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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2023-07-06 Daily Xml
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Motions

Joint Committee on the Establishment of Adelaide University

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) (12:01): I move:

1. That in the opinion of this house, a joint committee be appointed to inquire into and report on the establishment of Adelaide University, and in so doing consider—

(a) the proposal to create Adelaide University, to be formed by the amalgamation of the University of Adelaide and the University of South Australia;

(b) the expected impact (including non-commercially confidential modelling generated by the existing universities) of the new university, on:

(i) the South Australian economy and society;

(ii) current and future staff and students of the two existing universities; and

(iii) the higher education sector in South Australia.

(c) ensuring Adelaide University's legislative, governance and funding arrangements provide for a university that:

(i) facilitates access to education by South Australians from a broad range of socio-economic and cultural backgrounds, including Aboriginal South Australians;

(ii) is engaged with industry and business in South Australia on research and education outcomes;

(iii) generates high-quality research and engages in commercialisation of research of strategic importance to South Australia;

(iv) is likely to be consistently highly ranked against universities globally;

(v) is attractive to and welcoming of international students; and

(vi) has a modern governance framework consistent with high standards of fiduciary responsibility and understanding of the value of universities to the state's economy and society and of the Australian and global higher education environment.

(d) any measures by which the parliament and government can facilitate these outcomes in creating the Adelaide University; and

(e) any other related matter.

2. That in the event of a joint committee being appointed, it report on 17 October 2023, and the House of Assembly shall be represented thereon by four members, of whom three shall form a quorum of assembly members necessary to be present at all sittings of the committee.

3. That a message be sent to the Legislative Council transmitting the foregoing resolution and requesting its concurrence thereto.

The prospect of having a new university in South Australia is an exciting one. It is obviously not the first time that that has happened. There was not only the establishment of the University of Adelaide in the first place, but in 1966 there was the generation of the Flinders University of South Australia—one that caused a great migration of young and eager academics to this state, including my parents, and thenceforth I have always been grateful to the existence of Flinders University because that is why I am South Australian, Australian and not English.

Then, 32 years ago, there was the creation of the University of South Australia, itself created in many ways in a merger environment where two institutes of education were brought together to create a new university. In a way since the creation of Flinders, but escalating since the creation of the University of South Australia, there have been ongoing discussions about whether three is the right number, and whether the mix of what is taught where and what research occurs where is the right one.

Having been in and out of universities essentially all my life, I have constantly heard the idea that we are about to have a merger between two of the universities. But it took a government taking an interest before that became a conversation that translated into serious action. There was a near discussion, a discussion that came very near to landing, the idea that there could be a merger between the University of Adelaide and the University of South Australia, in 2018, but that foundered for many reasons, and many will have their own theories.

My view is that it was that the South Australian government took no interest in what was happening and that it left those two institutions to have a conversation, and it observed quietly from the outside and offered no guidance and no support for the idea of the merger. This government has chosen to take a different approach. This government has said, and from opposition, that it was committed to at least having the question exhaustively asked and that it saw that there might well be merit in the creation of a single larger institution.

Subsequently, of course, the two institutions have worked through a significant process to determine first of all the threshold issues of who would lead the institution, what its name would be, when it would start, and then there has been the last six months of very serious due diligence with intent to determine the feasibility of such a process. The reason I believe this to be meritorious, and I think I have canvassed this in this chamber both in question time and earlier this week in estimates, is that the way in which our education is structured in Australia argues for having at least one institution of a large scale in each state.

Our South Australian economy is highly dependent on the quality and scale of our universities. Our economy is bound up both in the quality of education that is provided by these institutions and in the quality and impact of research. It is also enormously dependent on the number of international students who come here. Immediately before COVID, international students were the highest export earner for this state. International education and wine vie between the two about which one will be first. I am not sure who is winning this month but they are both enormously important to us.

But the complexity with universities, of course, is that the state has a vested interest in their quality, the state has the act that creates these institutions, but the state largely does not control the levers that guide the policy and the funding of these institutions; that is held by Canberra. As I say, over the last 30 years in particular it has become increasingly clear that the settings that Canberra has created argue for a university of scale, and that that is rewarded in research, and that high-quality research is then itself rewarded by more students, international and domestic, choosing to study at the institution. Given those circumstances, I have become in favour of, and an advocate for, a new university created from two of our existing universities.

There are arguments that I hear often against this. One of them is that small institutions are better institutions, that they do very well internationally, and that the ANU is an exceptionally good institution. All of those things are true but irrelevant to the circumstances of South Australia. The ANU is funded to be the Australian National University. It is funded differently from the other institutions. It is based in a very small jurisdiction. It is not structured in the way that the state-based institutions are, and it was created with the express design to be the national university and, as I say, it is funded accordingly.

