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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2023-09-26 Daily Xml
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Camden Park Sinkhole

Mr PATTERSON (Morphett) (14:43): My question is to the Deputy Premier. Will the government fix the sinkhole in Camden Park and, if so, when? With your leave, sir, and that of the house, I will explain.

Leave granted.

Mr PATTERSON: The sinkhole, which appeared almost three weeks ago on 6 September, has caused extensive sewage flooding in my local community. Local resident Caitlin Penny said she came home from the grocery store around 10am on that Wednesday to find her home surrounded by sewage.

The Hon. S.E. CLOSE (Port Adelaide—Deputy Premier, Minister for Industry, Innovation and Science, Minister for Defence and Space Industries, Minister for Climate, Environment and Water) (14:44): I thank the member for his question. It's a very reasonable question, given the inconvenience for members of his constituency. It has been taking some time to replace that sewer break. Part of the challenge is due to the unstable ground conditions with a whole lot of groundwater infiltration and a number of other underground services to be dealing with. So it's not just, obviously, the SA Water sewerage pipe but other utilities are in there as well.

As has been mentioned, this started on 6 September and SA Water worked to ensure that the area was safe, disinfecting the areas, including the footpath and the road, and since then has been working through as quickly as possible. The leader may remember, when he was minister, a very significant similar kind of break that occurred in his own electorate, I believe in Cove Road, which took similarly quite a number of weeks to fix up.

From this week, SA Water is extending the excavation area and installing barriers to help prevent soil movement around the pipe. The traffic management remains unchanged, with detours in place between Deeds Road and Fitzroy Avenue, which will be familiar to the member. There will be no disruption to sewer services for SA Water's local customers. The time frame is dependent on weather conditions and also any further technical constraints if any further challenges become apparent, and SA Water is continuing to keep residents and businesses updated.

There was of course the challenge of some individuals being more affected than others, and as always SA Water works with individual customers to rectify any implications for them. SA Water apologises for the inconvenience that this is causing customers and assures me and the public that they are working as fast as possible.

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