HANSARD
SITTING CALENDAR
SEARCH
LIVE BROADCAST
Hansard Dynamic Member Index
House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2022-07-06 Daily Xml
Contents
Xml

Cross Border Commissioner Bill

Second Reading

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS (West Torrens—Minister for Infrastructure and Transport, Minister for Energy and Mining) (15:59): I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

I am pleased to introduce the Cross Border Commissioner Bill 2022 into the House of Assembly. It is important the government keeps its promise and keeps its word, and we have worked tirelessly to make sure that our word can be kept. It is important that we give due credit where credit is due. Cross-border communities have been through a lot—a lot. We have all been through a lot through the pandemic. This is an opportunity for me once again to place on the record my thanks to the previous government for helping steer South Australia through that pandemic.

But not everything was perfect, not everything was done as well as it could have been. That is why I want to pay tribute today, much to his embarrassment and probably peril, and show my gratitude to the member for Mount Gambier. It is not lost on this parliament or the people of the border communities the advocacy and work of our border MPs, especially our regional ones, who have to deal with vast distances of isolated communities who often rely on cross-border movement for everyday services that most South Australians would take for granted in their community.

It is common knowledge that in Mount Gambier people seek medical services in Victoria on many occasions. It is obvious that in Western Victoria many Victorian citizens seek medical services and other services in South Australia. The border is an artificial line drawn on a map between communities, and through no-one's particular fault that border became a hard border during the COVID pandemic. The way we dealt with those communities did not offer, I think, common-sense solutions to many of the problems they were facing.

The member for Mount Gambier was a strong and strident voice. I just want to point out to the house the political peril he put himself in. During the pandemic, the public had no appetite for anyone criticising a government or offering alternatives. There was no political appetite from the public. The public wanted the government to succeed. They wanted to fight this pandemic and succeed at it, and they wanted all parliamentarians—Labor, Liberal, government, opposition, Independent, whatever—to support the governments of the day and the institutions that we hold dear to keep us safe. With that in mind, think of the courage it takes to speak out during a pandemic and speak your mind.

There were plenty of opportunities to criticise the government and to offer constructive criticism, but the member for Mount Gambier went above and beyond. I also want to point out, without it being a criticism of then government members, that then government MPs were in a position where they could not speak out, they could not call out, and that burden fell almost entirely on the member for Mount Gambier to speak out alone, a lone voice, and that is not easy. No extra resources, not the resources of government, not the resources of the department—one man and his staff in his community standing up in the face of overwhelming pressure to advocate for border communities. I want to pay tribute to the member for Mount Gambier. He is probably losing votes as we speak with me supporting him.

As I said, the introduction of this bill in this house is a result of this government's commitment to regions and the evidence that we are listening to regions and responding to the needs and concerns of regional communities. By the end of this, I will have been in this parliament now nearly 30 years, and it is a constant refrain that many people in our regional communities think that the government's gaze does not go past Gepps Cross or the tollgate. As much as we try to smash that perception it is ingrained and that is why actions like this are so very important.

This is an issue that predates COVID, but certainly during COVID many regional MPs who represented border communities were crying out for support from what those communities thought were city-centric ministers. This might be an unfair criticism of all the Marshall government ministers and an unfair criticism of previous Weatherill government ministers but, as I said earlier, there is that perception.

Their views, I think, can be best categorised as governments were just ignoring or failing to listen to what cross-border communities had to say. When you fail to listen, when you are not listening to a concern, you are not going to act, and when you brush away concerns you build up resentment, and I think that has been witnessed in the most recent elections.

Many residents and businesses in regional South Australia travel across our borders daily. They cross the border for business, health, socialising, work and tourism just through their day-to-day travels. There are complicated issues for residents who live in cross-border communities that do not really reflect that we are part of a federation and a commonwealth, issues that most people living in the comfort of Adelaide would never have to navigate or contemplate or live through.

Tradies who work in the South-East operate on both sides of the border, and they are constantly forced to deal with bureaucracy on both sides of that border. This duplication of government regulation costs jobs, costs income, costs work, costs productivity and ultimately costs the state and the nation.

Another example is firefighters, who experience difficulty when they are travelling along borders and when officers cross the border having to switch radios or switch channels on which they operate. It does not sound like it is overly burdensome, but again fire and natural disasters do not recognise lines on a map, so making sure that we give those regional communities, those regional volunteers, the tools that they need to be able to fight a fire wherever it is, regardless of an artificial line on a map, is very important.

Farmers in regional South Australia are part of border communities. Many of those residents live in one state. They might even have properties that go across the border. Some of them send their children to school in a different state from where they reside, and there are arrangements that come with this complexity that make it difficult for those families to have a seamless and easy way through the education system.

It is hard enough in Adelaide to get organised with kids in school; it is even harder in regional communities. I can only imagine what families are going through in the cross-border communities where they are living in one state and sending their kids to school in another. I can imagine the bureaucracy.

With the onset of COVID-19, the pandemic highlighted the challenges of cross-border communities. This was highlighted through the public advocacy of the member for Mount Gambier and the private advocacy, I imagine, of some then government backbenchers, and I will pay tribute to the member for MacKillop and the member for Hammond—self-praise is no praise, remember, but I am joking—the member for Giles and, importantly, the then member for Frome and now current member for Stuart.

I also want to pay tribute to the upper house members who raised this as an issue. I know Nicola Centofanti and Clare Scriven were keen advocates, and I understand that at one stage in the last parliament, in the upper house, Clare Scriven was the only member of that house to live in regional South Australia, excluding the Hon. Mr Hunter, who lives at Normanville. Advocacy was very important to face the needs that these communities were facing and then act on them.

A commissioner will not solve all these problems. This is not the silver bullet we think it is, but it will go a long way to addressing many of their concerns. I have some experience in the task force model that we deployed, where you put one person in charge of a regulatory function and they are able to cut through the bureaucracy and red tape to get solutions. It worked exceptionally well with the Olympic Dam task force, it worked exceptionally well with the Whyalla task force to try to save steelmaking there and it worked exceptionally well with the Nyrstar redevelopment. This commissioner for cross-border communities should work no differently.

Basically, it is a government task force led by one person and a commission, supported by the department, to cut through the bureaucracy. It is a new mechanism where people can have access to someone whose job it is to deal with these cross-border issues solely. It is important that they can facilitate collaboration and engagement with other agencies. As a minister in a previous government and in this government, government is a slow-moving, large beast that is very difficult to turn. That is why our speaking up here in the parliament sends a very strong message to the bureaucracy that we as a parliament expect there to be action on these matters.

We could set up a non-legislative framework for this, but the legislative framework with statutes standing behind it gives the commission powers to force people to the table to work out solutions. It also gives residents and business communities the opportunity to come to one spot, to one point of entry for all tiers of government. That is always the difficult part: you turn up to one desk and they say 'No, no, that form is not filled out in triplicate. You've got to go to the other desk and get a stamp there and come back to us before you can talk about it.' This gives us one access point to all tiers of government, which I think is a very good aspect.

The commissioner will work with all stakeholders to identify issues, broker solutions, provide advice on matters impacting border communities, making it easier to do business across our borders while addressing barriers to education, health and other services. The thing about establishing these officers is that this is the risk that governments face: criticism from the officers we establish. That is a good thing. The small business commissioner, their job is to investigate how government deals with small business and be an impartial broker, and when government gets it wrong the Small Business Commissioner speaks up.

We saw that with the former commissioner, John Chapman, speaking up against the Weatherill government and then speaking up against the Marshall government. It is that type of independent advocacy that gives communities confidence that their issues are being addressed and that the Public Service has to respond. The commission will also work with other jurisdictions, such as Victoria and New South Wales.

With a commissioner dedicated to these matters in South Australia, the parliament and the government would expect collaboration with these jurisdictions, not only on an individual basis but in national arenas. There would be a common voice across border communities, elevating these issues to ministerial conferences, ministers at the most senior level.

Whether it be national heavy vehicle issues, whether it be livestock issues, whether it be grain issues or harvest issues, whether it be education, health care, policing matters or court matters, there is a greater level of collaboration we can have together with our cross-border cousins that can help us all make living in a border community more attractive.

A maximum three-year term has been provided, which is in line with all executive appointments for public sector employees, with a clear specification for a termination modelled on similar commissioners already in place, such as the Small Business Commissioner. I want to make a few of my own observations. Keeping your word, keeping your promise, is important.

Today, in a previous debate, which it would be disorderly to mention, there was discussion about how some cross-border communities have been treated through either government policy or government inaction. There is a sense within some of our border communities that the governments of South Australia have forgotten them, whether it is the privatisation of the forward rotations of the forest or the less than $2 million allocated in the last Marshall budget to the South-East.

We collectively have to recognise that our border communities are some of the most prosperous and important communities that we have. Whether it is up near the Riverland, right down through Bordertown or right through to the South-East, these communities are some of the most productive in South Australia, if not Australia. They have serious concerns with issues that should be our business and they should be debated here. That is why the Premier made a point of visiting a border community as one of the first communities he visited after his election. This is a good step forward. It is not the final step but a good step in keeping our word.

I want to finish by saying that I do not think we would be here today debating this had it not been for the member for Mount Gambier. I do not think this would be in statute. This is not so much a Labor Party promise as it is the advocacy of the member for Mount Gambier. The people of Mount Gambier are lucky to have a voice like his, who is prepared to speak up against both political parties whenever it is in their interests to do so. He does so quite well and effectively.

I have to say that I hope this bill has a speedy passage. I know that there are some amendments from the upper house and some amendments have been filed. I understand two will be withdrawn and I understand there should be broad support for the ones that remain. I look forward to the committee stage and the contributions of members in the house.

Mr WHETSTONE (Chaffey) (16:18): I will be the lead speaker for this Cross Border Commissioner Bill. I will make a small contribution. After listening to the member for West Torrens, he has some understanding but not a true understanding because you actually have to live within a border community to understand the hardship and complications of living in that community. The logistics and disadvantage of living through the pandemic are prime examples.

New South Wales initiated a Cross Border Commissioner back in 2012 and it took Victoria a little while longer to come on board in 2018. What we have seen over a long period of time is that there appeared to be relative harmony between the five borders, not just Victoria and New South Wales. That has been a concern of mine, that we have seen very much a focus on what has been the more populated areas and the complications.

I do acknowledge the member for Mount Gambier for his advocacy, but I also want to acknowledge all the MPs who have a border constituency: the member for MacKillop, the member for Hammond and me. I understand that the member for Giles has a constituency that is a border community, and it goes on. I want to make it very clear that it is a complex level of areas that we have to deal with on a day-to-day basis, and the pandemic really did highlight the pressures that were put on people's day-to-day lives that we had to deal with.

It was not just about people getting across the border to deal with their medical appointments—whether they had to visit hospitals, doctors or specialty medical frontline services—it was an interruption to people's mindset: they were being denied something they had always had passage of, and that was a free border.

As a free democracy, that is something we have enjoyed for so long but, when the pandemic came along, our freedoms were somewhat taken away and it meant we had to change our style of life. We had to forgo some of those freedoms we had enjoyed for such a long period of time, and it created angst. When people experience angst, they go to their local member if they cannot get their message out. That is exactly what happened to many of us sitting in this chamber as representatives of border communities.

Along the way, the idea of having a border commissioner in the first instance was met with some resistance. But through the course of the pandemic and through the course of individual cases, people having that hardship and people having that freedom taken away from them, the argument was put very strongly not only to the members of parliament but to the democracy that we have enjoyed forever when it comes to decision-making and the process of having that movement of freedom.