All the other universities that are referred to commonly—and the names trip off the tongue, Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard and Yale—are smaller institutions but enormously wealthy, enormously wealthy and enormously prestigious. The idea that the University of Adelaide is simply not trying hard enough because it does not have as much impact in research as Oxford does is ludicrous. It is a different institution and one on which we are dependent, but we need to create the right circumstances for it to be successful.

The aim of this institution is to bring together the research intensivity of the University of Adelaide, which is not to say there is not excellent research that occurs at the University of South Australia, with the equity of reach of the University of South Australia, which is not to say that Adelaide University has no equity of reach, but the two have different strengths. The two together become not only high-research intensive and with an emphasis on equity but, on the first day, the single largest educator of domestic students at the university level in Australia. That will make a difference to our economy.

Why set up a committee of inquiry? It is important that we have one because we need this parliament to pass the legislation. This institution cannot exist without this parliament choosing for it to exist. We on this side want to give every opportunity for this legislation to be passed for this to be successful. Why have we brought forward a motion now, suspending standing orders so that we can create it before the break? Because there is a sense of urgency, not just because it would be good to have this institution because it will help our economy but, more particularly, because having had the suggestion made that this might occur, that the universities are willing for it to occur, we cannot allow them to linger with doubt and uncertainty about what is happening to them.

They are major employers as well as being highly significant in the training of South Australians. We cannot allow the question mark to linger over whether they will be dissolved for the formation of a new university. Either way, they need certainty. The drumbeat, as the Premier has referred to, the demands of the academic cycle, means the sooner they are able to be clear on what is happening for early 2026, the better. Early next year, they need to gain accreditation from TEQSA, the accrediting authority in Canberra, so that they can create this new university. They then have a huge amount of work to bring over the courses into that new institution while maintaining their institutions at the same time.

So we have set up a committee with terms of reference, which I hope the opposition will also see, that cover all the questions that could reasonably be asked and receive all the information that can reasonably be expected. We have set it up now so that we are ready to go with this legislation as soon as possible and get it through, if not by the end of the year then at least very early into the following year. We owe those institutions that. They have in good faith offered to go through a process to determine whether this is the right thing to do. They have made a determination that, under the conditions agreed between the two of them and with the funding package that has been described, they believe this to be in their best interests. I am confident it is in the best interests of the state, which is properly the responsibility of this parliament as well as of the government.

It is now our job not to make them wait, but to—without party politics but with a firm view to the prosperity of the future of South Australians—have a careful look at what the proposition is, whether the piece of legislation does the job that it needs to, and then proceed to make a decision so that we all know, once and for all, if we are creating a new university in this state. I commend the motion to the house.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS (West Torrens—Minister for Infrastructure and Transport, Minister for Energy and Mining) (12:13): I move:

That the debate be concluded by 12.50pm.

Motion carried.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Member for Morialta?

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER (Morialta—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (12:14): The first guillotine moved by the government in this parliament notwithstanding—the opposition is disappointed in that. It comes hot on the heels of the opposition having been advised earlier this morning that there were no surprises today, when we specifically asked, and then standing orders were suspended, and here we are. I will not dwell, but I reflect.

Mr Odenwalder interjecting:

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: No surprises this morning, says the Government Whip. So by the mode of semantics that the government has moved to suspend standing orders at 12pm, we reflect on this motion the character that has been the spirit of the debate on the matter in question all week.

We asked questions in question time last week about the university merger proposition and we come to the idea with an open mind, but the way in which the debate was carried with the JFK impersonations in the parliament last week was not helpful. The manner in which the announcement was made with a drop to The Advertiser on Saturday night—and full credit to The Advertiser. A lot of people read them and I can understand why the government would want to consolidate their front page with the announcement.

Having had no opportunity for anyone else to contribute and consider the matter over the previous six months due the lack of information provided, it was within that vacuum of information that the government then came out on Sunday morning and the Premier said, 'Delay is denial', quoting Martin Luther King Jr this time, saying that there will be absolutely no consideration by the government of any course other than that which they had charted, for which they had not yet provided evidence of its benefits.

In the vacuum of information, a range of members of parliament, including I think all of the crossbenchers in the upper house, and the Liberal Party, confirmed that actually it would be a suitable proposition for this considerable expenditure of government money for this radical change to the way in which two of our most significant institutions have operated—in one case for well over a hundred years—should be subject to some scrutiny, an opportunity to expand upon the scant information that had heretofore been provided: a very high-level summary of what a university of the future might look like released in March, and a 19-page transition case released on Sunday morning, which provides a level of information but not enough information on which to base one's decision on whether the legislation that is yet to be seen should be advanced.

