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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fourth Parliament, First Session (54-1)
2018-10-23 Daily Xml
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Service SA Modbury

Ms BEDFORD (Florey) (14:55): My question is to the Minister for Transport, Infrastructure and Local Government. Given that the operational costs per customer at the Modbury service office is around $9, while the administration fee charged for most Service SA transactions is $17, how will the decision to close the branch and encourage online transactions deliver the government's desired budget savings?

The Hon. S.K. KNOLL (Schubert—Minister for Transport, Infrastructure and Local Government, Minister for Planning) (14:56): I thank the member for Florey for her question, and in answering the question can I say that I will have to check the figures that you provided. In fact—

Ms Bedford interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Florey is called to order.

The Hon. S.K. KNOLL: —the information I have is that, across the Service SA network, when somebody goes into a Service SA centre to undertake a transaction that costs government, off the top of my head, somewhere around the $17 figure. When that same person chooses to complete a transaction online that costs 40¢. So for every customer we are able to encourage to use an online option that is a 39th out of 40th fraction that we save on the total cost of providing that service, or thereabouts.

Can I tell you that I have not met anybody yet who has told me that they enjoy lining up at a Service SA centre to get a transaction done. It is a thing that we have to do. We have to get licences renewed. We have to—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order, members on my left!

The Hon. S.K. KNOLL: —renew registration of vehicles and do those kinds of things—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Ramsay is warned. The member for Reynell is warned for a second and final time.

The Hon. S.K. KNOLL: —but it's a basic function that everybody needs to go through. But nobody has said to me, 'I prefer to go to a Service SA centre than spend time with my kids,’ or go for a walk or spend some time cleaning up a garden that has been a bit neglected—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. S.K. KNOLL: —as is the case at my house. Can I tell you that here is an opportunity for us to create a win-win scenario, and that is to save government money. We only have a certain bucket of money that we are able to spend, and if we are spending money on this it means that we can't spend money on other things. The opportunity for us to be able to save some money in this area—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. S.K. KNOLL: —that can be redirected into spending on more worthwhile priorities, I think, is a good outcome, but more than that, it can actually save people money and time, instead of—

Ms Bedford interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Member for Florey!

The Hon. S.K. KNOLL: —having to actually get in a car and drive to a Service SA centre, line up, undertake a transaction and then go home. The ability to be able to do it on your phone or do it on a laptop or iPad in the comfort of your own home at an absolute fraction of the time seems to me to be like a good way to try to encourage people to provide that service.

There is more work that needs to be done because, more than that, you can actually use a phone line. Instead of having to go in, again, and line up at a centre, you can get on the phone, again negating the need to have to undertake that expensive and time-consuming travel. There is also the opportunity to go to an Australia Post, which is very likely to be closer to where you live than the Service SA centre.

This is an opportunity for us to be able to deregulate a part of government, which has historically been very regulatory, by providing a much broader range of opportunities for people to undertake these transactions. Yes, there is more work that we need to do to be able to encourage people—

The Hon. S.C. Mullighan interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order, member for Lee!

The Hon. S.K. KNOLL: —to help them to understand what the broader opportunities are to be able to transact. Yes, we are dealing with a budget pressure, three-quarters of which was left to us by the former government, but this idea that lining up at a Service SA centre is the only way to be able to undertake this transaction is wrong. The reason I say that is that, like many of the MPs who sit on this side of the fence, if you live in a regional area in South Australia there isn't a Service SA centre. In fact, in my entire electorate there isn't a Service SA centre.

There are other opportunities to be able to save individuals money and to be able to save government money and to take that money and then spend it on doing much more worthwhile things. I think that that's a great outcome. I know that it's causing some concern for people, and we acknowledge that we have more work to do in that area, but we will communicate and we will help people to take advantage of those other options and, in doing so, create, I think, a good outcome for government as well as the individuals themselves.

Ms BEDFORD: Supplementary, Mr Speaker.

The SPEAKER: No, no supplementary. Member for Kaurna.

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