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House of Assembly - Fifty-Third Parliament, Second Session (53-2)
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Rail Safety National Law (South Australia) (Miscellaneous No 3) Amendment Bill

Second Reading

Adjourned debate on second reading.

(Continued from 16 February 2017.)

Mr PISONI (Unley) (15:37): I rise as the lead speaker for the opposition on this bill. The Liberal Party supports the government's bill. In December 2009, the Council of Australian Governments implemented national rail safety reform, creating a single rail safety regulator, and developed the Rail Safety National Law. The Rail Safety National Law commenced operation in January 2013, with Queensland also adopting the law last year. The Office of the National Rail Safety Regulator now operates in all jurisdictions. The Office of the National Rail Safety Regulator was established as a body corporate under the law. It facilitates safe rail operation through accreditation of operators, industry guidance, education, training, etc.

The national training commission identifies legislative amendments in cooperation with the regulator and participating jurisdictions. Ministers of the Transport and Infrastructure Council approved this bill on 6 November 2015. South Australia, as host jurisdiction, is responsible for the passage of the amendments through the South Australian parliament, subsequently being automatically adopted into legislation by other participating jurisdictions through an application act.

The bill is the third amendment package brought to the South Australian parliament and similarly has additions to the Rail Safety National Law (South Australia) Act 2012. The amendment introduces powers of the regulator to charge additional fees to major rail projects designed to ensure that regulatory oversight and operations can be properly maintained as the number of rail projects increases. The bill also includes a review mechanism that will allow a rail transport operator to seek a review of the regulator's decision that the project is a major project.

It also specifies that the Rail Industry Safety and Standards Board Ltd is a prescribed authority for the purposes of sharing information to achieve national law objectives. It clarifies that a registered person may surrender a private sighting of his or her registration without the need to surrender the entire registration or go through a variation process, as is the current case. It introduces the procedure for a rail transport operator to surrender an exemption granted by the regulator separate to the regulator's power to suspend or cancel an exemption. Subordinate legislation will specify the additional project component fee amounts and the criteria that the regulator must consider when determining whether a project component fee is payable. I also understand that this bill has the support of the Minister for Transport and Infrastructure, the council and major stakeholders such as the Rail Industry Association. On that basis, we support the bill.

Mr GEE (Napier) (15:40): Today, I am pleased to speak on this important bill, which is continuing the improvements to rail safety across the nation. As the house may be aware, the Rail Safety National Law commenced operation in January 2013 with the Office of the National Rail Safety Regulator also being established. The Rail Safety National Law is currently enacted through legislation in all jurisdictions except Queensland, which is expected to become a participating jurisdiction on 1 July this year.

Since its establishment, the national safety regulator has successfully discharged its obligations, including providing a scheme for national accreditation in rail transport operators, promotion of national policies and procedures, and guidance to industry, as well as making positive progress on education and training in relation to safe rail work operations.

This bill will allow the National Rail Safety Regulator to charge additional fees for major rail projects. While no-one likes additional fees, the fact is that when the Office of the National Rail Safety Regulator was established in 2012 investment in major rail projects had an estimated value of $15.4 billion. However, in 2016 major rail projects announced, or having already commenced, total in excess of $60 billion. Naturally the Office of the National Rail Safety Regulator is not resourced to provide the level of oversight necessary without the introduction of this major rail project fee.

While we are on the topic of major rail projects, it would be remiss of me not to mention the $238 million Torrens Rail Junction Project. Stage 1 of the Goodwood and Torrens Rail Junction Project was finished in 2014, with the completion of the Goodwood rail junction and Adelaide Showground station upgrades. Stage 2 works are now underway and include a grade separation of freight and passenger lines at the Torrens rail junction, a new overpass at the Mike Turtur bikeway over the rail line at Goodwood Station and grade improvements for pedestrians and cyclists at the Leader Street rail crossing at Wayville. Stage 2 is expected to support about 212 jobs a year during construction.

This Labor government is getting on with delivering real improvements in conjunction with other major road projects, such as the Northern Connector Project, the Darlington Upgrade Project, and the Torrens Road to River Torrens Project. I might add that the Torrens Road to River Torrens Project has also seen the removal of a busy level crossing, with the construction of the Outer Harbor rail overpass. This would never have occurred if those opposite had won in 2014, as they promised to scrap the Torrens Road to River Torrens Project in favour of the Darlington Upgrade Project, which this Labor government is also doing. It reminds me a bit of the old El Paso ad, except that instead of, 'Why don't we have both?' we could say, 'Why don't we build both?'.

Members interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order!

Mr GEE: I am glad they found that amusing. I am pleased that the government has earmarked the Broadmeadows and Smithfield railway stations for a possible upgrade, which I am sure will be welcomed by the many people in my electorate who use the Gawler line. This government is also committed—

Mr Pederick interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Member for Hammond, what were you on before question time?

Mr GEE: —$152.4 million towards the electrification of the Gawler line from Adelaide to Salisbury.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: You are out if you continue, member for Hammond, another noise and you are out. Your voice carries. Sorry, member for Napier, that is not fair.

Mr GEE: Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. The state government will shortly be issuing a tender for the electrification, with construction to start in the second half of this year. However, sadly, electrification of the Salisbury to Gawler section remains unfunded, due to the Coalition walking away from the project in 2013. During last year's federal election campaign, federal Labor announced that it would reverse the $76 million cut, but the Coalition failed to make the matching offer, which shows their lack of commitment to the people of the north.

Mr Bell: We gave you $50 billion for the submarines.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Member for Mount Gambier!

Mr GEE: The member for Unley complains that the Gawler electrification is ranked in the lower order of proposed initiatives by Infrastructure Australia and that this means that the government is asleep at the wheel. I wonder if he means his counterparts in Canberra, who pulled the funding for the project, are asleep at the wheel or maybe indeed it is he who is asleep at the wheel, not calling on his mates at Canberra to reverse those cuts.

I note that the Liberals' Globe Link plan—also known as the great Adelaide Hills sandbag—is also not on the Infrastructure Australia priority list, and the commonwealth department responsible for evaluating, planning and investing in infrastructure knows nothing about it, nor has any information on it, as we found out during Senate estimates on Monday. This is on top of failing to consult with key industry groups such as the South Australian Freight Council—

Mr Pederick interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Member for Hammond, the next time you speak you will have to leave.

Mr GEE: —Adelaide Airport and the Adelaide Airports Association. It appears that, as usual, those opposite are the ones who might be asleep at the wheel. I am pleased to support this bill and I hope the Rail Safety National Law continues to improve rail safety across the country.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: You do not really deserve to be recognised, do you, member for Hammond?

Mr PEDERICK: I know I am little, Madam Deputy Speaker—

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: No! You know you should have left the room for interjections, is what I mean. We are all now going to listen to you in silence, which is a courtesy you did not extend to the member for Napier—

Mr Bell interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: If the member for Mount Gambier moves his lips once more, he can leave, too. Member for Hammond.

Mr PEDERICK (Hammond) (15:46): Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, and I acknowledge your tolerance. I want to speak to the Rail Safety National Law (South Australia) (Miscellaneous No 3) Amendment Bill 2017. I am quite happy to speak on this bill after that withering attack from the member for Napier.

In December 2009, the Council of Australian Governments implemented national rail safety reform, creating a single rail safety regulator, and developed the Rail Safety National Law. The Office of the National Rail Safety Regulator was established as a body corporate under the law and facilitates safe rail operation through accreditation of operators, industry guidance, education, training and other matters. The National Transport Commission identifies legislative amendments in cooperation with the regulator and participating jurisdictions.

Ministers of the Transport and Infrastructure Council approved this bill on 6 November 2015, and South Australia, being the host jurisdiction, is responsible for passage of amendment bills through the South Australian parliament, subsequently automatically adopted into legislation by other participating jurisdictions through an application act. This bill is the third amendment package brought to the South Australian parliament, similarly to additions to the national Rail Safety National Law (South Australia) Act 2012.

This amendment bill introduces powers for the regulator to charge additional fees for major rail projects, designed to ensure regulatory oversight of operations, so that they can be properly maintained as the number of rail projects increases. The bill also includes a review mechanism that will allow a rail transport operator to seek a review of the regulator's decision that a project is a major project.

The bill also specifies the Rail Industry Safety and Standards Board Limited as a prescribed authority for purposes of sharing information to achieve national law objectives and clarifies that a registered person may surrender a private siding from its registration without the need to surrender the entire registration or go through a variation process, as is currently the case. It also introduces a procedure for a rail transport operator to surrender an exemption granted by the regulator separate from the regulator's powers to suspend or cancel an exemption.

There will be some subordinate legislation that will specify the additional project component fee amounts and the criteria the regulator must consider when determining whether a project component fee is payable. From what I understand, this bill has the support of ministers of transport, the infrastructure council and major stakeholders, such as the rail industry associations.

I want to talk about a few issues to do with rail in this state. I note that the member for Napier brought up the issue of Gawler electrification. Yes, it has been a long time coming. We have seen the poles put in and nothing else happen. We have seen the embarrassment of diesel engines having to take electric trains to be serviced because there are no electric facilities to do the job. I have a long family connection to the Gawler area, with both sets of grandparents having lived there and one of my grandfathers having been a porter on the railways back in the day when you had porters.

The Hon. S.C. Mullighan: You should run for Light.

Mr PEDERICK: I have plenty of contacts. There are plenty of Pedericks buried in that area, up at Gawler River on our country. Yes, I probably could have had a run up there, but I have never lived up there. My father lived in that area.