The opposition in presenting our desire for a committee—which certainly judging by their media statements was suggested by the Hon. Robert Simms and was supported by the Hon. Frank Pangallo and SA-Best, and my understanding is that One Nation are also supportive; I could be mistaken. Nevertheless, the Premier changed his tune on Monday and said he would support a committee. My understanding is the Premier approached the Greens to talk about their terms of reference; I think other members of parliament had too.

There has been discussion around the building about what a parliamentary committee might look like, yet the first time that the Labor Party has seen fit to engage with anyone outside of its own caucus on the motion we are debating today, is when standing orders were suspended some 16 minutes ago. As far as we are aware, the opposition has not been advised of this. The opposition is being asked to take a position—

The Hon. L.W.K. Bignell: We don't know who is in the Liberal Party these days, mate.

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: And we hear the arrogance of the government, which is characterising the whole thing. The member for Mawson has decided to turn up to parliament today, shout across the chamber—

Members interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: —when the government is asking for our support for something, that they are seeking our support on legislation providing an avenue to consider the matters that we have raised in the public domains, and the member for Mawson continues to shout, sir. It is characteristic of the way the Labor Party has been operating all week. If the Labor Party were fair dinkum about—

The Hon. A. Koutsantonis interjecting:

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: —getting cross-partisan support for the proposition at hand, then the leader of the house would not be shouting across the chamber right now. The Labor Party have said that they want to work with others. The Premier said the other day that he wants to work in good faith with people across the chamber.

The Hon. P.B. Malinauskas: Let's have a committee then.

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: He said that anybody who wants to look at the opportunities for South Australia he will be happy to work with. The opposition has only ever said that that is what we want to do, yet we still hear the rhetoric, we still hear the urgency—

Members interjecting:

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: I have not even stated a position yet and the Premier is arguing, sir.

The Hon. P.B. Malinauskas: I am not arguing, I am agreeing.

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: He is shouting across the chamber, sir, and this is characteristic of the nature of how he has been presenting himself. It does not help his case.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Member for Morialta, could you just take a seat. Members on my right, the Deputy Premier was heard in silence. I think the member for Morialta deserves that respect too.

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: Thank you, sir. Sir, you were with us on Monday afternoon in estimates where the Deputy Premier and I had questions and answers on this matter for 35 minutes in a respectful vein. I appreciated the way in which that was conducted. There was more information released by the Deputy Premier in the house on that occasion in that 35 minutes than the sum total of the information released by the government prior to Sunday morning about this significant proposition that will impact nearly 7,000 staff, more than 40,000 existing students and, indeed, have much broader impacts across the state of South Australia, impacting communities and our future prosperity.

The government and the two vice-chancellors say that it is all to the good. I believe that they believe so, but the basis upon which they have come to that conclusion is not evident to the South Australian community. The business cases, the range of feasibility studies that the university vice-chancellors and chancellors took to their councils over the weekend, informed their view of whether it was in the best interests of those institutions from the point of view of the university councils. Their purpose as a council was to consider that from their point of view.

The government's purpose, and our purpose as parliamentarians, is different: it is to consider whether it is a good deal, good legislation and a good investment on behalf of the people of South Australia. The government is yet to release a bill. The government has been working on a bill, apparently for some time, but it is yet to release it to anyone other than the people within government. I understand that there has been consultation with the universities, but the broad sweep of people across this state have yet to have a look at this bill that the government is proposing to have a committee consider.

I had a quick look while the Deputy Premier was speaking at the page and a half of terms of reference for this motion. While the opposition is very cognisant of the numbers in this house and will consider this matter further between the houses, on face value the terms of reference do not appear to cover more than the governance of the institutions. There is one term of reference on the top of the second page that states:

Any measures by which the parliament and government can facilitate these outcomes in creating the Adelaide University…

That talks about measures and the manner in which they would interact with facilitating outcomes for the university, but I am interested in the broader outcomes on the community and the broader outcomes of the investment. The value for money for taxpayers has been raised but it is far from the only thing.

We think that a committee should consider matters related to all aspects of the deal. The legislation is first, and that provides for the governance frameworks for the university and a range of things that are dealt with in the terms of reference for the motion at hand. But we also believe that it is necessary to look into the nature of the government investments: a $200 million research fund to be held within SAFA and the investments being provided to Adelaide University—we understand not to any other degree-giving institution or research institution in South Australia but purely for one entity. That is, presumably, $10 million or $15 million a year from the government, effectively, to the university.