What we saw over a long period of time, and while we had a Marshall Liberal government in power, were many complexities. It was not about a government not listening and it was not about a government not prepared to make those changes, but we had to work with SA Health, we had to work with SAPOL and we had to work with many agencies to keep our states as safe as we could, and in some way, shape or form it was a race to the bottom.

States were trying to outdo one another, outsledge one another. We saw that a number of times with premiers and bureaucracy saying, 'We will make our state safer than our neighbour's because this is what we are going to implore that people do.' That was met with some level of support, but it was also met with a significant amount of pushback because of those interruptions. It was not just about people being able to attend health appointments, it was not just about those school students or university students who have always crossed the border via private vehicle or on a school bus: it was significant interruption on business, in particular, that had long operated between the borders, that imaginary line if you like, but it is a change of jurisdiction.

In my community, people were not just crossing borders one way or the other. People were living on one side of the border and their place of work, their loved ones, their day-to-day life, movement and services had been interrupted. That put great strain on the viability of some businesses. It put great strain on the viability of people being able to cross the border to buy food, to buy day-to-day items that they needed to survive in a normal world. We were not in a normal world through that pandemic.

What it showed me, what it showed all of the cross-border community MPs, was that we had to react, and we had to actually move and work with the government agencies. In some instances we had a little bit more freedom in other areas. I know that I had an advantage in the Riverland with particularly the Lindsay Point community as opposed to some of the communities in the South-East and some of those communities into Western Australia. We note that some of those states continue to play hardball, and they continue to keep their borders closed. What we saw, particularly in South Australia and the eastern seaboard, was a willingness to move and be as agile as possible.

As the member for West Torrens has said, government are big beasts, and they are very hard to manoeuvre; they are very hard to change direction. It is also very hard to change a bureaucrat's mind when they have a set of guidelines that they feel comfortable with but have to explore the challenges of crossing that comfort line. What we saw through the extended time of the pandemic was, I guess, the state being run by bureaucracy. The state was governed by red tape, and people's lives were interrupted by that red tape, and the bureaucracy.

I must say that the exemptions in the early days were very rigid, very hard to obtain and very hard to accept, but over time the guidelines became a little malleable and we were able to massage them to help people with exceptional circumstances and those who had not been able attend health services. There was also a really emotional side to it, where people were not able to visit loved ones. They were not able to visit sick parents. They were not able to take their kids to school. In some country communities, they do not have the digital connection to be able to undertake their schoolwork, to be able to undertake day-to-day life, because that is just the nature of living in some of those marginal areas, in particular here in South Australia.

Another one of the real issues was biosecurity, and we are not just talking about the issues of fruit fly, which has been an ongoing issue for many years. We are talking about plant biosecurity. It is about getting plant material across the borders so that people can actually plant their crops, grow their food, to make sure that people have produce in their fridges and in their cupboards on a day-to-day basis.

One of the big sticking points was the movement of livestock. At one point in time there was some suggestion that COVID would be transmitted by animals, and I think that was very quickly dispelled, but it did interrupt and it did create that uncertainty. At the end of the day, as constituents, as representative MPs, what we were really dealing with was the uncertainty, the unknown, from what we had been used to. It really comes down to what is step change.

I think an independent commissioner is something that the opposition will support, but I think we have to understand exactly what sort of person we are going to put into that role. Will it be a prominent community person? I think it has to be someone who lives in a border community. We cannot have a minister's pick, if you like, within an office or within the government as such. It has to be someone who has a clear understanding of how a commissioner will be of benefit, and how a commissioner will be an independent broker.

I think the independence has to be very carefully considered, and it has to give the assurance to those communities that a commissioner is there for their benefit. It is there to streamline some of those barriers that we currently endure from one side of the border to the other. As has been stated by a number of people, we continue to talk about this imaginary line, and it is an imaginary line, but there is legislation from one side of the line to the other.

There are regulations, and there are rules and guidelines that have to be adhered to from one side of that imaginary line to the other. That is why this independent broker or the commissioner will have to have a clear conduit to government, a clear conduit from the community to government and a clear understanding of how that would be of benefit. They also have to understand that if they get caught up in that regulatory burden, or the regulatory layers of red tape, they will very quickly be criticised. People will become very cynical of what the commissioner is there to do.

In closing, the commissioner has to be carefully selected and very carefully given a set of guidelines so that people have a clear understanding of transparency. By and large, transparency is the key so that people understand that the commissioner will benefit them in the big picture and will be that conduit to making red tape and regulations things they are able to push to one side with care and within the guidelines that need to be in place.

I want to make the comment that there was some concern from Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara people. They have indicated their support for the legislation, but they are concerned that the minister in the other place was very focused on the South-East. I am sure the member for Mount Gambier is very focused on the South-East, as is the member for MacKillop. I am sure the member for Giles would be very focused on all five borders, just as I am and just as the members for MacKillop, Hammond and Mount Gambier are, to make sure this commissioner is a success story.

This will be a legacy if it is successful; if it is not, it will be a bureaucratic nightmare for some people. What we need to understand is that, if it is there for the benefit of our border communities, if the transparency is there, if people are accountable for the decisions that are made, I am sure we will see a great embrace of what this independent broker will mean. The Cross Border Commissioner Bill does have the support of the opposition, and I look forward to its speedy passage.

Mr BELL (Mount Gambier) (16:32): I rise to make a contribution to the Cross Border Commissioner Bill 2022. This has been a very long time in the making. The other day I looked at when I first raised this, and it was a party room paper in 2016. I then pursued it through a notice of motion in 2018. If we reflect back, it would have been a very timely and opportune moment to establish a cross-border commissioner because at that stage we had no idea that COVID was just around the corner, and March 2020 rolled through pretty quickly. It is important to put context into it.

This cross-border commissioner is not set up as a response to the COVID pandemic. It is actually set up, as it says in the bill, to facilitate 'improved outcomes for people and businesses in cross border communities'. That is very important, and the opening sentence of the bill indicates what its objective is. We then roll forward past 2018, and in June 2021 I called for another look at the cross-border commissioner, with the thought at that time that the cross-border communities needed a representative on the Transition Committee and that this role would be able to facilitate that.

I certainly acknowledge my colleague just over the electoral border of MacKillop. The member for MacKillop was arm in arm with me during the pandemic because both our offices got worked to the bone, to be honest. There were issues every day, deeply concerning issues for individuals, such as not being able to travel across the border. I am not going to speak for the member for MacKillop, but I certainly felt that the concerns were not being heard or acted upon in Adelaide and the reagitating of the establishment of a cross-border commissioner sat pretty well.

I was really quite dismayed at the government's response to that, after enormous pressure being put on. In fact, certain MPs took a little time out and had to reassess where they were at. That was the level of concern our communities were facing. In response, after pretty much trying to push the government to a conclusion, they came back with a regional representative from PIRSA being the representative on the Transition Committee.

It just showed to me that they had missed the point—and I am not disrespecting the person who went on from PIRSA; he is an absolute gentleman and a great public servant—that we needed somebody who lived, worked and breathed in a cross-border community to understand the issues and perhaps some of the solutions that the Transition Committee could have supported in our area.

That is where we have come from, and it is really pleasing to work with this government. The now Premier has honoured every commitment that he made before the election. He has been very honest about things that he cannot do, but everything that has been committed has been budgeted for and will be delivered, and I thank not only the Premier but the government for that. If the member for West Torrens keeps going the way he is going, he is sure to make sure that I am not the member for Mount Gambier at the next election because with those kind words I am losing votes every time.

You sit there as an MP and you can be frustrated, you can be angry and you can throw rocks. It is very easy to do. There is always an issue. You can prosecute almost anything that you want and make the government look pretty bad, or you get proactive. In my case, we put together a Future Mount Gambier document to take our community and the next generation into the future. That document clearly stated the need for a cross-border commissioner and many of the objectives that we put in there have now been funded and will be enacted under this current government.

I am convinced that the cross-border commissioner will play a critical role in improving the lives and working conditions of our cross-border communities. I see this as a productivity driver, I see this as a jobs creator and driver, because the amount of red tape and duplication are a handbrake on local communities that are trying to operate across a border community. Those limitations are real and the cost to business is real and the end result of that is fewer people employed in that process.

Of course, I see it as better outcomes for our community members. The member for West Torrens went through a list of areas that I am sure we will see great improvement on. That includes water—water allocation, water usage, smart usage of a finite resource across our borders. It also includes fire, and not just fighting a fire but also the coordination, preparation and preventative measures before fire season comes around or is upon us. One of those is Eaglehawk smart technology.

Instead of putting a person in fire towers every day, which they do every fire season—and there are about six of them—technology can detect a puff of smoke up to nine or 10 kilometres away, during the night-time as well. This is the type of technology that this government is investing in for our community to be safe moving forward. We can work with the Victorians because the forests obviously straddle both sides of the border and they are in both states.

Tourism is the most untapped opportunity in the South-East that I can put my finger on. Most of our assets are free. You can walk around the Blue Lake, you can go to the Valley Lake, you can go to the sinkholes and you can go to a whole range of free, natural attractions. However, we have not taken the next step and done a value-add for those who want to spend money, who may want to go on a gondola up to the top of the lake or may want to go down a zipline. This is private capital that can be unleashed, of course promoting Mount Gambier and the South-East to Victorians and cross-border communities.

In terms of health, a large number of people use Warrnambool for specialist services because it is two hours away versus five hours to Adelaide. Trades we have touched on. Dual accreditation is needed, which is limiting some of the ability to work on both sides of the borders. In terms of education, we have a number of students who live on the Victorian side of the border and go to school in South Australia, but the bus will not pick them up because they are quite literally 15 metres over the imaginary line. Disease, pest management and control, transport, agriculture, fishing—there are a whole range of areas where I see a cross-border commissioner being very active.

I was really pleased to hear the lead speaker from the Liberal Party talk about red tape. The last thing I want to see is this legislation getting bogged down in red tape—excessive reports, excessive annual plans. I can go into a number of office buildings in Mount Gambier and pull off their annual plans that took two, three, four months to put together, and then they spend another two or three months reporting on the annual plan. We want this person on the ground from day one doing and not writing and justifying.

That is a really important point because the amendments I have put forward aim to do exactly that: they aim to cut out excessive bureaucracy, excessive red tape. It is important to understand how we got to this point. The amendments made in the other place I believe were made with very good intentions, but, from what I can see, many of the amendments introduced in the other place actually come from the Kangaroo Island commissioner bill 2014; in fact, some of them are word for word.

People need to realise that the two commissioners are extremely different in the intent and objectives they are trying to achieve. I will read a couple from the headline of the Kangaroo Island Commissioner Bill 2014. This was a commissioner whose primary act was to develop management plans in relation to the coordination and delivery of infrastructure and services on Kangaroo Island. I will just say that again: the development of management plans. That was the main aim of the Kangaroo Island commissioner bill of 2014.

If you go further, that commissioner had to deal with one council primarily, primarily one local MP and primarily one state government. If you contrast that with the cross-border commissioner, they will be dealing with over eight councils, the borders of which directly adjoin a state border, over five state MPs, two federal MPs and up to five different state governments. The roles are therefore incredibly different.

The development of management plans in relation to the coordination and delivery of infrastructure is not the primary focus of the cross-border commissioner, and I have just gone through the areas that I see the cross-border commissioner focussing on. This is the most important point: you cannot transpose one commissioner's bill onto another. It is not fit for purpose, and it will see the position bogged down with plans before they even start the role, and this is exactly what I am trying to address with my amendments going forward.

In fact, I have been advised that if the bill goes through unamended we will likely see a practical outcome that involves something similar. The position will be advertised and then be filled around late September. There will be up to three months' consultation with all the councils I have just talked about, which will see it through to the next year, and then they will need to begin the reporting process into the annual report, which is tabled in parliament before the end of the financial year.