Certainly, there is the issue of when that electrification is going to happen, if it ever gets off the ground. I look at what has happened with the Seaford line, where we have seen major breakdowns with the loss of power, poor quality cabling in place, services having to stop for many hours and substitute buses so people can have public transport on the Seaford line.

Another rail issue I want to talk about is the demise of the Mallee lines, which I think is terrible. It is sad that there have not been enough dollars put into the Mallee lines to keep them up to speed. I know that when they were last operating a couple of years ago the trains had to go very slowly, and they were just grain trains heading out to Pinnaroo or out through Karoonda towards Loxton. You certainly have to have the trains running only at night and certainly on days like this, when the temperature would be in the high 30s during harvest, the trains run at 25 km/h, so, yes, they were inefficient. In the end, I believe that was used as part of the excuse to shut those lines down.

The offset of that effect is that it puts thousands of more tonnes on the road, and that was certainly exemplified in this most recent harvest, which was the biggest harvest in South Australia's history and when so many more tonnes of grain had to come up those Mallee roads. I have talked in this place before about getting some overtaking lanes out there. There have been various theories about how the Mallee highway, up through Lameroo and Pinnaroo, was built; some say someone followed a goat and one theory is that perhaps they were paid more to survey more corners into the road because it certainly looks like that.

As someone who travels along it many times a year and has travelled along it many times over my lifetime, it is a terrible road. In fact, plenty of people have put to me that, if the rail corridor is not going to be used, it would have a much straighter road, but that would be a huge project. I think you would be far better off bringing the rail back to speed instead of going down that path, but it is certainly something that has been discussed in Mallee circles.

With the loss of those lines, we do lose a whole range of opportunities. I fear that we will have issues where Victoria will gazump us in getting rail freight around to the north. Victoria is looking at putting in rail through Mildura and further north in Victoria, whereas our rail lines out to the Mallee are closed down. This is a real pity for road users because those roads are getting pounded now by that extra tonnage.

During harvest, Viterra did get there in the end, but they were a little bit slow in building bunkers at Tailem Bend. I was talking to them during harvest. I suggested to them before harvest that they would need to build some bunkers in that area and they thought they would hold off. Just before Christmas I was told, 'They might build four or six bunkers.' In the end, they built 12 scratch bunkers, and they had the capacity of 220,000 tonnes. Tailem Bend is that inland strategic site or that inland grain port.

I should never get a text message from Viterra saying they are full of a variety, and I did say that to them at times. They want grain to go to Tailem Bend, but they are bypassing sites such as Peake and Geranium, and the Coonalpyn bunkers were not open and I am told will never open again. Coonalpyn is obviously in the South-East, not on the Mallee line, but in the direct line to Tailem Bend. We need to have grain in there and certainly there was a need for Lameroo's bunkers to be opened because of a whole host of tonnage of barley coming over from Victoria on our roads again.

I think we have missed a real opportunity with the rail where we could have had some opportunities for two-way freight in Victoria. I can understand why Viterra would not want to do it. Why would they want to put grain into Victoria when their ports are in our state? I get that, but there is also a lot of grain that goes that way, especially in a big grain year like this. Whatever happens, there is opportunity for grain to go over there for piggeries, feed lots and other uses, which could have been carted more suitably on rail.

Sadly, we are where we are and I am just glad that the Adelaide-Melbourne line is in good nick, and that is certainly utilised to a large extent by Viterra and others. They can load some pretty big trains—3,000 or 3,500-tonne trains—and they can do a couple of them a day. They can get grain going to port relatively quickly, so we want to see that continue. I noticed the member for Napier, as the other side do because they did not think about it, had a crack at our Globe Link policy.

Mr Bell: Good policy.

Mr PEDERICK: This is good policy, member for Mount Gambier. I think it is great policy. This has been an idea that has been thought about for 15 to 20 years and we have said, 'Let's get it out there. Let's get it progressing.' This is not just a rail bypass around the Hills but also a road bypass around the Hills, and a freight airport that can operate 24 hours a day out of the Monarto region in my electorate.

I reckon I could just about read the minister's mind of what he will say about rail freight going around north of the city. I know the minister has said in the past that 80 per cent of truck freight has to come into Adelaide. I have not checked those figures, but what I do know is that you could send trucks around to the north and connect up with the road train route where you have trucks towing two trailers coming straight into Port Adelaide, which they do now.

There is a real opportunity with Globe Link for road freight, bringing those trucks around to the north of Adelaide pulling two trailers. The junction could be at Monarto where they hook up the second trailer. They could then go in around the top, making that far more efficient. We could also do that with the rail. As far as freight is concerned, rail freight is not really that viable between Adelaide and Melbourne because we are too close.

The simple fact is that with rail freight you need those long leads, whether you are going through to Perth or Darwin. You certainly do not need to go up the Hills from Monarto, up through Mount Barker, going through all those Adelaide Hills areas at Blackwood and down through there. But Labor's plan obviously is that they will just keep trains going up through the Hills, through Blackwood, upsetting all those constituents, and then they will have to come down into the city.

As far as truck freight is concerned, currently a lot of the freight comes down the hill. In the past, we have seen some terrible accidents at the bottom of the hill, at the Glen Osmond intersection. The freight goes around Portrush Road, shoots around to Hampstead and heads down to the Port. I can tell you from experience of driving that route that it takes about 45 minutes to get to the port from Glen Osmond. Again, the Labor Party, the Labor government, do not want to bypass. They want to shoot the trucks straight into Badcoe, up near Elder, giving grief to all those residents throughout the City of Adelaide.

This is going to grow into the future as our freight grows into the future. We have a great opportunity with Globe Link to bring both road and rail around the city. This also links in with our plans with Globe Link to have an airport. As far as the eastern side of our state is concerned, I think it is the best location you could have. It would only be about four hours from Port Augusta, four hours from Mount Gambier, two or 2½ hours from the Riverland, 20 minutes from the Hills and on the doorstep of the Murraylands and Mallee. I think it is an ideal location to aggregate freight, as many companies have done over years now.

We have a Big W forwarding centre at Monarto. They use great code technology to split up their loads to be sent around Australia from that location So, it is already being used as a freight area, and there is great opportunity for other companies. I know Scott's and a whole range of others that have gone in there, as has Australian Portable Camps. There is so much opportunity from that area to expand not only rail freight options but road freight options and air freight options as well.

These things do come at a cost. People have asked me, 'How are you going to pay for it?' Well, it will not be our money because we will not have the billions of dollars in this budget to pay for it, especially after this government is finished with it. It will need federal funding, private investment and some state co-investment. It is visionary ideas like this that really will lead us into the future in the 21st century. There are lots of opportunities and we need to grasp them. We need to stop shutting down rail in this state, and we need to embrace opportunities and develop them.

As we have said, if we gain power in March 2018, in our first 100 days we will spend $20 million putting the business case together on why we should have Globe Link, why we should have that better, faster access of rail around the City of Adelaide to save all that freight going up through the Adelaide Hills, coming up past Blackwood and down into the city, blocking up intersections along Cross Road with train freight that could be far better suited going around to the north of Adelaide. There may be some freight that has to come into the city, and it could tap in from the north. As I indicated, there are so many options, not just with the rail freight but with road freight and a potential increase in road train operations to get efficiency and far better freight movements into the future.

Let's hope we get some far better outcomes. I say to the government, do not debunk our ideas just because they are great ideas and are forward-thinking. Just get on with it, and let's have some great transport designs into the future. With those few words, I support the passage of the bill.

Mr WHETSTONE (Chaffey) (16:05): I rise to make a contribution on the Rail Safety National Law (South Australia) (Miscellaneous No 3) Amendment Bill and provide some background to this bill. In December 2009, the Council of Australian Governments implemented national rail safety reform, creating a single rail safety regulator developed in Rail Safety National Law.

The Rail Safety National Law commenced operation in January 2013. With Queensland last year adopting the law, the Office of the National Rail Safety Regulator now operates in all jurisdictions. The Office of the National Rail Safety Regulator was established as a body corporate under the law and facilitates safe rail operations through accreditation of operators, industry guidance, education and training. South Australia, as host jurisdiction, is responsible for the passage of amendment bills through the South Australian parliament subsequently being automatically adopted into legislation by other participating jurisdictions through the application act.

Turning to the details of the amendment bill, it introduces powers for the regulator to charge additional fees for major rail projects, designed to ensure regulatory oversight of operators can be properly maintained as the number of rail projects increases. The bill also includes a review mechanism that will allow the rail transport operator to seek a review of the regulator's decision that a project is a major project.

It also specifies Rail Industry Safety and Standards Board Limited as a prescribed authority for the purposes of sharing information to achieve national law objectives, and it clarifies that a registered person may surrender a private siding from its registration without the need to surrender the entire registration or go through a variation process, as currently is the case. The bill also introduces a procedure for a rail transport operator to surrender an exemption granted by the regulator, separate to the regulator's power to suspend or cancel an exemption.

While I was doing a little bit of research on the rail, I was astounded to read that, in the National Rail Safety Regulator Annual Report 2015-2016, the total number of suicides relating to our rail system in Australia is quite concerning. Due to the nature of these incidents, they are often not reported. There were 73 deaths through suicide in Australia, which is a huge number. One is too many, but the three that happened in South Australia were just a small amount of what we have seen happen on a national scale.

