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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2022-07-05 Daily Xml
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Local Government Elections

Ms THOMPSON (Davenport) (15:31): I rise to bring attention to something very important happening very soon in communities all across South Australia. I know that South Australians are definitely feeling election fatigue following both a state and federal election, and for those people in Bragg even a by-election. However, it is not over yet because there are local council elections right around the corner. They are fast approaching—in November.

I am sure that no doubt we will soon hear a strong campaign from the Local Government Association of South Australia encouraging people to put up their hands and run for local government. I would like all members of parliament to encourage their communities to think about local government as an option for themselves as well.

Many of you would know that I am the former Mayor of the City of Onkaparinga. I ran a term before I found myself here in this place, and it was an extremely rewarding experience for me. I have never done anything quite like it before, where you able to have such a strong influence on your community and work with the people in your community and in your neighbourhood to deliver great things now and for the future.

I know that a lot of councils will work hard every four years to try to attract new people to run for local government elections, particularly more women, more young people, people from our Aboriginal communities and other diverse cultural groups. What we are trying to achieve in local government, much as we try to achieve here in state government, is to have elected members who represent the people they represent. We want to see a really diverse mix of people representing our communities at all levels of government.

In my electorate, I have a handful of councils: the City of Onkaparinga, the City of Marion and a little slice of Mitcham. I will certainly be working with their staff and elected members to do anything I can to promote the upcoming local government elections to make sure that we have a great suite of people putting up their hands to run.

I know that each of the councils, the LGA and the Electoral Commission will be running information sessions. People can get that information on the Electoral Commission website, the LGA website or their local council website. You can head into council in person and ask as many questions as you like of other elected members and of the staff. You can also tune in via Zoom and listen and learn as much as you can about the process and find out whether or not it is something that would be suitable for you.

I was really proud to have been able to deliver some pretty great things when I was Mayor of the City of Onkaparinga. One thing I was really proud of was introducing fortnightly green bins. The City of Onkaparinga was, I think, probably the last metropolitan council to bring in a fortnightly green service. They took it to council many, many times and struggled to get it up. It was one of my election commitments going in to be mayor, as well as for most of the other elected members who were elected that year. We were really proud to get that up, win it in the chamber and deliver a much-improved service for ratepayers.

Other things that were really important to the ratepayers included keeping rates low, so at Onkaparinga council we were able to introduce a long-term financial plan that ultimately capped rates at CPI and gave residents some relief at rate time. I know that they are still working hard to do that and to take the pressure off ratepayers as much as they can.

Local government is absolutely the closest level of government to the people and it is extremely rewarding because you are actually genuinely able to see the difference you make when you are there. I would encourage anyone who is thinking about it to get in touch with their local members, have a bit of a chat, find out if it is something that might be suitable for you and then go along and throw your hat in the ring and give it a go.

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