These amendments, I think, were really well intended, but again unintended consequences have the outcome sometimes of bogging down a cross-border commissioner before they even get on the road and start making some great improvements into these areas.

Another concern I have is that this person will be appointed by the government. The Minister for Primary Industries in the other place has made an open commitment that this position will be advertised. If you think about it, I am really confident that we will find somebody who should reside in Mount Gambier. They will be dealing with Liberal, an Independent and one Labor MP, so it makes sense that they are apolitical in everything they do because they will be working with a broad spectrum—in fact, the broad spectrum—of MPs in this house.

That is not a concern that I hold. What I would like to see is that this position be advertised and then the person appointed as soon as possible so that we can really start getting on the ground. As the bill states:

An Act to establish a Cross Border Commissioner charged with facilitating improved outcomes for people and businesses in cross border communities...

That is the objective of this bill, and I would like to see us enact it as quickly as possible without the red tape and without excessive plans being put in place. I will talk more about this during the amendments, but some of the role is not clearly identified yet, so we have to have flexibility for the commissioner.

They could have written a beautiful annual plan at the start of 2020. About three months in they would have quickly realised that COVID is a pressing issue, and that three months' worth of work would have been completely wasted because they are focusing on an issue that has come up.

I do sincerely acknowledge the intent behind the amendments in the Legislative Council. I am seeking to remove most of them. One that I am certainly not removing is the requirement for this bill to be reviewed after three years by an independent reviewer and then every five years after that. That should give some comfort that there is an appropriate mechanism.

The review will be completely independent of government and able to highlight areas for improvement but, of course, the annual report that will be tabled every 12 months gives every MP the opportunity to have input and oversight over what the commissioner has done. As a local MP, I guarantee you will have great input into working with the commissioner in delivering better outcomes for your community and for regional South Australia.

Mr PEDERICK (Hammond) (16:50): I, too, rise to support this bill for a cross-border commissioner. It has been well delivered in this house by previous speakers and this is something that I believe we should complete in haste.

I was very pleased when I got hold of Luke Wilson, the Victorian Cross Border Commissioner during the intensity of the COVID crisis when we had shutdowns and lockdowns. All kinds of things were happening across the border involving people with health concerns, people working in health, whether they lived in Murrayville or just over the border from Pinnaroo, whether it was schoolteachers and children who could not come to work when the lockdowns came in, whether it was the seven biosecurity employees who live in Murrayville, or the man at the Pinnaroo border station, which is actually, as I learnt during the pandemic, a kilometre inside South Australia but is technically where the border is. There were a whole range of scenarios, including farmers just trying to do their job, and many of them obviously had land on either side of the border.

I first want to commend the work that our former Marshall Liberal government did. They were difficult times. We have not had a pandemic for 100 years, since the Spanish flu. I certainly take my hat off to everyone in Health, from Nicola Spurrier, down and everyone in the police force, from Grant Stevens down. Several times I met with people on the border, and the police had been sent to Pinnaroo for rotations from different duties—usually from Adelaide but also from other areas in the state—and I commend them for working in difficult times. People were getting emailed updates on what was happening literally every half an hour, as things could change.

Sometimes, things got misconstrued, but it was a very, very dynamic environment. I certainly had business owners who were not allowed to come across the border and operate their businesses during the lockdowns. It was interesting during one lockdown when we were fighting the Yumali-Netherton fire—a long way from the border, relatively—we had hundreds of people coming together for the common cause of saving property and land.

There are a whole range of stories of what happened on the border and some of the most heart-wrenching involved the parents of schoolchildren who grew up on the South Australian side but were at different schools and colleges, whether it was in Hamilton in Victoria or elsewhere just over the border. The member for MacKillop would be well aware of some of these people and those down towards Naracoorte.

A good friend of mine had a daughter going to a school in Victoria who wanted the support of her mother. The best thing they could do to get anywhere close was to sit on a back road out the back of Naracoorte a couple of metres apart and talk to each other and have the dog run between them. That is all they could do.

I have mentioned here before that the police officers were actually in tears as they said, 'If you touch each other, I'm going to have to arrest you.' That is how tough it got. Assisting people to get exemptions took some time, but we got there in the end. It was very tough, and for the right reasons. People were not sure what could happen with the pandemic.

I mentioned farmers. I went up to meet some property owners and farmers at Pinnaroo one day and we were talking about what would happen if we got locked down and what would happen if we got to harvest. I said, 'Where's your boundary for your property into Victoria?' They said, 'You can see it up there on the tree line.' It was a couple of kilometres away. I asked, 'Have you got a wheat crop through the fence?' He said yes. I said, 'Well, you can't leave a wheat crop standing.' I know agriculture had exemptions but there was confusion at times about what was exempt and what was not going to be exempt. I just said, 'You've got to take that crop off. You call me if you have any trouble.' It did not get to that.

There are difficulties when you have seven biosecurity staff living across the border. Murrayville, for a range of reasons including football and netball, is essentially a part of South Australia; it just happens to be 30 kilometres across the border. I have attended the Murrayville Cricket Ground (MCG). My boys are now 18 and 21 and they have played football there since they were six. They reckon in the morning you just chase the kangaroos off the oval and away you go. It is not a bad ground.

Murrayville are so closely tied with South Australia that when they applied for grants to build their new facilities they had to work with the SANFL on the grant applications. They are obviously funded out of Victorian and federal government grants, but the support procedures came from the South Australian National Football League. They are part of the Mallee Football League, where my boys play at Peake. They were interesting times. They are some of the complexities.

We were talking about Neil Kerley and Russell Ebert today. People everywhere are passionate about their sport, no matter which sport it is—country football and netball. The Murrayville community felt like they were being excluded because of different lockdowns that meant they could not come through and play. It was just the way it worked. They thought they were being ostracised by the South Australian clubs. Some people over in Victoria thought the South Australian side were just trying to manipulate things. That could not be further from the truth.

I take my hat off to Lou Boughen, President of the Mallee Football League at the time. I had meetings with the SANFL and Netball SA. It got serious. There was talk of legal action at one stage as they were coming into finals. There was an interesting time when a notice went out on a Saturday that the Victorians were supposed to be shut in their homes at 1 o'clock that afternoon. I knew that everyone playing sport or involved in sport would be at Pinnaroo for one of the finals, and they were. I rang my local police superintendent. I must say the cooperation I got from Scott Denny, his team and all the other police that I ever had anything to do with during the hard times of the pandemic was just fantastic.

Scott Denny said, 'What can I do?' Then we learned about all the logistics with a whole range of procedures that South Australia Police obviously only operate on our side of the border and obviously Victoria Police operate on the other side. There were two finals played that weekend, on Saturday and Sunday, and I believe Murrayville people stayed on the South Australian side and played a final the next day. There was all sorts of talk that they were going to stay through until either the preliminary final or the grand final the next week, but they went home and they were locked out. It was a tragedy for all involved that they could not play in the final. That just shows some of the passion of these people.

I met with the Pinnaroo primary school principal, who had a problem with getting students and teachers through. We were having a very polite meeting with the door open, and one of his teachers stood in the doorway during the meeting. She was being very controlled. I had talked to her on the phone a couple of times previously. I said to her, 'Just let it go, just unload and say what you like. I've heard it all before. Just go.' That was the best thing: she unloaded on me and I did not care. She needed to vent because of the problems those people had just living their lives. As has been said, the border was just an imaginary line in the sand for these people that did not really exist for the way they ran their lives. That is how heated it got.

I must commend the security that went in place to make sure that people were not in the wrong place. A farmer in his self-propelled boom sprayer told me he had pulled up on a back road right near the border. He had to make a phone call, so he thought he would do the right thing and get on his mobile phone. He pulled up, but within a few minutes the police were there. They said, 'What are you doing?' He said, 'Well, I've pulled up to make a phone call.' They said, 'Well, you are going to have to move that because you are right in front of one of our cameras in the trees.'

Members interjecting:

Mr PEDERICK: Seriously, that's what happened. You just have to give credit. People knew that if they went around, as they did in the normal practice of work—they were not trying to dodge the main crossing on the Mallee Highway—they might go to their property on a back road and come out the other side, and the police could tell when they crossed because they had cameras there. Di Thornton, who lives on the Victorian side, runs a private health clinic in Pinnaroo. She could not come and run her own clinic. As we know, health care is a struggle even in Adelaide, let alone in a border community.

One thing that was a real problem was the supply of fuel. Murrayville does not have any fuel pumps anymore, so they got their fuel in Pinnaroo, and you can imagine the chaos with that. I think there was some ad hoc arrangement made at some stage for a little while, for a few weeks, when some fuel stocks were set up locally in Murrayville. It was a difficult time and people were frustrated at every level, and I get that. Whether it was through farming, working a business, working in health care or involved in education or whether they were trying to get their kids across the border to go to school, it was a very tough time.

Apart from the very sad story of a mother and daughter having to sit a metre or two apart at a border and talk without being able to touch each other, I just want to share one very good news story. On a Monday, I had contact from a constituent who said their son was getting married on the Friday. I thought, 'Yes, fair enough.' I thought, 'We have the cross-border bubble, so they can come across from Murrayville and perhaps go to Pinnaroo and Lameroo.' But, no, the wedding was in Hahndorf outside the cross-border bubble, which had been instituted in that time. We looked at it and did a bit of work on it and I thought, 'No, it's no good.' To that person's credit they kept ringing my office.

From the initial call, we kept ramping it up to the Hon. Stephen Wade in the other place and his team. I give them due credit because we hammered them on this one because this family were not going to be able to witness their own son's wedding. The wedding was on that Friday night, and I got a phone call to the office at about 9.30 in the morning.

The Hon. J.K. Szakacs interjecting:

Mr PEDERICK: Why?

The Hon. J.K. Szakacs: He doesn't like weddings. He doesn't like family gatherings.

Mr PEDERICK: He will get over it. Now I have lost my train of thought.

The ACTING SPEAKER (Mr Odenwalder): Start again.

Mr PEDERICK: Yes, I could—are you going to extend my time?

The Hon. A. Koutsantonis: The wedding was on a Friday.

Mr PEDERICK: I know—thank you—we are helping each other out today. At about 9.30, I got a call to say the exemption was on the top of the pile. I thought, 'Well, we're getting somewhere.' It was about an hour and a half later when I got the call: 'Your people across the border are going to a wedding.' That was a fantastic phone call to make. I rang the mother of the son, and she said, 'But my husband is out on the header.' I said, 'Well, it's too hot and windy anyway.' I said, 'You're going to a wedding.' That was fantastic, a fantastic result, an individual result, but I am sure a lot of MPs from either side of the house managed to get those exemptions, but they were tough work.

It was especially around the time when these footy finals were being played up at Pinnaroo and Lameroo over the weekend the Victorians were supposed to be shut in, and it was all crossed up who was supposed to be where. Luke Wilson is the Victorian Cross Border Commissioner—and I will note that both the Victorian commissioner and the New South Wales commissioner were appointments without legislation; I just place that on the record—working for another colour of government. He said to me one day, 'Adrian, have my mobile number.' I said, 'Are you sure?' He said that he was and to ring him any time. I said, 'Well, be careful what you wish for because that might happen.'

I must say that it was only during daylight hours, and I think it was only once or twice on a weekend, but I will always treasure the fact that I could pick up the phone and just go bang and say, 'What's happening your side?' He would already know a lot about what was happening on our side, but he said, 'What is your view of the world about what's happening?' It was fantastic just to have that dialogue with someone whose job it was to be the Cross Border Commissioner.