On another note, there were also a number of people hit by trains in 2015-16 sustaining injuries. Some of the major train crossings in metropolitan South Australia have pedestrian access over the train line, but the smaller crossings mean that people have to potentially directly walk across the path of an oncoming train. Of the 462 serious injuries in Australia in the 2015-16 year, around 81 per cent related to slips, trips or falls while crossing a train line. In New South Wales this comprised 85 per cent of their reports on serious injuries; in Victoria, 51 per cent; in Western Australia, 50 per cent; and there were no serious injuries resulting from a slip or a fall in South Australia, which is good news.

As at 30 June 2016, there were 45 operators accredited by the National Rail Safety Regulator under the Rail Safety National Law for operators in South Australia. There are three primary rail networks in South Australia: the Adelaide Metro passenger rail network, the Defined Interstate Rail Network; and the Genesee & Wyoming rail network, comprising approximately 1,870 kilometres. While we will touch on the issue of Genesee & Wyoming in the great electorate of Chaffey in the Riverland and Mallee, I worked with the minister on ways that we could avert the closure of those two rail lines, to keep those rail lines that were in need of repair. They had not been maintained for a number of years.

The rail line was at a point where it had become inefficient. It had heat restrictions, it had speed restrictions—it had restrictions of all sorts, which meant that rail was becoming more and more inefficient, and it was keeping about 200,000 tonnes per annum off the road. What we are seeing now is that extra 200,000 tonnes on our roads. This year, we have seen a record grain harvest, so we are seeing more than that put on our roads.

What we are seeing now is that road transport is becoming the only option. We are seeing trucks of all denominations, all shapes and sizes, that are using the Mallee Highway, the Karoonda Highway, and the Sturt Highway. Sadly, even though there was a bit over $2 million spent on the Karoonda Highway and some minor works undertaken on the Mallee Highway, we are seeing those roads fall into an acute state of disrepair. We are seeing trucks being used to carry grain or broadacre horticulture. When I say 'broadacre horticulture', I am talking about potatoes, onions and carrots. We are seeing all sorts of horticulture, and the vintage is currently underway, so all these trucks are now diverting their path of delivery via the Sturt Highway because it is a road that is not destroying their trucks.

We are seeing shoulders that are falling away and potholes. We are seeing the undulation on all these roads, but particularly the Karoonda Highway and the Loxton to Pinnaroo road are in such a state of disrepair that trucks are having to travel much further distances so that they do not destroy their suspension or their trucks on these roads that seem invisible to a government's budget when they are crying out for help.

What we are concerned about now is that the rail has ceased. Genesee & Wyoming has the lease over the infrastructure, and they are not maintaining it. The rail corridor is overrun with weeds. I would like to know whether any of the rail infrastructure has been looked at. Has it been checked? Is there a need to check it? Will it ever be used again? I have always been a very strong advocate of never saying never because you never know.

The closure of Loxton to Tailem Bend and Pinnaroo to Tailem Bend has put huge pressure on our roads. It has put a huge blight on the rail network in South Australia. All the commodity groups are acting accordingly; that is, our grain wholesalers and grain receiving depots are adjusting prices to transport and deliver grain so that it is taken from the farm to the port. It is taken to Roseworthy. It is taken to receiving depots that best suit them.

The rail network on these two lines has now been abandoned. It shows no respect for what it is doing to not only the condition of roads but also the nature of the impact on all vehicles, not only on trucks, heavy vehicles and passenger vehicles. Safety is now being compromised. That shows that, while we have a government that is continually focused on its back door, with the money that is currently being spent in Adelaide and surrounding areas, it is not focusing on spending money on our roads and productive infrastructure in South Australia. Sadly, the focus is certainly not on that productive infrastructure.

I have already acknowledged that the minister has put some money towards the Karoonda Highway with the $2.3 million upgrade. That was for 20 kilometres of shoulder sealing along some of the worst sections. The Premier and the Minister for Mineral Resources came up only a couple of years ago with pomp and ceremony when Murray Zircon reopened its mine at Mindarie in the Mallee. They made a pledge to upgrade the shoulders there. There is a small amount of shoulder sealing next to Mindarie, but some of the worst parts of that highway were not addressed. Now that the mine has closed, we are still seeing a small amount of zircon leaving the unused site. We are reducing the use of zircon, but we are seeing an increase, particularly in agriculture, of livestock on our roads.

In terms of commodity prices, there is an increase of grain production. Many people understand that the commodity price for grain is reaching a point where you have to produce volume to keep your business viable. So, we are growing more grain, using more technology, with poorer roads, now with B-doubles. We are trialling B-triple and road trains at the moment, and I acknowledge that. I think it is a step in the right direction. While we are doing that, we also need to address the increasing number of trucks, which need better and safer roads. Obviously, that all comes down to money. It is becoming a safety issue in South Australia.

I intend to talk about a report undertaken by the RDA in 2014. They came to the conclusion that the cessation of rail in the Mallee would increase by 30 B-doubles per day. I challenge that number. I think it is more in the vicinity of an extra 60 to 70 B-doubles. They were talking about four extra B-doubles from Karoonda to Tailem Bend. We took an extra 12 B-doubles from Lameroo to Pinnaroo. All of these truck numbers are adding up. The once up to 200,000 tonnes of grain that was put on rail is now put on the road, so we are seeing more and more pressure put on roads, and safety issues, particularly with passenger vehicles, are becoming more apparent. Something needs to change.

The minister needs to acknowledge that we need better shoulders and a better line of sight on our highways. We need to address the issue of the parallel rail line on highways. Once upon a time, if a truck pulled out onto a highway, its rear trailer crossed the rail. The rail is now not operating, so what are we going to do to get a better line of sight on our highways?

It is stated by DPTI that on an average daily volume you could expect marginally, at peak transfer times, that low-volume traffic highways have the capacity to manage these increases. Viterra would also have to reprofile the domestic and export mix that new facilities carry to help optimise larger transfers. As I said, these larger transfers are now being stimulated by the cost of freight to keep the trucks on the road longer and get it closer to port. What it means is that what was once upon a time a mixture of road and rail is now no mixture; it is now all road infrastructure, a road network only, that, as I said, is leading the state to a point where we are becoming less and less productive, less and less efficient.

We see the number of truck breakdowns, the number of accidents. I note the two recent truck rollovers on the Karoonda Highway. They were both grain trucks, and those trucks rolled on a negative camber corner. So again, are we addressing the safety of our roads, are we addressing productivity gains, are we addressing making South Australia a target for transporting our grain straight to port rather than having to double handle, and in some cases triple handle, that grain?

A couple of the speakers on this side have listened to the minister, particular in question time yesterday, when he talked about the South Australian Liberals' Globe Link proposal. He answered a Dorothy Dixer, and I thought it was an outstanding answer from the minister, particularly when he selected quotes from the Senate inquiry, with questions asked about Globe Link. There was no reference to the South Australian Liberal policy, it was just, 'Have you heard about Globe Link? Have you heard about Globe Link or a globe or a link in South Australia?'

That was a fairly selective Dorothy Dixer, particularly when it comes to what I think is an outstanding policy. It is about productive infrastructure, it is about taking what we would call an inefficient transport system here in South Australia, whether we talk about freight on roads coming down the South Eastern Freeway, coming down from Mount Barker. Just imagine the number of mothers taking children to school, anyone in a passenger vehicle, looking in their rear vehicle mirror waiting for a truck that has lost its brakes, is out of control. We have seen it happen all too many times.

Look at the trucks once you get onto Portrush Road. That is one of the most inefficient freight networks I have seen anywhere in the country. Again, Globe Link is trying to circumnavigate those unsafe areas. We are looking at putting it more on flat-gradient type country and running parallel with rail, getting that freight through the Northern Expressway, Sturt Highway into the ports via the Northern Connector.

It is about productivity, it is about double stacking containers so that they can actually create a productivity gain. Currently, you cannot do that, going through the tunnels, and going through the Adelaide Hills they have to run at slower speeds to keep the noise down. Where is the vision for this productivity gain in South Australia? The increased amount of freight we are seeing on our roads now is all happening because we are embracing research and technology, we are embracing new means on farms, we are producing a lot more grain per hectare, we are doing continual rotations and we are looking at new ways of driving our economy, being more productive, being able to compete with international markets.

By doing that, we have to reduce our costs on farm, but we are not seeing any support when it comes to reducing our logistics, getting our product from farm to port, getting our product from farm to airport. The minister's Dorothy Dixer yesterday really did not tell the story. Of course, the minister is always going to pooh-pooh anything of quality, and that is the Globe Link proposal put to South Australian transport operators. They think it is a sensational idea.

We have also heard that the Freight Council said they did not think it was a good idea. Well, why would they think it was a good idea when Adelaide Airport is their number one member? I visited Toowoomba Airport last week and met with the owners. We talked at length about the viability of an airport and the catchment area needed to make that airport viable, with either a combination of passenger or freight or freight alone.

Let's be plain about this. We are not talking about an airport that is going to be built tomorrow: this is a 20-year project. It is something that is in our sights in the '2036' document and it is something that we in South Australia are missing. Again, we need to make sure that South Australia does move forward, its rail is made safe and its roads are safe. I ask the minister to respond.

Mr ODENWALDER (Little Para) (16:25): I rise to make a very brief contribution to the Rail Safety National Law (South Australia) (Miscellaneous No 3) Amendment Bill. As we know, the Rail Safety National Law is currently enacted through legislation in all jurisdictions except Queensland, which is expected to become a participating jurisdiction on 1 July this year. As we know, this bill will allow the rail safety regulators to charge additional fees for major rail projects. This is required due to investment in major rail projects more than tripling since 2012. Naturally, the Office of the National Rail Safety Regulator is not resourced to provide the level of oversight necessary, without the introduction of this major rail project fee.

