and Fisheries

Minister for Forests

Minister for Tourism

Minister for Recreation and Sport

Minister for Racing

Minister for Transport and Infrastructure

Department of Primary Industries and Regions (part)

Administered Items for the Department of Primary Industries and Regions (part)

South Australian Tourism Commission

Minister for Tourism

Administered Items for the Department of Treasury and Finance (part)

Department for Planning, Transport and Infrastructure (part)

Administered Items for the Department for Planning, Transport and Infrastructure (part)

FRIDAY 24 JULY AT 10.30 AM

Minister for Health

Minister for Health Industries

Minister for Mental Health and Substance Abuse

Minister for Arts

Department for Health and Ageing (part)

Department of State Development (part)

Administered Items for the Department of State Development (part)

MONDAY 27 JULY AT 10.00 AM

Minister for Investment and Trade

Minister for Defence Industries

Minister for Veteran's Affairs

Minister for Manufacturing and Innovation

Minister for Automotive Transformation

Minister for Aboriginal Affairs and Reconciliation

Department of State Development (part)

Administered Items for the Department of State Development (part)

Defence SA

Department of Treasury and Finance (part)

Administered Items for the Department of Treasury and Finance (part)

TUESDAY 28 JULY AT 9.00 AM

Premier

Treasurer

Minister for Finance

Minister for State Development

Minister for Mineral Resources and Energy

Minister for Small Business

Legislative Council

House of Assembly

Joint Parliamentary Services

State Governor's Establishment

Auditor-General's Department

Department of the Premier and Cabinet (part)

Administered Items for the Department of the Premier and Cabinet (part)

Department of Treasury and Finance (part)

Administered Items for the Department of Treasury and Finance (part)

Department of State Development (part)

Administered Items for the Department of State Development (part)

ESTIMATES COMMITTEE B

WEDNESDAY 22 JULY AT 10.00 AM

Minister for Sustainability, Environment and Conservation

Minister for Water and the River Murray

Minister for Climate Change

Department for Environment, Water and Natural Resources

Administered Items for the Department for Environment, Water and Natural Resources

THURSDAY 23 JULY AT 10.00 AM

Minister for Employment, Higher Education and Skills

Minister for Science and Information Economy

Minister for Status of Women

Minister for Business Services and Consumers

Department of State Development (part)

Administered Items for the Department of State Development (part)

Department for Communities and Social Inclusion (part)

Administered Items for the Department for Communities and Social Inclusion (part)

Attorney-General's Department (part)

Administered Items for the Attorney-General's Department (part)

Independent Gambling Authority

FRIDAY 24 JULY AT 10.00 AM

Minister for Education and Childhood Development

Minister for Child Protection Reform

Minister for Public Sector

Department of Education and Child Development

Administered Items for the Department of Education and Child Development

Department of the Premier and Cabinet (part)

Administered Items for the Department of the Premier and Cabinet (part)

MONDAY 27 JULY AT 9.00 AM

Minister for Disabilities

Minister for Police

Minister for Correctional Services

Minister for Emergency Services

Minister for Road Safety

Minister for Regional Development

Minister for Local Government

Department for Communities and Social Inclusion (part)

Administered Items for the Department for Communities and Social Inclusion (part)

South Australia Police

Administered Items for South Australia Police

Department for Correctional Services

Department for Planning, Transport and Infrastructure (part)

Administered Items for the Department for Planning, Transport and Infrastructure (part)

Administered Items for the Department of Treasury and Finance (part)

Department of Primary Industries and Regions

Administered Items for the Department of Primary Industries and Regions

TUESDAY 28 JULY AT 10.00 AM

Minister for Communities and Social Inclusion

Minister for Social Housing

Minister for Multicultural Affairs

Minister for Ageing

Minister for Youth

Minister for Volunteers

Department for Communities and Social Inclusion (part)

Administered Items for the Department for Communities and Social Inclusion (part)

Department for Health and Ageing (part)

Motion carried.

The Hon. G.G. BROCK (Frome—Minister for Regional Development, Minister for Local Government) (18:14): I move:

That Estimates Committee A be appointed, consisting of Ms Bedford, the Hon. P. Caica, Ms Chapman, Mr Gardner, Hon. J.M. Rankine, Mr Tarzia and Ms Wortley.

Motion carried.

The Hon. G.G. BROCK (Frome—Minister for Regional Development, Minister for Local Government) (18:14): I move:

That Estimates Committee B be appointed, consisting of Mr Odenwalder, Ms Cook, Ms Digance, Mr Duluk, Mr Picton, Mr Speirs and Mr Whetstone.

Motion carried.

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