I know there has been some talk about whether it creates another section of red tape, and that is the last thing we want. We want the right outcome here. Some people have said, 'Oh, well you can just ring up the appropriate ministers over the border,' or this and that. I do not know if anyone else has, and perhaps they do, but to have a list of ministers' contacts—whether it is in Victoria or New South Wales, or Western Australia if you are on the other side of state—is just too much. You just ring one person, like I rang Luke Wilson multiple times, and he would give me the drum. That was something to truly treasure during the dark times of COVID.

We do need to get this right, as the member for Mount Gambier has indicated. It is good to see that it appears that across the parliament a review will be acknowledged and put into legislation. I fully support the cross-border commissioner, as long as we have the right process in place. It is not about setting up useless plans that just do not mean much but about people like Luke Wilson, who you can ring up and just get the job done. I commend the bill.

The Hon. A. PICCOLO (Light) (17:07): I rise in support of the Cross Border Commissioner Bill 2022. In my opinion, this bill is evidence of this government's commitment to support South Australian regions to grow and become places where people are happy to live, work and visit. It is a very important position that the bill creates, and it is also an indication of this government's commitment to the promises it made at election time. It is delivering on those promises, and it is also an important indication that we are listening to people in the regions and their representatives.

The member for Mount Gambier has been a strong advocate for this position, and clearly he has influenced the way the government is going in this direction. I understand his amendments will also be supported by the government. It is good that we can work in that way. It is not only the member for Mount Gambier. Other regional members have also been very vocal in their support for some sort of structure to deal with the issues of people who live along the border. I know that the member for MacKillop in the last parliament often showed a strong streak of independence on a number of issues and also spoke his mind quite clearly when it was not in that government's policy.

It is good that we have reached this point, and it is good that we can actually get this position created because I think it is very important. As has been outlined quite well by the member for Hammond, state boundaries are just lines on a map of paper. They are not lines on the ground, in the sense of how people live. For people who live close to those borders, those boundaries should not impact the way they live their lives—whether it is going to school, working, doing business, a whole range of things. It is our role as a parliament to make sure we remove those barriers that make it harder for people in the regions to live along the border.

This position will help develop those policies and inform governments of the day on what needs to be done to remove or reduce the red tape that often comes at the border. The amount of red tape and barriers people face along the borders were quite obvious during the COVID period, when just trying to get simple things done, simple business things done, became almost impossible. They went some way to create what they called 'bubbles', but I think even people of good intent found it hard to work through some of that.

The commissioner's job, day-to-day and in a proactive way, will be to make sure that when we enact laws on a whole range of policies we understand the impact they will have on certain groups in our community along those borders. A reality we are going to have to face is that different states will have different governments, different policies and different laws, but hopefully our commissioner, who will work with the other two commissioners, can work through some of those issues and make sure we understand how any new laws may impact on people.

It is particularly difficult for families who live along the border and who literally cross the border every day for whatever reason. When those borders become a barrier to them living their lives, that is something we need to deal with, particularly when it is around education, health or accessing other government services. I remember very clearly that it was one of the areas the member for MacKillop raised quite strongly during the last government in the COVID period.

At times, he was quite animated about his concerns for his community around Naracoorte and the difficulties faced by people, from shopkeepers to tradies to schoolkids to farmers, who would normally cross the border on a daily basis and the impact—not only the impact but the disproportionate impact, and that is what is important—our polices and rules have on them.

We have laws that apply to everyone in the state; that is fine, but sometimes the way these laws act in reality has a disproportionately negative impact on people along the borders because of the geography involved. My understanding is that the commissioner will focus on engaging with all our cross-border communities to understand their issues, and we expect the following matters to be dealt with:

improving access to further and vocational education;

assisting to develop strategic and cross-border regional approaches to addressing workforce shortages. This has always been an issue, but particularly these days, when a lot of rural communities are finding that shortages in the workforce are holding back the growth of their communities, and we need those communities to grow;

encouraging collaboration between investment in sport and recreational facilities across borders, where sporting teams play across the border; and

very importantly, licensing.

I am not familiar with how licensing works in a whole range of professions between Victoria and South Australia or between New South Wales and South Australia, or whether the states change. In this day and age, you would think we could normalise those licences so that, if you are a plumber, an electrician or a professional on one side of the border, the same rules and regulations apply as on the other side of the border and vice versa. We have been able to achieve that in the law field through a national scheme, and there is no reason we cannot also do that for other professions.

I think it was the member for Hammond who indicated the assistance he got from the commissioner from, I assume, Victoria during the COVID period. There was one person he could ring and get matters resolved.

That is one of the beauties of this office: it is a place people can go if they have an issue with the border and they are not trying to track down the right person in the right agency. If you are an MP, it is bad enough trying to find the right person to assist your constituents but ordinary people find it even more challenging to do that.

Also, I think some of the benefits that come from this are that when these commissioners work together they will not only improve our state's interests but they will also improve our national interests. Our national interests will improve from the collaboration of these commissioners because they can break through things and work out things that are holding back a whole range of communities on either side of the border, particularly those things that impact on productivity, efficiency or increased costs. That is a major thing: those things that increase costs unnecessarily to do business or just to live day to day. This will also then influence government policy for the better.

I think the reality will be that this commissioner will not have any shortage of work. He/she/them/they and their staff will have an enormous amount of work to do because there are clearly already issues to be addressed and new issues will come. I think the member for West Torrens raised a couple of issues. I think he gave the example of firefighters and the issues they have, which are those small things we talked about regarding road safety. One of the examples I provided was about various people in the trades and making sure that they can actually do that as well.

l understand that while the position will be based in the South-East, it will be a commissioner for all our borders. The reality is that it had to be based somewhere, and I think it is important that they be based in a region, whatever region that may be, because there is a danger if they are based in Adelaide that they could become city-centric.

So, having them based in the regions, they will have contact with regional people on a regular day. They will see how regional people live day to day, which is very important, and experiencing that firsthand is very practical. They will be engaged with those communities and there will be common issues. Whether you are in the South-East or the Riverland, there will be a lot of common issues for people in the boundaries and how to deal with those issues, so it is very important.

It is with those few comments I support this bill. I also indicate that I look forward to the amendments to be put by the member for Mount Gambier. I understand his amendments improve this bill, and there is nothing like having a bit of collaboration to make things better in this place.

The ACTING SPEAKER (Mr Odenwalder): The member for MacKillop.

The Hon. A. Koutsantonis: Hear, hear! Give us hell!

Mr McBRIDE (MacKillop) (17:17): No, I will not be doing that from the other side. Hopefully I can put my case clearly that there is an immense opportunity with this cross-border commissioner, and may I thank the member for Mount Gambier for his strong advocacy for solutions up and down our borders. He and I both think and hope that this cross-border commissioner stands for everything that will benefit, not only South Australia but everyone who lives on this cross-border community right around our borders.

I rise today to speak on this Cross Border Commissioner Bill. The context of my community has been important in my consideration of this bill. My strong interest in this matter would be no surprise to those in this chamber and my community. Communities on our borders are just that: communities. They should not be impaired in their operations by virtue of a state boundary, a line on a map.

The MacKillop electorate shares a long border with south-western Victoria. The areas adjacent to the border can be best described as rural landscapes. Primary industries are the dominant land use on the border, which is characterised by broadacre cropping in the north of the MacKillop electorate in the area around Pinnaroo, through to more intensive livestock and horticultural enterprises in the south of the region around Nangwarry. Important softwood forestry plantations span both sides of the border in the south.

Some key South Australian border service centres that are relevant to the southern communities include Pinnaroo, Bordertown, Naracoorte, Penola, through to the regional city of Mount Gambier in the south of the Limestone Coast. Our regional communities are like any other, relying on the services offered by townships which supply schooling, shopping, medical services, hospital care, farm services, machinery and vehicle sales, and a raft of other services including trades.

These services underpin the everyday transactions we all take for granted: students catching a bus to school, workers travelling by car to work, accessing health care, seeing a general practitioner, accessing hospital care or visiting specialists and ambulance access. It might be through engaging a tradesperson based in a border town or the work of a truck driver in freighting goods on well-known and well-travelled freight routes.

However, our communities on the border, by virtue of their location, also have to contend with differing rules, priorities and standards established by adjacent states, which can often be seen in stark contrast and cause a range of challenges. The relatively dense population distribution on the South Australian-Victorian border in the south of our state feels these contrasts with an intensity like no other border population.

While my focus is on the southern communities, all the communities that live adjacent to our state borders feel the impacts, including those cross-border communities in the Riverland that cross back and forth into Victoria, those who live and work in the north of our state that cross into New South Wales or into the Northern Territory or Western Australia. They will also be facing different rules and priorities. In the case of MacKillop, we see sometimes subtle disconnects which place barriers in the way people going about their daily lives or conducting their businesses. Some of these differences can be much more pronounced.

During 2020-21, we saw unprecedented restrictions on our state borders that created many challenges for our border communities that took the brunt of restrictions to prevent COVID from entering our state. While those COVID border restrictions are now well behind us, the need for a cross-border commissioner is no way driven alone by our COVID experience. There remain a range of other intersections of South Australian and Victorian laws and requirements that proceed COVID. These are matters upon which the position of a commissioner may provide assistance.

Coordination of school bus transport is such an issue in the area of Frances, a small but mighty town that is literally a stone's throw from the Victorian-South Australian border. An opportunity exists to better integrate the transport of Victorian and South Australian children to their closest school of Frances. A commissioner could provide support to get the right amount of resolution on this matter to better integrate the policies of South Australia and Victoria to provide better services for students and the school community.

We need to recognise that border areas have differences from other areas of our state, and we need to work for equitable and sustainable outcomes for our communities. The commissioner may also be able to examine the intersection of trade licence requirements for plumbers and electricians who are currently required to be licensed in South Australia and Victoria. In meeting these licensing requirements, these tradies are required to do more paperwork and pay more fees annually by virtue of their location on the border. The reduction in red tape and fees for these in-demand services is more important than ever in the current building environment. We want these businesses spending time being productive and effective members of our economy, not paying additional fees and doing more paperwork

An important matter into which the commissioner may be able to lean support is to generate impetus to progress the review of the Green Triangle Freight Action Plan. The freight action plan was prepared in 2008 and is well overdue for review. The plan identifies the strategic areas for action in the areas that include road and rail network enhancements, regulatory reform, job opportunities, skills and training and socio-economic and community development.

I support this bill and the creation of a cross-border commissioner position. I am mindful that the success of this position will rest on the relationships they establish with their stakeholders and all tiers of government. It cannot be another layer of bureaucracy. I want to see this position work and be accountable for effective outcomes for our border communities. The bill is designed to provide a mechanism for residents, businesses and community organisations and all tiers of government to collaborate on matters impacting border communities.

The establishment of a commissioner will rely on doing the work to properly engage with all tiers of government and the business community, having a keen eye on simplifying the regulatory processes and working with our interstate counterparts to examine education, justice, health, and community services for these communities.

The commissioner must of course be accountable for the work they undertake. They will need to add value and be effective in brokering collaboration to deliver outcomes. They will need to be responsive to the emerging issues raised by the community. The commissioner will be required to work to a plan in its preparation, and I believe this plan must be fit for purpose and be prepared in such a way as to provide guidance and clarity about the objectives of the commissioner for border communities.

I just want to touch on and further address the Green Triangle Freight Action Plan. It is well known in my region that this freight action plan is a committee. It is dominated by Victorian representation. It is meant to be about the Green Triangle as a whole, which encompasses the Limestone Coast, the South-East of South Australia and Western Victoria. The Green Triangle certainly encompasses the forestry asset in this neck of the woods.