This Labor government is getting on with delivering rail improvements, such as the Torrens and Goodwood Rail Junction Project in conjunction with other major road projects such as the Northern Connector, the Darlington upgrade and Torrens to Torrens. I am not as familiar with the numbers for Darlington and Torrens to Torrens but, with the Northern Connector particularly, the jobs figures are as important to us as the infrastructure build itself, particularly for people in my electorate where, as we know, Holden is closing on 20 October. I am pleased that Lendlease, which is building the Northern Connector, has built up a very good relation with the Holden Transition Centre and with our automotive task force, which is looking after the supply chain people who previously supplied Holden.

The minister and the government have built into the tender process requirements about local economic benefit, and this translates to jobs for people in the northern suburbs. We are hopeful and we predict that we will exceed at least 50 per cent of jobs in the north from that project. I have heard that there were similar projects around Torrens to Torrens and Darlington, and the minister can correct me if I am wrong. Certainly, the local jobs figures are improved by these infrastructure builds.

I know that many people in the western suburbs are looking forward to the level crossing at Park Terrace being removed as part of the Torrens rail junction project, just as we in the north are looking forward to the day the Northern Connector project is finished. The people in the electorates of Light and Schubert are probably looking forward to that as well. That is due to be finished in 2019.

The Torrens Road to River Torrens project has also seen the removal of a busy level crossing with the construction of the Outer Harbor rail overpass. This would not have occurred if those opposite had won the last election in 2014, as they promised to scrap the Torrens to Torrens project in favour of the Darlington upgrade project.

This government has also committed $152.4 million towards the electrification of the Gawler rail line from Adelaide to Salisbury, which is great if you live in Salisbury. The state government will shortly be issuing a tender for this electrification with construction to start in the second half of this year. This is great but it does not go far enough. Sadly, the electrification of the Salisbury to Gawler section, which will benefit people in my electorate and benefit people in Light and Schubert, as I said before, remains unfunded due to the Coalition walking away from the project in 2013.

We did see some reports that this was due largely to the fact that apparently DPTI had not produced a business plan. Again, I stand to be corrected if I am wrong, minister, but I think in 2012 a business plan of 150 pages, I am led to believe, was submitted to Infrastructure Australia. I could be being led up the garden path, but I believe that is the case. I may have even seen a copy, but again, we hear the member for Unley, I think, make that claim. Again, I could be wrong, but I think it was the member for Unley.

Members interjecting:

Mr ODENWALDER: Either I am wrong or the member for Unley is wrong. We will see what happens. During last year's election campaign, the federal Labor Party announced that it would reverse the $76 million cut, but the Coalition did not. I call upon those opposite in this place to stand up for South Australians and stop doing everything that Canberra demands. After all, we are here to represent the best interests of South Australians and not the best interests of the Coalition government in Canberra. I am pleased to support this bill, and I hope that the Rail Safety National Law continues to improve rail safety across the country.

Mr DULUK (Davenport) (16:29): I would also like to make a contribution on the rail safety national law bill and put on the record that we on this side of the house support the bill. I want to make a few comments on South Australian rail transport and rail infrastructure because, for those who know, they are huge parts of the electorates of Davenport, Waite and Elder and the surrounding areas of the Mitcham Hills.

On a daily basis, the people I represent are affected and impacted by rail in this state. The rail line—that is, the Belair passenger line and the freight line—cuts through the Mitcham Hills, passing thousands of homes and businesses on a daily basis. Taken together with the Cross Road intersection at Hawthorn, about 63,000 vehicles cross the track daily in this section, so we are talking about a bit of rail line that affects tens of thousands of South Australians on a daily basis. Anything we can do to improve the safety of the rail line for commuters, to improve the efficiency of the rail track for both passenger and freight and anything we can do to increase patronage, especially on our passenger rail service, is very important.

To that extent, I would like to speak about the need for additional park-and-ride facilities in my electorate. The reality is that people will not use public transport if they cannot find a car park close to a station. Of course, as we all know, the use of public transport is vital in reducing road congestion, but it needs to be accessible and an attractive alternative for commuters. There is no point asking commuters in my community to catch the train if that train journey is going to take 40, 45 or 50 minutes in the morning when the alternative is to drive.

If you drive to the Eden Hills train station to catch the train for your morning commute and you have not parked your car by 7.30am, you will not get a car park. Commuters end up turning around and driving down the hill into the city, adding to congestion issues. Just this week, we saw that the ARTC will no longer be making available their portion of land at Eden Hills for car parking, which means that there will be further pressure on the existing department car parking at the Eden Hills train station. If we do not address this issue, we will see fewer people using the Belair service.

Of course, an additional park-and-ride and an expansion of the current park-and-ride stations along the Belair train line are both critically important. I say that especially in relation to Eden Hills and Bellevue Heights. At the 2014 election, the Labor government pledged funding for a scoping study for park-and-ride facilities across various locations in Adelaide, including Bellevue Heights, but so far there has been no action, much to the disappointment of local residents. As I said before, if we want people to use public transport, especially rail transport, we need to provide a service that is accessible and efficient to them.

Another really big concern for my community—and this actually goes to the heart of rail safety—is that of the repeated boom gate failures along the Belair line at Blackwood, Glenalta and Coromandel railway stations, but in particular at the Glenalta station. It is an ongoing issue for residents and commuters. The boom gate failures, which are too many and too frequent, hold up traffic and cause frustration. I am still waiting for a response from the minister about the boom gate failures in late January, which of course closed the Blackwood, Glenalta and Coromandel stations simultaneously.

It is a risk in an emergency situation. Emergency vehicles have difficulty accessing the Mitcham Hills area and, in the event of an evacuation, the gridlock you would see through my community in the event that the three boom gates were down would just be horrendous. On a too regular basis and, dare I say, even on a monthly basis at the moment, we are seeing boom gate failures on the Belair line.

Governments should plan for the worst and hope for the best. Should the worst ever happen when the boom gates were down, as I said before, it would be truly catastrophic for the Mitcham Hills. Despite that risk—we all know about the risk and hopefully we are now at the back end of the bushfire season, even though there is another month or two to go—the infrastructure continues to be neglected by the government. The government has failed to fix the issue on an ongoing basis since 2015 when works were started to fix the ongoing signalling issues, but they have not been fixed appropriately.

The government has constantly ignored calls from me, local residents and, of course, a parliamentary committee in 2009 that sought huge investment in the road and rail infrastructure of the Mitcham Hills to ensure that issues like boom gate failures did not occur. We need action and we need to improve the reliability of the level crossing boom gates. There is a petition in my office collecting signatures on this issue for residents of my community. In the first month of the petition running, hundreds of people contacted my office to raise their concerns about the issue of boom gate failures along the Belair line.

As I said before, the rail use through my community is incredible. It is probably one of the biggest rail corridors through suburban Adelaide. It has the Adelaide Metro line, which provides a passenger service, and of course it has a freight line, which is the central corridor of the Melbourne-Adelaide-Perth rail line. That rail freight line causes lengthy delays at all crossings across the line and frustrated commuters are trapped on a daily basis in peak hour bottlenecks.

The cost of traffic congestion in terms of lost productivity and the impact on quality of life is incredible. Of course, that means less time at home with family and friends, more time on the commute and a frustrated worker when they get to work. There are also health concerns for local residents from the noise pollution as a result of the topography of the Adelaide Hills in that it is just not suitable for modern trains. There are steep gradients which, combined with tight corners, emit noise squeal at an intense level.

If you were to design a modern rail freight network, you would not put kilometres of rail freight line through the Adelaide Hills. As I mentioned before, bushfire safety is a constant concern for my community and there are justified fears of freight line derailments, especially on fire danger days. Freight trains may start a fire from sparks emitted when the freight trains brake heavily on tight curves through the Hills. In February 2014, a fire began in the Belair National Park and it is believed that it was as a result of a freight train.

The other issue with the freight line going through my community and through the Adelaide Hills is that of limited capacity. The Adelaide-Melbourne rail line has served our community since about the 1880s and capacity constraints are going to hit us before we know it. As I said, the tight curves, the steep gradients and the height restrictions along the Adelaide Hills corridor limit our ability to increase the freight load. If we are to become an efficient state again and a state that drives its economic activity through exports and through our primary producers, then we need to have freight operating efficiently in South Australia.

By 2030, we expect to see a 90 per cent increase in freight capacity going through South Australia, going to about 10.7 million tonnes. This 10.7 million tonnes is the expected capacity of the freight line, so within a decade we will be hitting capacity for freight movement in South Australia. What we are saying at the moment is that within 10 years we will not be able to improve our economic capacity or our economic growth in terms of freight movement as a result of capacity constraint on our freight lines in particular.

South Australia is at risk of being cut out of interstate freight movement. It would be an absolute shame for this state if providers and operators saw an inability for efficient freight movement through South Australia and created alternative networks. There is a solution to all this, and that is simply to invest in the infrastructure. We need a modern rail network, one that capitalises on improving technology, one that manages increased train speed and load-carrying ability, one that is internationally competitive and a network that can improve end-to-end supply chain efficiencies for South Australian businesses, exporters and potential investors.

