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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fourth Parliament, First Session (54-1)
2018-06-05 Daily Xml
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Mayo Electorate

Mr BIGNELL (Mawson) (15:17): We all know how important it is for people in South Australia to have a good local member of parliament. Most of us go in to bat for people in our local area and for community groups, organisations and schools. As a minister, I had a few favourites around the place on both sides, people like the current member for Flinders, the former member for Goyder, the current member for Frome and the federal member for Kingston, just to name a few. They are people who came in and really fought hard for their area. They made sure that the minister knew exactly what it was that local area wanted.

One of the true hardworking, persistent local members I have come across is Rebekha Sharkie. She has fought so hard for things in her area while we did not hear from the state members in some parts of her electorate. I notice that there has been a bit of a clean-out on the other side, and some people we have never heard of have been replaced with some people I know are already doing a good job in their area.

For Rebekha Sharkie, no sooner was she elected at the last federal election than she was in my office sitting down with a big long list of demands for her area, which is quite a significant part of South Australia. It includes the Adelaide Hills, goes down through the Fleurieu Peninsula and, of course, includes Kangaroo Island.

Sometimes she would turn up with the Mount Barker mayor, Anne Ferguson, who was also someone letting all ministers know exactly what their particular area needed. I went up a couple of times to catch up with Rebekha and mayor Ferguson in Mount Barker to make some significant announcements about funding from the state government, but I know Rebekha has gone after federal funding as well. Just some of the things that Rebekha supported that were funded during her period as the member for Mayo were:

the Mount Barker sports hub female facilities $475,000;

the Uraidla Bowling Club sporting services program $107,000;

the Mount Barker sports hub community recreation and sports facility program $800,000—a terrific result for Rebekha Sharkie and the people of Mount Barker;

the Anembo Park sports and recreation grounds female facilities $463,000;

the Mount Barker Football Club female facilities $460,000;

the Willunga Recreation Park female facilities $500,000;

the Port Elliot Tennis Club community recreation and sports facility program $62,000; and

the McLaren Vale Netball Club female facilities $293,000.

You can tell this is a member who goes in and fights really hard for the sporting groups in her electorate to make sure they have some of the best facilities anywhere in Australia. Other clubs to benefit were the Stirling Tennis Club, the Adelaide Hills Hockey Club, the Dudley United Netball Club, the Myponga Bowling Club, the Port Elliot Bowling Club, the Willunga Bowling Club, the Piccadilly Valley Community Recreation Centre, the Summertown Tennis Club, the Goolwa Netball Club, the Hahndorf Soccer Club, the Normanville Surf Lifesaving Club, the Victor Harbor Football Club, the Adelaide Hills Hawks, and the McLaren Vale Bowling Club, around the corner from my house.

I reckon it is great to have Rebekha Sharkie as my local MP and I hope she wins the 28 July by-election because she deserves to be re-elected. I will be voting for the Labor candidate—and watch this space, we will have one announced very soon—but my second preference, as I have said in here before, will be going to Rebekha Sharkie. She is a long-term local, as opposed to the Liberal candidate, who is a blow in, an interloper from Victoria, who has turned up in daddy's palace down at Carrickalinga and moved in there trying to claim she is a local.

We all know that Georgina Downer is not a local, so it riled everyone over the weekend, all of us locals, to see Georgina Downer out there claiming that she got a $10 million grant to build a swimming centre at Mount Barker. We have the list of everyone who supported that: number one was the federal member Rebekha Sharkie; the local council; Mark Goldsworthy, the former member for Kavel; the Office for Recreation and Sport; the Urban Development Institute of SA; SwimmingSA; and the local swimming clubs up in Mount Barker.

Nowhere on that list of support was the name of Georgina Downer. No-one has ever heard of her before and no-one is going to vote for her on 28 July because Rebekha Sharkie deserves to be re-elected as the member for Mayo. She has done an outstanding job.

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