What is ironic about this Green Triangle Freight Action Plan that I hear about in MacKillop and in the seat of Mount Gambier and from the member for Mount Gambier as well is that there has not been the impetus from this plan and from this committee towards South Australia. It has been highlighted and the suggestion is that all the money has been put into roads that take the forestry asset to Portland and not back to Mount Gambier and into South Australia.

There are two huge differences when you have roads and infrastructure for a forestry resource that heads all the way to Portland and ignores going into Mount Gambier, the South-East or the Limestone Coast, because if it goes to Portland it is going for export. It is not going to be processed and the product is going overseas.

If it goes towards Mount Gambier, more likely it is softwood. It will be pine, not blue gum, and it would be sawn up into log and, obviously, further processed thereby developing economic wealth and jobs for not only Victoria but also for Mount Gambier, the South-East and the Limestone Coast as a whole. This has been missing.

I know that the Wattle Range Council has been at war with the Green Triangle Freight Action Plan and the committee for the lack of connection back into South Australia. If we had a cross-border commissioner on our side batting for these roads and networks, we could be bringing more of this forestry resource back into Mount Gambier, back into the Limestone Coast and back into Tantanoola at Timberlink and having this timber processed rather than the roads all being modernised and upgraded towards Portland, which is what the industry tells us.

Another issue is out of my electorate. I have heard about this, and I saw the Marshall government spend a lot of money—in the hundreds of millions of dollars—on the Strzelecki Track. You might say, 'What has this got do with the cross-border commissioner?' Well, the Strzelecki Track joins not only South Australia but also Adelaide with our greatest gas resource, Moomba. A lot of the work and the services have to use the Strzelecki Track to service whatever is required there in that Moomba gas basin.

I know and I have heard that Queenslanders now have a bitumen road all the way from Moomba to Brisbane, and now the contracts for Moomba are going back towards Queensland and Brisbane. To give you a classic example, and it is only a recent development, a Toyota dealership here in Adelaide used to service hundreds of Toyotas at Moomba. It has lost this contract, which now is being serviced by a Brisbane business, and it would be solely because we do not have a bitumen road up towards Moomba.

If we had a cross-border commissioner batting for South Australia, recognising this infrastructure deficiency, we could have had that Strzelecki Track bitumised, and we could have the headquarters of Santos in Adelaide and the contracts for Moomba rather than lost to Brisbane, as I think is already occurring or has occurred.

These are just small examples, but they have huge ramifications. Another thing that is really interesting to note about our cross-border community—it was advertised but it was not taken up, and I do not know whether it will be—is whether there will be any cancer care, chemo and radiotherapy in Mount Gambier. It is being offered but no-one is going near it. Again, you might say, 'What has that got to do with a cross-border commissioner?’ No-one wants to go near cancer care, radiotherapy or chemo in Mount Gambier because everyone is diverted to Warrnambool in Victoria, which has a population of 33,000 and which has a beautiful medical system and facilities.

That is not much good to you when they lock the borders during a COVID pandemic, but we are not doing this bill about appointing a commissioner because of the COVID pandemic. The fact is that Mount Gambier will not get that traction into chemo and radiotherapy because of the chemo and radiotherapy services that are being provided at Warrnambool. There has to be great connection. People need to know. Our medical staff, our medical facilities, our hospitals and medical clinics need to recognise that if there are not going to be these services in Mount Gambier then Warrnambool is the next point of call.

I know that just out of Bordertown there is a little town called Nhill, which is probably about 50 to 100 kilometres from Bordertown into Victoria and towards Horsham. It has a large medical centre. A lot of South Australians end up going to Nhill for their medical services because it has a medical hub that attracts good GPs or a number of GPs with medical practitioners and other specialist services. Again, if there is this great crossover and we should be doing this and that is the way it fits, then let's make it work for all Victorians and South Australians.

I did touch on the little town called Frances. Frances has a little primary school with 34 students. It would have had more and could have had more if we had a South Australian bus that supplied Frances, but the bus was taken away from Frances because there were not enough students because there is a threshold, a number that must be on the bus to provide that bus. However, the Victorian bus is not full; it comes from Victoria, but it can only pick up Victorian students. Even if there is a South Australian student on the side of the road on the way, they have to leave them behind.

It is a nonsense, it is nuts and it is all because there is no collaboration, no communication and we are not working together. In the end, it is not the bureaucracy that suffers and it is not the education system in Victoria that suffers: it is the community residents, the community families we are meant to be providing for. These are just some of the small bits of detail that we have seen and heard and that we know go on.

The member for West Torrens talked about farming businesses that straddle the border. To give you an analogy, a firsthand experience, our McBride business has a property that straddles the border and we had to have three shearing teams shear the sheep on this property, because it is a large one, and one of them had to be a South Australian team on the South Australian side because the border was closed because they could not go across into Victoria to shear those sheep or vice versa. This is the sort of stuff that can go on, but that was through a pandemic problem.

It just goes to show, though, that this line in the sand, which has no relevance to business, no relevance to health or catching a bus really, unless you want to make it, should be able to be worked through so that we have advantages being alongside another jurisdiction—such as Victoria or New South Wales, Queensland, Northern Territory, Western Australia—rather than it being a disadvantage.

Other towns I will just touch on that I know are very important along our border include Mount Gambier, Naracoorte, Bordertown, Pinnaroo, and then we go up to Renmark; I think they are probably the largest towns that are right along the border. They are major service centres for South Australians. We know the Victorian counterparts, our neighbours, come into South Australia to utilise these towns for health, education, services, industry, dealerships, service and maintenance of major capital purchases, and it works well. Once we closed those borders during the pandemic, did we know about it.

On the other side of the equation, we have large towns like Hamilton, with 10,000 people; Horsham, Victoria, with 20,000 people; and I have already mentioned Warrnambool, with 33,000. It is interesting to touch on Hamilton and maybe even Horsham. Robe council even has some council meetings in Horsham and Hamilton because I think it is nearly 20 or 30 per cent of Robe houses have a Victorian influence or are owned by Victorians. There is this real connection between Victoria and South Australia, particularly down in our neck of the woods.

Another issue I will just touch on (I do not know where this has ended out, and it may have changed) is a silly anomaly that used to exist in the heavy transport industry of livestock. The South Australian and Victorian rules were such that they had some leniency about overweight and underweight on the livestock carriers. They had some discrepancy because you can never tell how heavy a beast is, a cow, a sheep or a lamb, so it is really tough for a stock truck driver to know exactly the tonnage on their truck.

Both South Australia and Victoria had rules that gave some sort of dispensation to the fact that there was leniency there, but there was no leniency when they went into New South Wales. If they were caught overweight going into a New South Wales feedlot with these cattle on board, there was a hefty fine. What they did was they ran the gauntlet. They put it into their business plan, they knew that every five or 10 truckloads they might get pulled over and there might be a chance they were over and get the fine.

With every load of cattle or sheep—but mainly cattle this time because we are talking about cattle feedlots going up in the Riverina into New South Wales—if they were over, there would be a fine of $5,000 or $10,000 per load. It was built into the cost of transporting the cattle from South Australia into the Riverina, so if they were caught once, twice or 10 times a year it was just built in as a mechanism. That is how nuts it is because no-one was talking and trying to address this.

Yes, we did try to get the New South Wales government on board very early on. We probably should have another go at addressing this, particularly now that the borders are open and COVID has gone, and there might be a little bit more common sense about jurisdictions working collaboratively together. These are the sorts of opportunities we would have if we had a South Australian commissioner and all of us were pulling in the same direction, as we are Australians and we are Australia as a nation. Yes, we do have different state jurisdictions but we do not have to be that different that we have to make this a cost and make this whole task a poisoned chalice for businesses and people going about their lives.

I commend the bill. I hope that the bill is kept in its simplest form. I hope it is practical and I hope it is workable. I certainly do not want to see the bill being over bureaucratic. I do not want to see that the commissioner is tied up in knots and unable to do his job because he is having to report every month or two months. There is a reporting system and there is a review. I think the review is in about three years' time to make sure this is working.

Perhaps I have a fear that if we have a border commissioner—and I want to address the Frances school bus to pick up South Australian students. It is another level of consultation that, as the member for MacKillop, I will have to work through. If that works and if that gets us the answer, well, it is really a great process. If it does not work, it just means that I have to write a second letter, I have to send a second email, I have to address an issue that perhaps I did not have to if there is no commissioner at all if this is successful in rolling it out.

As I said, I hope that this process is put into place for the right reasons, that we find the right person, who is well connected, who is a busy individual—male or female, it will not matter—that they are proactive all the way from Mount Gambier right around to Ceduna and consider all the borders that we have to deal with. The more they look, the more they delve into all the issues that our borders have to work with, the more they will find they have to do. There is no doubt that I am looking forward to any of these reviews in the future to highlight that this has been a good process, it has worked, there are efficiencies and we are moving forward to solve them. The bill has merit to assist our border communities, it needs support, and I support this border commissioner process.

Mr HUGHES (Giles) (17:36): I also rise in support of this bill and, like others have done, I want to highlight the persistent advocacy of the member for Mount Gambier. I also know that the member for MacKillop is a strong supporter. I think it is to the credit of the Malinauskas government that we have taken this on board. We made a commitment leading up to the election that we would instigate this particular approach and it is great to see that this is now happening.

I acknowledge that today, at least in principle, at least when it comes to the support for a commissioner, it has crossbench support and bipartisan support. I would flag a concern and the member for Mount Gambier has also flagged that concern. People have been talking about trying to keep it simple, based on common sense, but I do not think it is a good starting point when you have a whole series of amendments that mirror what happened on Kangaroo Island to apply it to this particular situation because this situation is different.

We are talking about a cross-border commissioner. We are not talking about a commissioner for Kangaroo Island within South Australia. I hope common sense will prevail when it comes to the discussion about the various amendments, the various clauses, so that the legislation that we end up with is fit for purpose and legislation that will assist us to get a commissioner who can cut through the red tape and who can be a catalyst for change in our cross-border areas.

As people know, I live in Whyalla. I am a long way from any borders. When you look at the borders, as the crow flies the borders in the South-East are closer to Whyalla than my borders in my electorate. That is the scale of the electorate. There are communities in my electorate that do border another state and a territory—essentially, the APY lands with Western Australia and the Northern Territory.

I remember one time being at Amata in the APY lands, and I was taken out to a place called Cave Hill. If anyone gets an opportunity to go to Cave Hill, I encourage you to do so because of the magnificent rock art. You have to be invited to go and be taken out there. When you stand on top of the hill, you can see over into the Northern Territory. In the distance, on a good day, you can see Uluru.

For the people of the APY lands, the Anangu people who have lived there for thousands of years, our borders are meaningless. Those borders do not exist. They will move where they want to move, and quite rightly so. The major population centre for the Anangu people is Alice Springs, so they obtain a lot of their services in Alice Springs. Indeed, the Regional Anangu Services—that particular organisation that delivers services in the APY lands—is based in Alice Springs.

There are a whole range of informal arrangements in place and some formal arrangements in place when it comes to the to-ing and fro-ing between Western Australia and the Northern Territory in the northern part of our state. They work reasonably well, but it would not hurt to have a commissioner for when problems do arise or when things can be improved and for the commissioner to be involved provided—and this is an important proviso—that there is real active on-the-ground grassroots consultation with both the APY Executive and the communities in the APY lands because the executive is not always representing all the views of the communities. It is important, as it is everywhere, to actively consult.