It is not just me and members of the Liberal Party who are talking about this issue at the moment in terms of capacity constraints and the need to do something about it. This week, Infrastructure Australia released its priority initiatives. It talks about the Melbourne to Adelaide to Perth rail upgrade. On page 104 of that document, it states the problem:

The interstate rail freight network in South Australia comprises links between Melbourne, Adelaide, Perth, Sydney and Darwin and was identified in the Australian Infrastructure Audit 2015 as a key part of the National Land Transport Network. The track handles 80% of the land-based east-west intercapital freight market and is also utilised by regional mineral and agricultural producers in South Australia.

The track is expected to become capacity constrained over the next 10-15 years due to steady growth in the east-west non-bulk freight task (expected to double by 2030) and future mining and agricultural production. Some sections of track are approaching the end of asset life and have alignments that impose speed and axle load restrictions.

The combination of congestion, poor alignment, and asset age is expected to impact travel times and the reliability and productivity of the interstate freight network. The viability of future mining projects may also be affected.

Those are not my words: they are the words of Infrastructure Australia. They recognise that there needs to be a solution to the rail line that goes through suburban Adelaide, through my community and beyond. Of course, there is an answer: it is called Globe Link. That will remove rail freight from the suburbs and the Hills. There are 41 level crossings along the corridor between Adelaide and Murray Bridge. Moving rail freight would improve the daily commute of an estimated 135,000 drivers. It would lead to efficiency gains, as nearly 80 per cent of all rail freight passing through suburban Adelaide is travelling to Perth from Melbourne. It no longer makes sense for this journey to be made through the Hills.

A failure to develop a future network capacity as outlined by Infrastructure Australia will have a devastating consequence on the economic future of our state. It does not make sense for this journey to be made through the Hills. It does not make sense to force the double stacking of trains on the existing line, which can only be achieved by the costly widening of tunnels. It does not make sense to see trains of up to 1.9 kilometres in length being pulled through the Mitcham and Adelaide Hills.

For those opposite who think it is acceptable to have double-stacked 1,900-metre trains chugging through my community, through the Mitcham Hills and the Adelaide Hills, going over Cross Road, going through the intersection and then B-doubles coming down Cross Road, which they want to see as well, it is simply ludicrous. There is a better way, and we need to invest in that better way. We need a long-term plan. The Liberal Party, the alternative government of South Australia, has that plan. The Labor government's plan is to have long trains, double stacked, going through suburban Adelaide, leading to further congestion.

To me, this is an absolute travesty. It needs to be dealt with. It needs a long-term solution—and it is Globe Link. In addition, Globe Link will see road trains exiting our roads in metropolitan South Australia, coming off the freeway and coming off Portrush Road, because a road bypass will be coupled with the freight bypass at the same time. It is unacceptable to my community and to so many other commuters to see B-doubles going down Cross Road, as the transport minister is advocating, and going down South Road, leading to further congestion.

Roads such as Cross Road cannot be widened. There is no capacity at the moment for what goes down that road. I would just love to see the havoc that will be caused during peak hour when we have a 1.9-kilometre, double-stacked train going through the Cross Road intersection, with four or five B-doubles at that railway crossing at the same time. The disruption that will cause to suburban Adelaide and our road network cannot be calculated.

There is an alternative to improve rail safety through South Australia, through my community, and that of course is the Liberal Party's Globe Link plan. I suggest that the government actually look at this plan. From what I understand, they have been looking at it, and the reason why you see the minister daily attacking this plan is that he is jealous that the Liberal Party pipped him at the post because we know—

The Hon. S.C. Mullighan interjecting:

Mr DULUK: We know you have been working on this plan. We know you have been developing an alternative transport plan. You know that having double-stacked trains through the Mitcham Hills is not sustainable and is not workable. You know there is a better way, and I implore you to get on board with our plan that will see improved rail efficiency for South Australia.

The Hon. A. PICCOLO (Light) (16:45): I rise to speak briefly on the Rail Safety National Law (South Australia) (Miscellaneous No 3) Amendment Bill 2017. Before I begin, I would like to make some comments regarding the member for Davenport's contribution. When I listened to his speech very closely, it sounded like he was running for election to Burnside council.

Just recently, one of the councillors on Burnside council made it very clear what Burnside council's view is about things. The member for Davenport was saying, 'Rail freight routes are not good for my constituents. Send them somewhere else. Let the plebs have them.' That is what the member for Davenport was saying. It is the classic nimby response.

I will explain why it is important for the member for Davenport to promote his global link or Globe Link or whatever they call it. However, getting back to the actual amendment bill, my understanding is that it is part of an ongoing national reform that aims to support a seamless national rail transport system, to improve existing levels of rail safety, to streamline the regulatory arrangements and reduce the compliance burden for business, and to improve national productivity and reduce transport costs generally, which are very noble objectives. I understand the bill has the support of the ministers of the Transport and Infrastructure Council and major stakeholders, including all rail industry associations, so for that reason I am supporting this bill.

Very interestingly, the bill has the support of the national council and also major stakeholders, including rail industry associations, unlike Globe Link, which does not. The member for Davenport says that we oppose and speak against Globe Link. The biggest critic of Globe Link is actually from the industry itself—the Freight Council. The member for Davenport spoke a number of times about freight rail, yet the representative council of that industry actually opposed the proposal. I will quote—

Mr Duluk interjecting:

The Hon. A. PICCOLO: No, I will quote what the executive officer of the South Australian Freight Council has said, word for word, but let's just look at Globe Link. In 2008, the commonwealth department of infrastructure, transport, regional development and local government provided $3 million to undertake an Adelaide rail freight movement study. The independent study was undertaken by global engineering group GHD to determine how Adelaide's rail freight network could be made more efficient to increase capacity to cater for higher freight volumes in the future, and included an assessment of moving the freight line out of Adelaide.

The study was released in June 2010 and considered five options for the future management of rail freight. Options 2, 3 and 5 in the study broadly resemble the rail bypass put forward by those opposite, also referred to as Globe Link. What did the independent study say about these options? The capital costs outweigh the benefits, as there was 'significant negative net present value'. Operational benefits would be modest and social benefits would be marginal.

Infrastructure Australia—an independent body—has also had this report since 2010 and has not included it in their infrastructure priority list released just last year. Infrastructure Australia recommended the $440 million Goodwood and Torrens junctions upgrades to improve efficiency to future freight capacity of the freight line. These were jointly funded, with Goodwood junction delivered in 2013, and with the Torrens junction works underway.

It is not just rail freight that has been comprehensively investigated, but also road freight. In 2013, the federal government, first under former federal transport minister Albanese, and then also under assistant minister Briggs, funded the north-south corridor 10-year strategy. The strategy was completed and published in the first half of 2014. The strategy has informed decisions by the South Australian Labor government and federal coalition government to invest $2.5 billion into upgrading three sections of the corridor.

These upgrades on South Road are necessary because 80 per cent of heavy vehicles travelling west on the South Eastern Freeway at Murray Bridge remain bound for Greater Adelaide because they pick up or deliver to businesses in metropolitan Adelaide. Further, 10 per cent of heavy vehicles currently use existing roads to bypass Adelaide. There is already a road bypass available for heavy vehicles which is already being used.

Not only have those opposite not bothered to consider the economics, the logistics, the projects already underway, and the existing evidence base, they did not even bother consulting with industry—not only industry, they did not consult with interested local councils such as the Coorong council, which wrote a letter to the Premier on the Globe Link proposal, requesting that the government consider other opportunities as an alternative to the short-sighted Liberal policy that is being pushed.

I would have thought the Coorong council would be a bastion of socialists. I would have thought that within the Coorong council there would be a lot of farmers and a lot of small business people, so not exactly people on our side of politics. It is interesting that, on their side of politics, there are people who think it is a dumb idea. I would now like to quote Evan Knapp, who is the South Australian Freight Council Executive Officer. The council speaks on behalf of industry, and I quote from an opinion piece which was published in The Advertiser on 8 February. I assume that the member for Davenport has taken exception to the industry not liking the idea at all. Mr Knapp said:

People in larger countries, cities or states may be blasé about spending billions of dollars, but South Australia doesn't have that kind of money to splash around—every infrastructure dollar is valuable.

Meaning that it has to be spent in the most effective way. Why would the Liberal Party go on this journey to I am not sure where, and spend billions of dollars of taxpayers' money? We will come to that in a second because I am sure there is an answer to that as well. I continue to quote Mr Knapp:

That's why the Liberal's Globe Link plan seriously concerns the SA Freight Council. The plan includes a 24-hour freight-only airport at Monarto, near Murray Bridge, and a combined road/rail bypass to the north of Adelaide.

But it won't work—

that is the industry's conclusion: 'it won't work'—

here is why.

Airports are almost never sustainable purely on freight. The majority of any exports goes in the belly of passenger aircraft, and it requires a combination of the two to make such services viable.

He goes on to say:

There's a second problem with a rail bypass—it's not in our interest to be bypassed.

'It's not in our interest', in other words the state's interest, 'to be bypassed'. I am quoting him here. These are not my views, not the government's views: this is the industry council's view. Mr Knapp continues:

If Melbourne-Perth trains cease to go through Adelaide, they won't stop to pick up our freight.

Relatively speaking, we have only a small number of containers to be picked up and dropped off—this volume will not support the number of services we currently receive in the presence of a bypass option.

So why would we spend billions of dollars to cut ourselves off from additional rail services?

Like other industry organisations, the SA Freight Council supports further evaluation of the road corridor.

That is fine. He continues:

However it should not be viewed as a panacea for the South Eastern Freeway or Portrush Rd.