An issue that did focus people's minds when it came to COVID was cross-border interactions. In my electorate, in the APY lands the APY Executive went into shutdown, and quite rightly. They were one of the first places in the country to do that. Given what was at risk in the APY lands at the time, it was a very sensible thing to do, and they essentially did that. They had the capacity to do it, and it was a unilateral decision and it was the right decision to make.

In the South-East and areas with higher population concentrations and communities on either side of the borders and businesses on either side of the borders, that generated a lot of complexity. If a commissioner were present, they might have been able to assist in sorting out some of those issues. Irrespective of COVID, there have still been those ongoing issues when it comes to cross-border interaction in the South-East, the Riverland and going further north to Broken Hill, New South Wales, and South Australia. I am sure the member for Flinders will talk about issues in his electorate with respect to the interchange with Western Australia. I will make sure I provide some time for him to do that.

This initiative is important. We have these borders, and they are the legacy of how Australia developed with separate colonies and territories coming together. A lot of people always say to me that we should get rid of states, but it was Paul Keating—and he probably was not the greatest fan of states; he certainly was not the greatest fan of the Senate, which was supposed to be a creature of the states—who indicated that the states are an organic part of the Australian make-up. He was just flagging that it would be virtually impossible through referendum to move away from the states to some other form of governance in this vast land.

Because of those separate states, it has left a whole smorgasbord of different rules and different regulations, which particularly impact upon people in the cross-border areas. A commissioner can help to address some of that.

I would also say that some of this should be continued to be addressed at COAG because there has been that attempt amongst the states with the federal government to introduce a greater compatibility, transferability, congruence—whatever word you want to use—and that is especially important for when it comes to qualifications, trade qualifications and licences to practise here and there. It should be transferrable across the country, provided we do not reduce it to some form of lowest common denominator, so that we have a good approach to the standards that we want to impose.

I think there is a lot of opportunity for a commissioner to introduce and amplify common sense, a lot of scope for a commissioner to cut through all of the things that have been said today that niggle at people, that frustrate people, when it comes to that interchange. It should be far smoother, it should be far easier, and ultimately to the benefit of the cross-border communities. I know the member for Flinders wants to have a few words as well, so I will make sure I give you that opportunity. With that I will resume my seat.

Mr TELFER (Flinders) (17:46): Thank you to the member for Giles. I rise to speak in support of this bill. The Cross Border Commissioner Bill is an interesting one, and one that I am encouraged has come across our bench now, obviously in light of the arrangements with COVID-19, but some of the speakers here are starting to highlight the opportunities for such a body, such an individual, for the world we are going to be living in post-COVID. I think to have a single reference point for people across borders who are caught up in legislation or bureaucracy across borders is going to be really important. We need to get the arrangements right.

Speaking from a unique perspective, inasmuch as the Western Australian border is the one my electorate goes up against, communities in Flinders already feel a long way away from the decisions that are made in Adelaide. I look at Ceduna, the centre furthest west in my electorate, which is some 800 kilometres away from Adelaide, and it is pretty easy to feel isolated from decision-makers and isolated from people who actually have an influence on your life.

Another 450 kilometres on from that is the Western Australian border. During COVID, and the arrangements that were in place across borders, we saw an incredible challenge faced by those in those communities, and those who were going through. We saw the challenges with the movement of freight and the Eyre Highway, which traverses across as part of National Highway 1. We saw an incredible challenge in trying to logistically manage this freight movement.

There were people who were uncertain whether they were going to be able to get products across, and we soon realised that—although it has been spoken about already in this place—it is just a line on a map. But when these borders are enforced, and there are different arrangements in place across these borders, we realise how much of an impact it actually does have on the movement of freight, the movement of livestock and the movement of travellers. There were people who were caught up in the arrangements that were very quick moving and restrictions that were brought in with very little notice. There were communities within my electorate, especially on the Far West Coast, who had incredible numbers of travellers who were isolated and caught up in these arrangements. It meant that they were stuck there for an incredibly long period of time.

The opportunity for a cross-border commission to be involved in this sort of arrangement—the transport and freight movement—is really important, especially with the interactions with the Western Australian border. Western Australia is not actually part of the National Heavy Vehicle Regulator (NHVR) area; it is separate to it. That is why the arrangements that a cross-border commissioner could be involved in would try to streamline some of those things.

Throughout COVID we saw there were incredible challenges for people who had to have interactions across borders. Although my population is a fair way away from the border with Western Australia, we saw it exactly the same as we saw at the Eastern States borders. We saw families who were separated with inconsistent rules and uncertainty about the process, uncertainty about who they could turn to to get an answer. I am sure like many other people within this place, I was bombarded with pleas for help from people who did not know where to turn.

I want to quickly speak about one family in particular, whose son had a terrible accident in Western Australia and became a paraplegic; it was a terrible accident. The parents were forced to move from the West Coast community of Streaky Bay over to Western Australia in the short term to care for him. These are people in their 80s, caring for their son who had had this terrible accident.

They had to make the very difficult decision to uproot their lives and move to Western Australia. They came back from Western Australia, packed up their belongings, leased out their house and, under the rules that were in place, started travelling back to Western Australia (they had already been there for a couple of months). Then the rules changed in a snap. They were across the border at Norseman—if you have travelled across the Nullarbor you will know that is a fair way into Western Australia—but were turned around and sent back to South Australia.

It was an incredibly difficult time, and the question was: who could they turn to? They were trying to work through the bureaucracy, trying to work through the Department for Health and work with police. This was not an isolated thing; there were families and individuals all through our state who were having to deal with that situation.

They got the tick-off to start travelling again and got to the Western Australian border this time, but the paperwork was not right. The paperwork had been changed in Western Australia, and they did not have the permissions. They had to travel 550 kilometres back to Streaky Bay. This is just one example of the uncertainty created when there is no clear and direct line of communication for people needing help, especially with these interactions across borders.

Thankfully, this elderly couple finally got permission to travel back into Western Australia and they successfully managed to do that. The grief, the time, the extra strain on families were really highlighted through this process. We do not need a commissioner who is set up just for COVID, because I trust that the arrangements now across borders are a lot more streamlined than they were.

However, this highlighted to me that we need facilities and a proper arrangement in place, especially if this commissioner role is properly put together, so that they have communication lines with ministers and departments across the border, across states. The role must be one that is non-partisan; they have to work across borders, and South Australia is surrounded by a number of different states with a number of different colours of government, departments and ministers.

There are so many economic opportunities for our regions that would be maximised if we got effective in working together across borders, across communities across borders. If we have an effective, single contact point that has the ear of decision-makers and of senior ministers and departments that can help drive outcomes and positive actions, it will be really positive for us as a state. As has been highlighted previously, it can also frame positive outcomes for the whole country.

There is a great responsibility for us in this place to get this legislation right, to make sure the arrangements in place are going to be effective and not just something that are piecemeal, rushed or ineffective. We need to make sure that outcomes are the things we are driving to. Regional people are practical people and we like to see outcomes, we like to see things get done and we like to see solutions.

I am encouraged that we are debating this bill, debating amendments to try to make sure we fine-tune it to get it right. The most important thing is that we get the arrangements right to make sure it is effective for people within our regional cross-border communities. The opportunity is here for us, and I look forward to this debate continuing. Once again, I speak in favour of the concept behind this Cross Border Commissioner Bill and thank the house for the opportunity to speak on it.

Ms HOOD (Adelaide) (17:54): I am very pleased to also support the Cross Border Commissioner Bill 2022. This bill fulfills one of the government's commitments to support South Australia's regions to grow and be vibrant places to live, work and visit.

For me, whilst I am here as the member for Adelaide representing my community, I have a strong connection to the South-East, being the home town where I grew up. My mum lived in the cross-border community of Frances. They had a sheep and wheat farm, Cloverdale, just across the South Australia-Victoria border, so I grew up with all the stories from my mum about the challenges of living in a cross-border community from having to pay for the school bus, as an example, to be able to go in to Naracoorte High.

It is really important for me to be able to speak on this bill, to be able to reflect the difficulties that people in cross-border communities have experienced. I believe this bill does demonstrate the government's clear commitment to our regional communities and to finding practical ways to create better economic and wellbeing outcomes. This was also one of the many election commitments that the Malinauskas Labor government announced for the South-East prior to the election and it is a policy that has been called for, as we have heard by the member for Mount Gambier, dating back to 2018.

Of course, with the onset of COVID, the need for a cross-border commissioner has only increased over the previous two years. We saw during the height of COVID endless cross-border issues that regional residents faced, with little to no support from government to resolve their issues. During the time of the pandemic, I was contacted by people I had gone to school with in Naracoorte, people who lived across the border, and some people were quite distressed at the time having to constantly cross the border and undertake tests in order to go to work. They felt that no-one was listening and that process, when they were only going from their home to their work during that time was quite traumatic simply because they lived across an invisible line.

The goal of establishing a cross-border commissioner is to make the lives of regional residents easier by simplifying often complicated red-tape issues that occur through different regulations on both sides of the border. It is an issue that predates COVID-19, having just spoken about my mum's own experiences going to school in the sixties and seventies. But certainly during COVID many regional MPs who represent border communities were crying out for support from the former Marshall Liberal government, which was failing to listen to those concerns of regional members.

It was not until last year that the Marshall Liberal government even agreed to add a regional representative to the COVID emergency management committee to advocate for regional communities. Families and individuals in cross-border communities regularly cross the border, as we have heard, to access further education, health or other government services. This can create issues in navigating the right organisation or government departments to speak to or share information with.

As an example, my mum and stepdad were living near the border in Apsley at the Border Inn. It is always difficult when we have to organise a time in the evenings to work out at which time we are actually going to get on the phone and have a chat, and one of the challenges that she experienced during that time was just who to speak to and seek advice given that she was living across the border but doing most of her shopping in Naracoorte.

Other issues include compliance with multiple systems, different licences and permits, as we have heard in regard to tradies, and separate accreditation and training requirements for workers, which often end up increasing the cost of doing business.

I understand the Minister for Primary Industries and Regional Development has already stated that the cross-border commissioner must live in regional South Australia and that the office will be based in the state's South-East which is the second biggest city in our state. There would also be pop-up offices around other cross-border communities in our state, which I believe is incredibly important. It has been great to hear from members in this place who live in regional areas, or who like me have lived in regional areas, and understand the issues of the communities and people who live there.

The cross-border commissioner established by the bill will provide a new mechanism to address these issues we mentioned earlier: facilitating collaboration and engagement with residents, businesses and community organisations as well as all tiers of government. The commissioner will work with all stakeholders to identify issues, broker solutions and provide advice on matters impacting border communities, making it easier to do business across our borders while addressing barriers to education, health and other services.

Sitting suspended from 18:00 to 19:30.

The commissioner will also work with other jurisdictions, in particular the Victorian and New South Wales cross-border commissioners. With the commissioner dedicated to these matters in South Australia, it is expected collaboration with these jurisdictions will improve not only on an individual basis but also, potentially, in national arenas where the common voice of cross-border communities will be strengthened. The functions of the commissioner are included in the bill to reflect the intent of the position. An annual plan, in consultation with the minister, will be required and an annual report will be tabled in parliament to ensure that the outcomes being achieved are clear to all stakeholders.

While the commissioner will focus on engaging with all our cross-border communities to understand their issues, we expect the matters likely to be raised will include: improving access to further and vocational educational opportunities; assisting to develop strategic and cross-border region approaches to addressing workforce shortages; facilitating a collaborative approach to increase the opportunity for investment in sports and recreational facilities for cross-border communities; strategic planning and investment for, and access to, health service provision that takes into account cross-border users; different licensing or training requirements for business activities that need to be accommodated by cross-border businesses and their staff; and promoting tourism and visitor experiences in a cross-border region.