About 80 per cent of trucks that use the South Eastern Freeway have business in Adelaide and will use the freeway regardless—the proposal is likely to have greater benefit for inter and cross regional movement of goods.

Even the members who spoke in support of Globe Link this afternoon said it is not funded, and they are not sure where the money is going to come from, but it is going to come from somewhere in the future. If I understand it correctly, that is a 20-year project beyond 2036—like 2056. For all this hoo-ha about how this is going to do everything, most people will not benefit from it. It will be so far away even if it did occur.

The South Australian government is obviously looking to invest billions of dollars in other ways. The question remains, and this is the key question in this whole Globe Link debate: why have South Australian taxpayers been asked to fund a project to protect the interests of the future members of Heysen, Davenport and Waite? That is what this project is about: it is sandbagging three electorates from the X factor. It is simple, that is it. South Australian taxpayers are being asked to fund the re-election of three Liberal members, and that is just appalling.

The member for Davenport mentioned car parks for park-and-ride, of which I am a great supporter. I would like one constructed in my electorate as well. Some of them would have been built by now if the Liberal Party had not blocked the revenue stream in the upper house. The money would have been in the coffers and the car parks would have been constructed today. I remind people that the Liberal Party blocked the revenue stream in the upper house, and that is why we do not have a park-and-ride in my electorate. Why did the Gawler rail electrification not go ahead? Because Tony Abbott said that no way would the federal government support public transport. With those few comments, I support the bill.

Mr TRELOAR (Flinders) (16:56): I rise, as have others on this side of the house, to support the Rail Safety National Law (South Australia) (Miscellaneous No 3) Amendment Bill 2017. In December 2009, the Council of Australian Governments implemented national rail safety reform, creating a single rail safety regulator, and developed a Rail Safety National Law. One of the very first debates I was involved in, as a newly elected member in 2010, may have been in relation to that regulator.

The Rail Safety National Law commenced operation in January 2013, with Queensland last year also adopting the law. The Office of the National Rail Safety Regulator now operates in all jurisdictions right across Australia. The Office of the National Rail Safety Regulator was established as a body corporate under the law, and it facilitates safe rail operation through accreditation of operators, industry guidance, education and training.

The National Transport Commission identifies legislative amendments in cooperation with the regulator and participating jurisdictions. Ministers of the Transport and Infrastructure Council approved this bill on 6 November 2015. South Australia, as the host jurisdiction, is responsible for the passage of amendment bills such as this through the South Australian parliament, and they subsequently are automatically adopted into legislation by other participating jurisdictions through an application act. We have significant responsibility in relation to this bill.

This bill is the third amendment package brought to the South Australian parliament, similarly as additions to the Rail Safety National Law (South Australia) Act 2012. The amendment bill introduces powers for the regulator to charge additional fees for major rail projects designed to ensure that the regulatory oversight of operations can be properly maintained as the number of rail projects increases. Let's hope that they do. The bill also includes a review mechanism that will allow a rail transport operator to seek a review of the regulator's decision that a project is a major project.

Subordinate legislation will specify the additional project component fee amounts and the criteria that the regulator must consider when determining whether a project component fee is payable. I understand that the bill has the support of the ministers of the Transport and Infrastructure Council and major stakeholders such as the rail industry associations. As part of this debate, I would like to refer to the rail system on Eyre Peninsula. My electorate covers much of Eyre Peninsula. The railway line was first begun as an act of parliament in this place in 1904 or 1905 and ultimately reached its maximum extent by the 1920s.

By that time it had extended from Port Lincoln first to Cummins and then from Cummins to Penong, west of Ceduna, and also from Cummins to Buckleboo. So, the line branched out at Cummins. There was also a branch line from Yeelanna to Mount Hope, and the family farm that I grew up on was actually adjacent to one of the sidings on that line, the Yeltukka railway siding. There were also a couple of spur lines surveyed but never built; one was out to Mangalo in the Cleve Hills, and there was the intention, at one stage, to even extend the line out into the country north of Buckleboo.

Of course, it was a critical part of the settlement of Eyre Peninsula and focused very much on the ports of Thevenard and Port Lincoln, from where the produce of the district was exported to the world. Unfortunately, over the years we saw the demise of the rail service on Eyre Peninsula. I think by the time the mid-sixties came around the railcars had ceased, and the freight line, the grain line, now terminates in Wudinna and Kimba, so it is probably at about half the extent it once was. Of course, there is a line from Kevin near the Penong gypsum mine into Thevenard, which is used by three trains a day.

However, it remains busy. Up to a million tonnes of grain each and every year are carried on the Eyre Peninsula line, from Wudinna down to Port Lincoln, from Kimba down to Port Lincoln. That is exported mostly to Asia these days, but also right across the world. It is an important factor in giving Eyre Peninsula farmers the ability to get their produce to market. It is an efficient and effective rail system, and, of course, it takes one million tonnes out of a total of three million tonnes of Eyre Peninsula grain off the state's roads. Apart from any other argument for keeping, for upgrading and supporting the rail line on Eyre Peninsula, it is the fact that one million tonnes, which would otherwise have to go on the state's road system, is currently on rail.

Back in the late 2000s, and I am thinking probably 2008 or thereabouts, there was a $43 million road and rail upgrade project that was supported by the state government, supported by the federal government and supported by both Viterra, the owners of the bulk handling system, and also by Genesee & Wyoming. I might also add that it was supported by the farmers of Eyre Peninsula, who contributed around $2 million, through a levy system, to that total of $43 million.

It was a big outlay at the time and it was a very important project, but in the end $43 million does not go very far. In fact, most investment was in that 42 miles between Port Lincoln and Cummins. A little bit was spent farther north, but the majority of it was in that southern part, south of Cummins, the busiest part of the line, and you can understand that. Through my own observations, I can certainly vouch for the fact that the trains through Edillilie travelled much more quickly after that money had been spent.

However, it remains in a precarious state once you travel further north on Eyre Peninsula, and my concern is around the future of Eyre Peninsula rail. I did have a very brief conversation with the minister towards the end of last year about how we might attract investment into this very important part of the state's rail infrastructure, and I look forward to continuing that conversation through this year. At the moment, I understand there are three-year contracts in place between Viterra and Genesee & Wyoming to ensure that the million tonnes of grain remain on the rail line, but of course what is vitally important is that the rail line has the capacity to continue to carry that freight.

It has certainly had minimal spend, I guess that is the best way of putting it, and that was known in the early days. Even the initial railway line was built out of second-hand material that had been salvaged from other railway lines around the state. So, it has not had a lot investment in more than 100 years, and I look forward to being part of attracting some more investment and ensuring the long-term future of the Eyre Peninsula rail system.

There are some practical issues that I might bring to the parliament's attention. I have certainly had correspondence with the Minister for Road Safety and the Minister for Transport about this practical issue relating to the rail crossings up and down the Tod Highway, in particular where the railway line and the highway run parallel to each other. They are actually adjacent; there is not much room between the rail corridor and the road.

Of course, there were six and seven-tonne trucks in the old days, such as Bedfords and all the rest of it—short wheel-base trucks—and there was not a problem. In this day and age of road trains, there is simply not enough room for a road train to obey the law and stop at the stop sign at the rail crossing and not have the second half of the truck, the second trailer, hanging out onto the highway. It is a very dangerous situation.

Minister, I know you and I have corresponded on this issue. It has not been resolved yet; it remains a problem. I am not sure what the answer is. Probably money spent on the highway creating slip lanes is the most practical solution. Of course, that will come at a cost, but unfortunately, if we do not spend this money, it creates a quite dangerous situation for traffic up and down the Tod Highway—and, of course, we do have to stop at a stop sign.

Looking through the Infrastructure Australia priority project list, I notice that some rail projects have been listed. The Adelaide to Tarcoola upgrade acceleration has been listed as a priority project. That is well underway. In fact this year, 2017, is the centenary of the Trans-Australian Railway. Somewhere near the siding of Ooldea, the two lines met and Australia was joined east to west. It is a hundred years since that occurred, so that will be an important project.

The Iron Road proposal is also listed as an Infrastructure Australia priority project. This infrastructure project is very much about the development of a magnetite mine at Warramboo. Should the project go ahead, an important part of getting that product to market will be a rail and infrastructure corridor winding its way through eastern Eyre Peninsula to a proposed port. It has not been built yet, but a port is proposed at Cape Hardy near Port Neill. Once again, that will involve rail.

The Gawler Craton rail access has also been listed as an Infrastructure Australia priority project. This is probably just at the concept stage although, should a deep-sea port be built somewhere on the east coast of Eyre Peninsula or the west coast of Spencer Gulf, that could give Cape Class availability to the Gawler Craton. In recent months, there has also been talk of a rail line from Whyalla to the proposed new port at Cape Hardy.

Lots of infrastructure ideas are being thrown around. Many of them relate to rail and involve rail, but of course ultimately three things are required: a market, a product and funding. With those few comments relating to my electorate, I remind the house that I support this bill and we, as an opposition, support this bill.

The Hon. S.W. KEY (Ashford) (17:08): I wish to contribute to this debate for reasons that will become clear in a moment. First of all, I indicate my support for the bill. On Sunday, I happened to be at a function with a number of Ashford constituents, and they raised again with me the concerns they had with regard to freight trains going through different parts of Ashford, including the issue they have been campaigning on for quite some time about reducing the speed of the freight trains as they go through the crossings in local Ashford and their concerns about the noise of those freight trains at some stages.