The cross-border commissioners in Victoria and New South Wales have demonstrated how a high-level role that is dedicated to listening and working on behalf of cross-border communities can make a difference. This is what we want for South Australia. With the commissioner dedicated to these matters in South Australia, it is expected collaboration with these jurisdictions will improve not only on an individual basis but also in national arenas. These enhanced relationships could lead to program and project partnering opportunities between state, territory and commonwealth governments for the benefit of cross-border businesses and regional communities.

I want to take this opportunity to thank a number of people who have worked hard to advocate on behalf of regional communities, who are living in them and who have lived in them like me. In particular, the member for Mount Gambier and also my brother Ben Hood, who is a local councillor in Mount Gambier and has advocated strongly for a cross-border commissioner, in particular in the area of the forestry industry which is a major employer in the Green Triangle. He has also advocated to allow for better communication between LGAs of both states through a commissioner in relation to tourism and trade.

I also wanted to thank the minister in the other place, the Hon. Clare Scriven; the member for MacKillop, who represents my home town of Naracoorte; the member for Hammond; and the Hon. Nicola Centofanti in the other place. I think it is so incredibly important, even though I am the member for Adelaide and I represent a metropolitan constituency, that you always should remember where you come from. It is those communities that made you who you are, and I believe that this bill is an important step in the direction of advocating for our cross-border communities.

Ms HUTCHESSON (Waite) (19:33): I rise today to speak to the Cross Border Commissioner Bill 2022 and I am really pleased to be able to do that, because it is very hard to go through the COVID pandemic and see the stories that came out of these communities. Regarding the bill itself, we made the commitment in the lead-up to the election and we took a lot of time over the last four years speaking with members of the community. Our shadow for the regional areas went out and spoke to a lot of people and found out what was important to them. We heard a lot of stories, especially during COVID, where the farmers had properties on both sides of the border and they could not access their other property. They had animals they needed to feed, they had crops they needed to tend, and they were unable to do both.

There are a whole lot of other opportunities that they missed out on and there is a lot of complexity, but when we talked to all the communities and brought it all together we did promise that we would make this commitment to them that we would bring in the commissioner. Now we are in government, I am really pleased that we are going to be able to do that. We are a government that keeps our commitments, as we have shown with all our election commitments as we start to roll them out, and I am delighted that this matter is being progressed through the parliament today.

The introduction of this bill shows that we have a commitment to the people in the regions, we will listen to them and we will be working for them. Quite often, they feel like they are being neglected, but that is not what our government is about and that is not what we are doing here. Cross-border communities have in many cases been infected by COVID, the longest in our state given the fact they are impacted by what is happening in the state they are next door to. It is quite confusing and it made things very difficult for those communities, even when the border was open and they were able to share a buffer zone as to which regulations applied.

They struggled a lot to have a direct line to government and the people who were making the decisions because they had two governments that they needed to deal with. Families were separated by borders. Some attend schools on one side and live on the other, or they were not allowed to see their friends or family. It made it very difficult for them. Having a commissioner who understands and works in the region will allow them to address a lot of these concerns.

In terms of the ability to access medical procedures and specialists that may be on one side of the border or the other, the different regulations that apply to both sides make it very difficult. Many residents and businesses in regional South Australia travel over the borders sometimes daily, back and forth. In 2018, we know that the member for Mount Gambier tabled a motion, but the Marshall government were not interested in it at that time, so it is very interesting to hear them get excited about this now. Of course, we know the Marshall government was a city-centric government and ignored the calls. I am glad that we are now in government and able to make these commitments.

There are many complicated issues that residents living in these areas have to deal with. We have read about a lot. I have read quite a few articles about tradies who are having to do two different types of red tape just to get the work that they do if they work on both sides of the border. Tradies are already strung out. They are working hard, and during COVID life was very difficult for them. I think that if we are able to address some of those issues, it will be very helpful for them.

In terms of the impact on volunteers in those areas, it is quite an interesting thing when there is a fire on either side of a border and the brigades have to come from both sides. We have spoken already today about different radios, different channels, and having to change from one to the other. Quite often, we see brigades coming from all over the country to help when there is a big fire, especially like the ones we saw down at Pinery and a couple of the others that have been down there.

The forests run on both sides of the border. You can be on one truck one day and another truck the next. They can be set up differently. They can even have different hose couplings. You just do not know what you are getting until you get on that truck. To be able to address some of those issues and bring it together so that they are the same will allow volunteers to be there for what they are there for, which is protecting communities.

It is important for us that we continue to support these communities as well. They are a community. They do not care if there is a border in between them; they are family. They are there to work on either side, go to school on either side and access services on either side. A cross-border commissioner who understands this and lives in the area is going to be able to come back to government and advocate on behalf of those communities. It will be great.

Also, having the opportunity for the commissioner to be directed by the minister will enable them to consider emerging issues that come up after this bill has gone through. Standard probity, confidentiality and delegation powers have also been included in the bill, which ensure that the commissioner operates within appropriate public sector parameters modelled on the Small Business Commissioner legislation as well.

It allows the commissioner to focus on those local things such as improving access to further vocational and educational opportunities, the opportunity to share resources and the opportunity for the students in those areas and the slightly older students to access different things. They are only going to grow those communities and encourage people to stay in those communities if people can access the training and the skills that they need. That will also help with workforce shortages because if they are trained there then they may meet people there and stay there and bring those skills into those communities.

It will also allow the opportunity for collaborative approaches in terms of sport and investment in facilities. We could have a sports team on one side and those facilities can be shared by both sides. It brings a community together. There are different licensing or training requirements for businesses and activities that need to be accommodated and the commissioner will be able to go through those things and attempt to make things a little bit more streamlined for the people who live in those communities.

It also allows us to promote tourism and visitor experiences. I have been down to Mount Gambier and you hop in a canoe and the next minute you are in Victoria without even realising it. There is no line there; there is no big red line when you cross over. To bring those communities together as an ongoing thing, even after the pandemic, can only be a good thing.

I have spent a lot of time in Mount Gambier and the Riverland in my work with bank staff and I know bank staff who live in Victoria and have to come across to South Australia to work, especially in Mount Gambier but also in the Riverland, where they have kids on one side and had to deal with some restrictions and then, when they came to work, they had different restrictions. Employers do not always understand. They are just there to get the job done.

There are a whole lot of things this commissioner can look at to make life a lot easier for the people who live in these communities. Our government is committed to ensuring that these regional residents are not ignored or taken for granted. I think that the proposal for this cross-border commissioner has been taken to an election. Obviously, we are now in government so it is clear that this is a mandate for us to be able to do this. I sincerely hope that all the members here today support this important piece of legislation.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS (West Torrens—Minister for Infrastructure and Transport, Minister for Energy and Mining) (19:42): I thank the house for the very professional manner in which this debate has occurred. I would like to thank also the crossbench for their encouragement and support for the government to continue this. Hopefully, we can pass this pretty quickly and get the support to the cross-border communities that they deserve and require so urgently. With those few words, I commend the bill to the house.

Bill read a second time.

Committee Stage

In committee.

Clauses 1 and 2 passed.

Clause 3.

Mr BELL: I move:

Amendment No 1 [Bell–1]—

Page 2, line 13 to page 3, line 32 [clause 3, definitions of government agency, responsible Minister and State authority]—Delete the definitions

Mr WHETSTONE: With regard to the interpretation of the act and the commissioner, there has been an amendment put forward by the member for Mount Gambier to delete the definition of 'government agency'. Minister, can you give me an understanding of why we will not want to have those definitions of the responsibility of the 'government agency', 'responsible Minister' and 'State authority', and we understand who the responsible minister will be?

The ACTING CHAIR (Mr Odenwalder): I understand that question was on the amendment. The member for Mount Gambier can respond.

Mr BELL: I thank the member for Chaffey for his question. As the amendment stands, once the amendments go through, there is no requirement for those definitions to be referred to in the bill because they actually will not appear in the bill, so to keep those in there is unnecessary. Again, this is a process of streamlining and simplifying the legislation. The definitions do not need to be there because they will not appear further in the bill once the other amendments go forward.

Mr WHETSTONE: Thank you, member for Mount Gambier. We understand the responsible minister will be the minister for regions, but can the member explain how the delegation process will go from the minister to—or how the commissioner will be appointed?

Mr BELL: It is my understanding—and again I am happy to defer to the government on this—that the position will be advertised, nominations sought as normal and a process carried out to appoint the inaugural Cross Border Commissioner under the Cross Border Commissioner Bill 2022.

The ACTING CHAIR (Mr Odenwalder): I think the minister may also have a response.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: I am advised the definitions are no longer required if the amendment is successful. The consequence is that the 'government agency' definition will be removed due to the amendment filed regarding the removal of clause 9—Annual plan. The 'responsible Minister' definition will be removed due to the amendment filed regarding removal of clause 9—Annual plan. The 'State authority' definition will be removed due do the amendment filed regarding clause 9—Annual plan.

I understand that the cross-border commissioner 'should' live in a cross-border community, rather than 'must'. It is the aspiration of the act that they live there. I hope this goes some way to answering the member's question. If there is something else I can get him a briefing on, I will be happy to do so.

Mr WHETSTONE: Thank you, minister. I guess I am a little concerned that you are talking about an aspiration. That is no clear indication in that application, that we have a cross-border commissioner who, as an aspiration, lives in the regions. It could potentially be a ministerial appointment out of an office—someone who lives in Adelaide and not understanding what the regional issues are as the commissioner.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: I understand that the democratic process in the upper house has given us a bill that says that a cross-border commissioner should live in the regions rather than must, and we respect that democratic process.

The ACTING CHAIR (Mr Odenwalder): I will be generous and allow you one more question on this clause, either to the amendment or to the clause itself.

Mr WHETSTONE: My question is to the amendment and to the member for Mount Gambier. The member has made it very clear that he will delete the definitions of the 'agency', the 'Minister' or the 'authority'. To the member: can you give me an undertaking of your desire to have a specific person living in the region, or what the call for that position would be if it is someone living within a cross-border community?

Mr BELL: It is my understanding that the minister has given that undertaking and that it will be advertised. It is also my understanding that you cannot legislate, which is what this is, where somebody lives. The emphasis on 'should live' is a strong indication that they should be living in the cross-border region, and I believe Mount Gambier has been identified. Legislating where somebody must live would be highly peculiar, and there would be legal argument on whether or not you could legislate where somebody actually must live.

The clear intent in this, of course, is that this person should and for all intents and purposes will be living in Mount Gambier. The conversation I had around this was: let's say somebody is appointed, they are living in Mount Gambier, and then a family tragedy occurs and they are required back in Adelaide for a period of time. The notion legislatively, and in terms requiring them under legislation, is something that would be highly peculiar and not known to be done in any other piece of legislation in South Australia.

Of course, it is the clear intent and I believe that the minister who has carriage of this bill in the other house has indicated that desire. 'Should' is in the legislation, and a process will be undertaken which is open and transparent.

The ACTING CHAIR (Mr Odenwalder): Minister, do you have anything to add to that? You do not have to.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: I concur with what the member has said. It would be impractical legislatively to make it a requirement where people should live within a state. I am not even sure it would be constitutionally lawful. The intent here is very clear and, obviously parliament can send a signal, as we do—we do so through our second reading speeches, we do so through our language in our legislation—and this is a clear indication to people within the department and the minister's office who are in the process of employing a cross-border commissioner that the intent and will of the parliament is that this should be a person who is from a regional community.

Amendment carried; clause as amended passed.

Clause 4.

The ACTING CHAIR (Mr Odenwalder): I understand there is an amendment which essentially deletes clause 4 in the name of the member for Mount Gambier.

Mr BELL: I am not progressing with amendment No. 2 on clause 4.

The ACTING CHAIR (Mr Odenwalder): In that case, are there any questions on clause 4 as printed? No.

Clause passed.

Clause 5.

Mr BELL: I move:

Amendment No 3 [Bell–1]—

Page 3, lines 36 to 39—This clause will be opposed

This amendment removes clause 5 as an act to bind the Crown. The information I have been given is it is impractical to have this in. This is a direct copy and paste from the Commissioner for Kangaroo Island Bill 2014. It perhaps did not cause issues in that bill, but with the power of hindsight may going forward, and that is around binding other agencies and parliaments such as the commonwealth, the local government, even down to planning.

If this clause stays in there, it is unenforceable to bind the commonwealth with state legislation. That is what this would in actual fact be aiming to do. Again, for simplicity, to streamline the bill it seemed prudent to amend that and take that out because in practice it is not workable at that level.

Clause negatived.

Clauses 6 and 7 passed.

Clause 8.

Mr BELL: I move:

Amendment No 4 [Bell–1]—

Page 5, line 13 [clause 8(g)]—Delete ‘in accordance with section 9’ and substitute:

in consultation with the Minister

Amendment carried; clause as amended passed.

Clause 9.

Mr BELL: I move:

Amendment No 5 [Bell–1]—

Page 5, line 18 to page 6, line 27—This clause will be opposed

Mr WHETSTONE: I have a question. If we are prepared to embark on a commissioner, the annual plan, I have concerns around the commissioner in relation to the delivery of services. This is one of the main issues that we have had to deal with through implementing a cross-border commissioner, that we have been held back with the delivery of services, particularly with cross-border communities—services that are provided one side of the border or the other.

The annual plan is about understanding how we define what services will be impeded through the implementation of the commissioner and how they can deal with the services that have been impeded through different regulation or legislation either side of the border. Can you please give me a better understanding of why you are opposing the annual plan?

Mr BELL: This is a really important point: there will be an annual plan. It says so in clause 8(g), which we just amended to read 'to prepare an annual plan in consultation with the minister'. So there will definitely be an annual plan. This has been a little bit confused between the houses, but it is there in black and white.

What we are opposing is the prescriptive nature of that annual plan because, quite frankly, we do not know what we do not know yet, and if you go with a very prescriptive method of how you are going to set out that annual plan what you are really doing is locking the commissioner into a whole set of procedures that may or may not be relevant going forward.

To give comfort to people around this, look at clause 8—and I will read this out:

The functions of the Commissioner are as follows…

(b) to work and engage with all tiers of government, businesses and the community to ensure the needs of cross border communities are considered in the development and implementation of policy, procedures and legislation;

So there is consultation scripted in this legislation. The annual plan has to be done; that is under clause 8(g). We have the annual plan and we have the prescription that you have to consult with all the stakeholders. The part that I am opposing is under clause 9, where it sets out in a very prescriptive way how that is to occur. The reality is that everybody spoke here today about cutting red tape, making sure that we do not bind this commissioner to endless plans, endless reporting and no doing. The fact of the matter is there will be an annual plan. The commissioner will take direction and work with the minister, and the commissioner will have to work and engage with all tiers of government, with business and with the community, etc.

Again, the intent of removing clause 9 is to simplify the bill, to make sure we do not inadvertently—because I think the intent of this comes from a good place—bind the hands of the commissioner. All they are doing is writing an annual plan and then reporting on that annual plan without actually doing the work that needs to be done. If I could allay people's fears, there will be an annual plan. It is in this legislation. They will have to consult and they will have to produce an annual report that is tabled here in parliament. So all those things are covered off.

What I am removing with my amendment here is the very prescriptive nature of it, and again it looks to me like it is lifted pretty closely from the Kangaroo Island bill of 2014, yet the two commissioners are set up for entirely different purposes, with entirely different outcomes that they want to achieve. One was an infrastructure one that absolutely had to put those plans together because they dealt with the council on infrastructure.

With this one there is quite a lot of stuff that will not involve a local council at all. It might be state government to state government. It might be federal government. It might be business to state government. Whilst the council is a key partner in this, they might not need to be consulted on every single piece of planning that is going forward. Again, it is really just to simplify, and not tie the hands of the commissioner before he or she is able to hit the ground and actually make some runs.

Mr WHETSTONE: We are talking about clause 9, the annual plan. Member for Mount Gambier, in your first sentence you referred back to clause 8(g) and you said to 'prepare an annual plan'—and I missed that last bit. My paper tells me it is to prepare an annual plan in accordance with section 9, so the only thing that is prescriptive is ensuring consultation with the community, and I guess there is no minimum requirement for consultation.

Mr BELL: I will address that by amendment No. 4, which is what we just passed. It was clause 8 deleting 'in accordance with section 9' and substituting 'in consultation with the Minister'. We just deleted part of that line and put consultation with the minister in there. That part has already been done.

In terms of the member for Chaffey's question, there will be consultation. It may not necessarily be with the council on that particular deliverable, KPI—whatever we want to call it—because quite frankly we do not know the scope of the issues that the commissioner will start on. What gives me comfort in this part was the previous amendment that the minister will be guiding the process and, of course, local MPs are key stakeholders. It says in clause 8(b) 'to work and engage with all tiers of government', and that obviously includes local members.

Clause negatived.

Clause 10.

Mr BELL: I move:

Amendment No 6 [Bell–1]—

Page 6, lines 28 to 33—This clause will be opposed

Amendment No. 6 in my name is that this clause be opposed; that is what the amendment says.

Mr WHETSTONE: Member for Mount Gambier, you mentioned the power to require information. What is it that you are opposing, that the commissioner should not have the power to request or require either information or the performance of the functions of the act?

Mr BELL: The information that I have is that, again, this is an unnecessary clause for two reasons. One is that it is consequential to the previous clause which, for reporting purposes, is not required, and the intent of the bill is for this position, this commissioner, to be collaborative and foster or facilitate bringing people together. If there is a need for requiring information that a department will not hand over, the commissioner has the support of the minister and the support potentially of the cabinet.

We could not think of a situation where the commissioner would be requiring or forcing a department to hand over information that they would either not be able to get or have access to, or a situation where a minister or the cabinet, if it was deemed extremely important, needed that information. It is the intent of the role to be collaborative, to bring people together, to foster solutions and not necessarily to be adversarial to other government departments. Of course, when you take the scope of this position wider than just South Australia—this is a very important point—the commissioner will have no power to compel another state government or federal body to hand over information.

If we are going to start going down this road of putting in legislation that they can compel, you are setting up an adversarial system when, quite frankly, I do not see the purpose in it nor the need for the compulsion of evidence or information that would not be able to be obtained, either through a minister, who the commissioner will be working very closely with, or the entirety of the state government.

Clause negatived.

Clauses 11 to 14 passed.

Clause 15.

Mr BELL: I move:

Amendment No 7 [Bell–1]—

Page 7, line 19 [clause 15(1)]—Delete ‘Act’ and substitute:

section

Mr WHETSTONE: Member for Mount Gambier, you are saying that you are looking to substitute 'act' with 'section'. What is it that you are deleting, as far as any delegation from the commissioner or the minister to the commissioner?

Mr BELL: Absolutely none. It is my understanding that maybe this is a typing error that has slipped through. To avoid confusion, the proper reading of this section should be as I just outlined, that subject to this section the minister and the commissioner may delegate any functions under this section. Coincidentally, I have used the Commissioner for Kangaroo Island Bill 2014 not disparagingly but as a contrast, and in this case that is exactly how it is written under the Commissioner for Kangaroo Island Bill 2014.

My advice is that it is the correct determination and it will avoid confusion, because if you keep it the way it is the delegation could be over the entire act, and that is fine but it is this section that gives that power of delegation. So instead of reading that you will delegate under this act, the correct reading of it is that you are delegating under this section of the act, and you may delegate a whole range of aspects from there.

It is really just tidying up that one word. There is no intent to remove delegation powers, change it or anything like that; it is really just tying it up. It is semantics to a degree, because we are splitting hairs on this, but my advice was that that was a word that really should read 'section' because that is the section where the delegation comes from.

Amendment carried; clause as amended passed.

Clauses 16 and 17 passed.

Clause 18.

Mr BELL: I will not proceed with my amendment on this clause.

Clause passed.

Remaining clause (19) and title passed.

Bill reported with amendment.

Third Reading

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS (West Torrens—Minister for Infrastructure and Transport, Minister for Energy and Mining) (20:16): I move:

That this bill be now read a third time.

I congratulate the member for Mount Gambier on his skilful navigation of the committee stage. It shows he is now not only a crossbench member but also a legislator, which is a very fine title to have indeed. With those few words, I thank the opposition, thank the crossbench and commend the bill to the house.

Mr WHETSTONE (Chaffey) (20:17): This has been an issue that many regional MPs have had to deal with for quite some time. I have a level of concern that this is a very centric appointment for someone in Mount Gambier. I would have liked to see something a little broader that gave everyone the opportunity to apply for the job, not only people living in Mount Gambier.

A commissioner's role has to be on behalf of five borders with South Australia, and we have a complex set of issues. Not every border has the same concerns and not every border has the same issues or the same barriers to dealing with the complex situation we have recently been through. As history tells us, we know that New South Wales embarked on a border commissioner some years ago in 2012 and Victoria picked it up in 2018. It looks like 2022 here in South Australia.

I want to make sure that the right person is there for the right job. I do not think the centre of the border communities' universe is in Mount Gambier. If we look at it sensibly, it should be someone who is best for the job, whether that be someone living in Ceduna, someone living in the far outback or someone living in the far east of our state. I do wish them well, and I am hoping that the best person for the job is appointed, not just someone who is a favourite son living in the South-East.

Mr BELL (Mount Gambier) (20:19): I also want to thank all the MPs who have made a contribution to this bill. I especially want to thank those who have put in time and effort for careful consideration and amendments in the other place, the Legislative Council. I do believe that those amendments were put in with very good intent, but I also believe that what we have done in this chamber is to simplify the bill—not to confuse that with a simplified bill, which was a disaster, but that is another story—and really give the cross-border commissioner position the best chance of being an active position, not just a planning and reporting type of position, although both of those aspects are extremely important.

To give some comfort to those in the Legislative Council, where this bill will now go back, I really want to highlight the review of the act that is in this bill. The review of the act should give comfort because the minister, legislatively, must cause an independent review of the operation of the act to be conducted and a report on the review to be prepared and submitted to the minister. After this act has been in operation for a period of three years, and at the end of each period of five years thereafter, the minister must cause a copy of a report submitted under subsection (1) to be laid before both houses of parliament within 12 sitting days after receiving the report.

That is a very important part that is unique to this commissioner's role: it is not under the Small Business Commissioner and it is not under any other commissioner's role. This provision is specifically in the bill to give comfort—the ability to have independent oversight or an independent review of the act and a report back to this house, so that if changes need to be made or if it is not working as it is intended, corrective action can be taken.

I want to highlight that part because I think it is very important for people to realise that what we have done here tonight is streamlined and less bureaucratic, with less red tape. The most important part, which I think is a sticking point and unique in comparison to other commissions, is the review of this act. It should give everybody comfort that there will be independent oversight. Going forward, I think there is nothing to be worried about. The bill should be embraced because the review is clearly in the legislation if, of course, it passes the Legislative Council.

Bill read a third time and passed.


At 20:23 the house adjourned until Thursday 7 July 2022 at 11:00.

PARLIAMENTARY BUSINESS
MEMBERS
GET INVOLVED
ABOUT PARLIAMENT
VISIT
LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL
HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY
CONTACT