This remains an ongoing issue in the electorate and, while I have some sympathy for the comments made by the member for Davenport because we have similar problems and I have family members who live in Davenport and the area the freight trains go through, I know some of the concerns they have raised, particularly about noise and screeching of the bogies as they go through the Hills. There are other parts of his contribution, of course, I did not agree with, but I will not go through them because I am sure the minister will be able to correct him on those points.

I need to make the point that in my dealings with the Australian National Rail people I have found them to be very polite, but there has not been any action over the years. I feel very concerned that a number of constituents are still complaining, as recently as Sunday, about the same things they have been complaining about for the past few years.

I am not a rail enthusiast as such but, having grown up next to the Draper and Largs Bay stations—and I know that the Draper station would be very close to where the minister lives—I have a fairly high tolerance with regard to the noise trains make, even passenger trains, with their horns and all the other things that happen with trains. These particular constituents are really at their wits' end, so I hope we may be able to look at this issue again.

The EPA, through minister Hunter, put in noise meters along the track where we were having the most complaints. Interestingly, the residents seemed to think that, for the two weeks the noise meters were there, there did not seem to be as much noise as there had been in the past. So, one of things I am thinking of doing is seeing whether minister Hunter can help us again with the EPA putting in noise meters to see if we can mount a case about what they consider to be unreasonable noise levels.

One of the other things I should mention is that there are a number of enthusiasts in Ashford for rail, and special mention should go to the Kintookie rail group, which has model trains and a number of rail enthusiasts who live around the Ashford area. Unlike some of the constituents, they are very pleased for any rail to be going through Ashford.

After surviving the electrification of the passenger rail line with the residents, I am pleased to say that, all this time on, people generally seem to think that it was a good measure. I very rarely get complaints on that level but, because today we are talking about the Rail Safety National Law, it is important that I raise the concerns of Ashford constituents with regard to freight trains.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN (Lee—Minister for Transport and Infrastructure, Minister for Housing and Urban Development) (17:13): Rather than thanking the members who made a contribution, I will thank the parliament for their consideration of this bill. As members may be aware, South Australia is home to the National Rail Safety Regulator. As part of the agreements that were reached by national transport ministers some years ago, South Australia is the lead legislator for the National Rail Safety Law. When there are changes and amendments made to that Rail Safety Law, then it is the South Australian parliament that is responsible for making them and that then enables the remainder of the jurisdictions, which are party to the rail safety regulator, to follow suit and make sure that they have mirror provisions in their jurisdiction.

Having said that, I would also like to thank the members for their contributions. This is a relatively brief bill, but one which has certainly elicited a far-ranging discussion on a number of topics.

The Hon. A. Piccolo: You are going to get us back on track, are you?

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: As the member for Light says, let's get things back on track, on the straight and narrow, and I am sure there are several other—

Mr Duluk: Not really through the Mitcham Hills; it's quite windy.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: Yes. As the member for Davenport interjects, there is a huge amount of obfuscation when it comes to his local community, and he is probably one of those responsible for it. That is what I understood his interjection to be in any event. Perhaps I slightly misheard it, but I do not think I did.

Can I address some of the comments that have been made by members and particularly the topics that they raised. I particularly want to address those comments that were made by the first couple of speakers from the opposition, the members for Hammond, Chaffey and Flinders, who highlighted a significant concern in regional South Australia regarding the future of freight rail lines being used for the benefit of those communities. It is particularly relevant, given we have just come out of the harvest season with a harvest that I think was 50 per cent above the previous largest harvest. So, we have had an extraordinary amount of grain and other commodities moved around these communities.

As the member for Chaffey mentioned, it is unfortunate that in recent years, to be fair, despite both our efforts—mine as minister and his as local member—the Mallee rail lines are no longer being used. The member for Chaffey is certainly correct that those rail lines have suffered from a lack of investment in recent years, which has caused them to have all the restrictions the member for Chaffey mentioned: speed restrictions, restrictions on its use during periods of hot weather and axle load restrictions because of the condition of the line.

It is at this juncture that some people can surmise why that is an important fact to point out, because some people would have you believe that it is a direct result of the careless underinvestment by the rail operator, which I think is perhaps not quite capturing the whole of the fault when it comes to the upkeep of these rail lines. There has certainly been a big concern since the loss of the single desk arrangements that farmers have had to organise the freight of their produce at the behest of one multinational company.

Not unlike other multinational companies, this multinational company has a primary focus, as well as secondary and tertiary considerations, and perhaps a secondary or tertiary consideration would be how profitable the farmers' operations might be. The primary focus might be something about returns to shareholders, investments on capital and so on. I think they have forced those rail line operators to be price takers when it comes to freighting grain around those regional communities, getting them to Tailem Bend so that they can be transported directly down to Port Adelaide for export. Or, as the member for Flinders says, there is a similar arrangement on Eyre Peninsula, where we fortunately still have rail freight operations servicing the grain industry in that part of South Australia, but for how long?

What we need to see is the arrest of this trend of these regional freight lines no longer being used because Viterra is just chasing the cheapest possible transport price to pick up that grain or other produce from the farm gate and get it to a silo or a rail head, such as at Tailem Bend or, in the member for Flinders' example, at those rail collection sites along the freight line on Eyre Peninsula. That is an arrangement or a trend that needs to cease. I have certainly made it clear year after year in the federal context that, for a very modest investment from the federal government, to which the state government would be willing to contribute, that could be averted on Eyre Peninsula.

Maybe one good thing the rise of Nick Xenophon's popularity across South Australia has done, other than eliciting the first forays into public policy development by the Liberal opposition anywhere, let alone in transport—tepid and unworkable and uneconomic as they are, but I will come back to that—is to place a little bit of pressure on the federal member for Grey. Maybe he is now sufficiently incentivised to make a compelling argument to the commonwealth government's cabinet that, for a very small investment, the member for Flinders can look his community in the eye and say, 'We have fixed this problem,' at least for the next 10 or 15 years.

People would not need to worry—not about what happened in the Murray Mallee area, where a couple of hundred thousand tonnes was taken off the rail and put onto the road, but about over a million tonnes being taken off rail and put onto the road, as the member for Flinders said. That would be a completely unacceptable outcome for everyone, particularly for the local communities. I commend the member for Flinders for raising that, and I thank him and also the member for Chaffey for mentioning it.

It would be remiss of me not to address the other comments from the member for Hammond, who really was the first cab off the rank to completely mix the transport metaphor in trying to defend the uncosted, uneconomic, impractical, unworkable and, as the member for Chaffey said, not short-term or even medium-term policy of Globe Link, or 'Glob Link' as the member for Unley insists on calling it. It was interesting that the member for Chaffey said that this is not going to happen tomorrow: this is something that will happen in 20 years' time, which I think will be interesting to talk about in the context of the coming election campaign.

Someone who did give a slightly more spirited defence of the policy was the member for Davenport, or should I say 'né Davenport' because he is hoping there is some marriage of convenience which will take him to another, probably unfortunate, bride in the seat of Waite, but we will see how that goes at the next state election. I say 'slightly more spirited' because it was not what you would see from the Liberal opposition. If they were really serious about giving a speech to the parliament, they would have had the camera crew come in from the leader's office. The jacket would have been buttoned. We would have seen all the gesturing as if they were B grade actors in a 1950s, Cecil B. DeMille, thong-and-sandal epic: 'Mr Speaker, I implore the parliament.'

There was none of that, so I know the member for Davenport was not really serious in his defence of Globe Link. However, he did start to kick things off. He did try to warm himself up about his experience on the Belair line. The member for Davenport should be thankful we are not like the previous state Liberal government, which gave up half the corridor and started forcing these Belair trains to run on a single track with crossing loops, thereby nullifying almost any efficiency gains that can be made into the future, as well as closing down train stations on the Belair line, which we have had to come back in and reopen—like in the electorate of Ashford. I thank the local member for the seat of Ashford for the strong advocacy.

Mr Duluk: Who makes this up?

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: It is really needling you, isn't it? I have not even warmed up. We are going to be here for at least 45 minutes; you might even miss the dinner break. So, he did start on the Belair line—

Mr Duluk interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member for Davenport is warned for the first time.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: —and he did concede that the government is investing in the signalling upgrades, which have, certainly over the second half of last year—

Mr Duluk interjecting:

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: —seen the average reliability of Belair train services—

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member for Davenport is warned for the second time.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: It would be a shame to boot him, wouldn't it? Well, not really. It has seen the performance of the Belair line increase in its reliability thanks to the ongoing rollout of those signalling service improvements but, as the member for Light said, it was not just about the performance of the Belair line and the signalling upgrades—my recollection is that he lauded the state government for that.

He lamented the lack of parking infrastructure on the Belair line. It is a lament that the member for Hartley, albeit for a different mode of transport, has made about his own electorate, or perhaps the border of his electorate and the member for Morialta's. He has lamented the lack of parking infrastructure next to transport nodes in that seat as well.

Would you not think that it is ironic that those Liberal members, those members of a caucus that took a view to break decades, if not well over 100 years, of tradition by not only supporting supply but by supporting the appropriation bills of the government of the day, chose to break that tradition so that there would not be sufficient funds, there would not be a revenue stream, to invest in park-and-ride facilities?

You can see—slowly, course, because that is how it needs to happen for the member for Hartley—the penny gradually dropping that this is going to be a matter which we will campaign on very heavily in the coming election, as these members have ensured that their local communities do not have access to expanded park-and-ride facilities. It is not just the leaflets of the member for Hartley's head that we will put under every windscreen wiper on a daily basis out at the Paradise park-and-ride so that people fully understand who is responsible and the outcome of the actions of the member for Hartley and his colleagues. It will be, as the member for Davenport says, in those places where parking has become at a premium, like at Eden Hills, for example.

We will be telling those constituents exactly what happened and who is responsible for it. I do say of the member for Davenport that he has almost shaken the monkey off the Liberal Party's back. He has uttered the first comments I have heard for many years from a Liberal Party MP supportive of public transport. Remarkable—absolutely remarkable! We have had generation after generation of Tories in this place and in the other place who have not been interested in public transport.

There was not even a transport policy at the last election from the Liberal Party, but at least the member for Davenport has made some warm, encouraging noises about whether public transport is important for communities. Maybe it is an outward sign of frustration at the current leadership of his party—maybe it is. That is almost the farthest possible distance he could sit from the leader's chair. Who could possibly say whether that is causing his frustration and these outbursts of contrarian public policy positions? Maybe that is what it is. Maybe that is causing his frustration and these outbursts against Liberal Party policy position.

Mr Duluk interjecting:

The ACTING SPEAKER (Hon. S.W. Key): Member for Davenport, could you cease, please? I know that the Deputy Speaker has left the chamber for the time being, but you will find that I can be as harsh as she can be, so I warn you to behave yourself.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: On a slightly more serious note, picking up what he was talking about earlier, I have written to him, as has, I think, the former minister for emergency services, cautioning him and the Leader of the Opposition about what can only be almost dangerous rhetoric, saying that people, in the event of a high bushfire danger day, should be able to flee their home or business at the last possible minute, and that the transport networks should provide them with unfettered passages to flee those communities.

That is precisely the opposite advice to that which emergency services provide to people. Emergency services tell our communities that they need to prepare earlier and that they need to make an early decision about whether they stay or whether they leave. They do not wait to see the flames flickering at the fence before they make a decision whether they should leave their properties. They have to make a decision early.

Just as the member for Davenport points out that if a boom gate was down during one of those periods and somebody was trying use the road network to travel away from danger, it is equally true that the network can become impassable for such a motorist if there is an accident. That is exactly why emergency services do not provide the advice or specifically counsel against people making late decisions, and for anyone to try to convince a community that they have some safety net about making late decisions, because of the performance or otherwise of the road network or the rail network or the intersections between the two at rail crossings, is irresponsible and I would counsel very strongly against it.

Just before we move away from the performance of the Belair line, there are two other things that I would like to say. Firstly, the member for Davenport says that he is about to issue us with a petition of his constituents, whose details he has been collecting, in an effort to convince us to improve the car parking facilities at and around the Eden Hills train station. I look forward to getting their details. We will communicate with them, specifically about what some of the challenges are and how they have been caused, in relation to car parking facilities, in the community that he is seeking to represent at the next state election.

Then, of course, we transfer to a discussion about the freight line and how the freight line needs to be taken away from its current alignment for all sorts of reasons, under the auspices of the Liberal Party's first foray into policy-making, Globe Link. As the member for Hammond said earlier this afternoon in his contribution, this current operation is upsetting constituents. That really is at the heart of why this policy has been developed.

It is about targeting a relatively small number of constituents in a few target, otherwise safe, Liberal seats along the freight line, and trying to sandbag those seats against the threat of Nick Xenophon, who, at the recent federal election, has proved very, very effective at carving votes away from the Liberal Party and keeping them for himself, to the point where they were able to dislodge one of the jewels in the crown of the South Australian Liberal Party—the federal seat of Mayo. They took it against a former federal assistant minister, somebody of very high profile, somebody who had the capacity and, indeed, took the opportunity to be in the media on a very regular basis and so was able to communicate directly with many constituents on a more regular basis than perhaps any of the other people he was contesting for that seat in that election.

That threat became very real when that seat changed hands in the Hills from Liberal to the Nick Xenophon Team. That is what this policy is about. This is a multibillion-dollar sandbag against that threat of Nick Xenophon in these Hills' seats. There are all sorts of dress up around it, about why it is good. There is the talk about 'We will be able to remove all of the road freight movements from trucks from Adelaide.'

I have said it before, and I will say it again: the figures we have from the transport department show us that at least 80 per cent of trucks that are coming down the South Eastern Freeway drop off or pick up business in greater metropolitan Adelaide. These are not trucks that are carrying commodities that are just trying to transit through from one part of the state to the other. There are those trucks, they do exist, they are a small minority and they are already using those parts of the road network which can avoid greater metropolitan Adelaide. They are choosing, from Tailem Bend, to detour up towards Mannum and come around what you could call the back of the Hills, around to the northern side of greater metropolitan Adelaide.

Those truck movements are already happening. It is the other truck movements, the more than 80 per cent, that are coming down that hill that need to service the community or the communities in greater metropolitan Adelaide. These are the trucks that are delivering the goods and the equipment that allow tens of thousands of businesses and hundreds of thousands of households to go about their daily business or to go about their daily lives. Those trucks cannot be relocated.

We have heard the argument against moving trucks from Portrush Road—and, once again, another thing that the member for Davenport got wrong; there are no road trains that use Portrush Road, and a simple Google search of the department's website would have shown that that is the case. Yes, there are B-doubles but they are not road trains, they are very different combination vehicles and they do not use Portrush Road. We have a plan which has been developed by the state government and signed off by the federal Coalition government, a 10-year strategy to update the north-south corridor.

Not only has it been signed off by the federal Coalition government, it is being funded. They are putting billions of dollars on the table to provide the transport improvements that those people who live along that corridor need, whether they are people who reside in the (at least current) seats of Mitchell or Elder or Badcoe or West Torrens or Adelaide or Croydon, all the way through to what will be the end of the corridor up at the furthest reach of the Northern Expressway, up in the member for Schubert's electorate. That is the plan that has been developed, costed, signed off, funded and delivered by both levels of government.

Inherent in what the member for Davenport claims—that heavy vehicles should not use Cross Road they should not enter onto a predominantly lowered motorway away from residents, away from local businesses, away from road safety risks, that they should not go down there—is leaving them on Portrush Road. How would the good burghers of the seat of Dunstan feel about that—a marginal Liberal seat? Well, we will ask them in some detail how they feel. When we talk to the electors of Ashford—soon to be Badcoe—or Elder, we will ask them whether they want the same transport improvements that the current constituents in the electorate of Croydon are enjoying.

The improvements that they are enjoying are the lack of rat running; the lack of traffic on their back streets, their suburban streets; the lack of people who are whizzing past local schools; people are now able for the first time to get a park outside their local businesses; the lack of traffic going past those places, those playgrounds, those kindergartens, those other meeting places where the community recreates—they are all the benefits of an upgraded transport corridor.

The Liberal Party's position is that they do not want those benefits for hundreds of thousands of South Australians. What they would like to do is to spend billions and billions of dollars on a transport plan which has already been thoroughly investigated by an international engineering firm, GHD. That firm has concluded that the benefits are less than the cost, so the investment in this piece of infrastructure is actually a drag on the South Australian economy. As any economist will tell you, it is the study of the best use of resources, in this case, financial resources.

The Liberal Party's position is not to invest in those projects with a very positive benefit cost ratio but to invest in a project that has costs outweighing the benefits. That is the reason why the South Australian Freight Council has criticised this plan so severely, because anybody with the most cursory interest in freight or transport movements in South Australia—anyone, whether it is the member for Schubert or anyone else who spends time on a laptop—could find and tell you what the right transport solutions are for greater metropolitan Adelaide.

Now that we know that Globe Link will not service the heavy vehicle industry and it will not service trucks because they will still need to come into metropolitan Adelaide, and it will not provide a benefit to those trucks already bypassing Adelaide, how will it fund this new link? They propose a new tax on the industry. This is the member for Bragg's old attitude of, 'Let's introduce tolls. Once again, let's ignore that they are uneconomical here in South Australia and let's make sure'—much like her presence here—'that we have a 1990s solution to what is a contemporary problem. Let's make sure that we come up with something which, once again, can be a drag not only on the state economy but on a particular industry here in South Australia.'

Is any part of the north-south corridor being upgraded with private sector charging? No, it is not, and that is very deliberate because we know that not only do tolls not stack up for the heavy vehicle industry, or even for the light commercial vehicle industry, but they do not stack up for private car owners either. They are wholly uneconomic. Logistically, for heavy vehicles, Globe Link does not work. Economically, it does not work, and for the industry it does not work. So now you can turn your attention to the freight rail element, and this is really at the heart of the policy of wanting to sandbag these safe Adelaide Hills Liberal seats against the threat of Nick Xenophon.

The member for Ashford outlined very clearly the problem that needs to be dealt with, and most of it is noise. It is not, as the member for Davenport would have you believe, the huge number of times that the boom gates come down for freight rail movements in peak hour—which is what he said earlier. In fact, I was so interested in that that I googled it, and do you know what the first result of that Google search was that anyone could do on a smart phone or a tablet? The first result was ARTC's train movement timetable for all these trains.

Do you know how many freight train movements there are in peak hour, in South Australia, affecting that section of the line that the member for Davenport is so passionately interested in between Belair and Keswick? I wonder how many it could be? It sounds like it must be a large number if the member for Davenport thinks that it happens all the time. It is four times; it is four times in peak hour that it comes down.

Mr Duluk: Four times a day.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: Four times in peak hour it comes down.

Mr Duluk: Four times a day.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: I think we are warming up for a personal explanation from the member for Davenport. He would like to correct the record because he was so manifestly inaccurate earlier.

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