There is a $100 million investment fund to support low SES students to help the university fulfil its requirements under the federal arrangements to increase equity and support low SES students. This is not in itself potentially a bad thing, but we certainly need to look into those arrangements, understanding also the implications of having these investments for one institution and potentially denied to other institutions—Flinders University is the obvious one, but they are not the only degree-giving institutions in South Australia.

The third aspect, of course, is the land sales. On Monday, the Deputy Premier described the land sales as, I think, a no-risk or a no-regrets investment. She says that because the value of the land will sit on the Treasury books, so it will not affect the budget bottom line. We will exchange money for something that looks like money as far as the Treasury balance sheet is concerned. But is it really? We are proposing to have an investment at Mawson Lakes for land that the government, as far as I am aware, does not have a purpose for using. The investment at Magill is very significant: $60 million for pieces of land in the member for Hartley's electorate and in my electorate.

This is community open space at the moment with a childcare centre, a swimming pool, sporting grounds usage—indeed, the university itself is using it. The government made use of those facilities not two months ago when it was used to house the Morialta Secondary College students for the first month of their schooling experience because the building was not finished. There is a wide range of uses for the community at the moment in that space, and there is an extraordinary biodiversity component where the creek runs through. There are a lot of questions to be asked.

The Deputy Premier said that for 10 years the western side of the road would continue to be owned by the government, operated by the university for as long as they needed, and there would be no changes there. That would give time to master plan. What would be the nature of that master plan? Certainly, I think we need to have some understanding there before we are capable of moving forward with an understanding. As I understand it from the Deputy Premier, she is proposing that there would be development on the eastern side of the road in my electorate sooner than that.

There has been significant development in that area, there are enormous traffic issues, there are enormous infrastructure issues more broadly, and we have recently had to build a new school to cater for the student population that is already there. There are questions to be asked. These are not necessarily issues that cannot be resolved and satisfactory solutions arrived at, but they are not captured by these terms of reference. To inform any credible or sensible party looking at taking a position on this bill, these matters need to be considered.

We asked about the $30 million investment that is proposed for international students—or, indeed, we did not ask about it because I think the Deputy Premier identified in her statement that there was more work to do on how that would be used. These are matters that should reasonably be considered by a parliamentary committee for us to come to a reasonable point of view.

Then we come to the question of the information that has informed the decisions. Obviously, the universities are going to have some information they would want to redact from the public release of any documentation, and that is understood, but we would ask the universities, as I have done in person, to consider releasing as much as is humanly possible, because it is necessary for lawmakers who are seeking to change legislation to take into account every bit of information that will help inform whether it is in the best interests of our community as well as the institutions.

We need this committee to consider the impact on students and staff. There have certainly been some commitments given, and they sound like good commitments, but they do need to be tested and we are uncertain, from the information that has been provided, whether the government has done any of that testing.

I do not want to go into the back and forth of the politics of the other day in relation to reading business cases, other than to say that I remain extremely concerned that there has been no attempt by the government to release any information about analysis it has done to inform their decision to invest $440 million of taxpayers' money, beyond the fact that the Premier says it is a good idea and that the Deputy Premier has some arguments, which I will take on face value that she believes but which have not been backed up by evidence presented or analysis done by an independent body.

I come back to the point that the government had an election commitment to have a commission. It would have been a natural thing, had that commission been established, say on 1 July last year—around the time I was asking the Deputy Premier further questions about it in estimates last year—for that commission to have considered at length. Indeed, that commission could have considered not just whether it was in the interests of the universities but whether it was in the interests of the community.

The government has come at this, since the second half of last year, with a proposition not that we should research whether or not this is a thing we should do, but on the assumption that this is a thing we should do and then how do we get the university councils to agree to it. The university councils have obviously taken into consideration, in their business cases, in their summaries, in the documents that have been considered on the weekend, the government's investment, because it derisks for the universities all the matters they may have been concerned about in relation to coming to a merger.

They have made their decision on the basis of the government investment that has been proffered. These investments were not put to an election, they were not taken to the people of South Australia to be the arbiter, so there must have been some process by which cabinet determined that $440 million should be spent this way. It was not done through a budget process either, as far as we understand it, because the Treasurer told us there was no money in the budget for this but that Treasury had taken a view—this is last Wednesday in question time—that there was enough flex in the budget to allow for a deal to be done.

This is where we come to it, because this has been approached from a dealmaker's point of view. Somebody says, 'I want an outcome. How do I get the outcome? What do universities need? Let's give them this. Let's offer them $100 million here so that they don't have to do that. The universities can do investment in this area and we'll do investment in that area, and here is the sum of money.' That is the approach the government has taken.

Whether or not it is a good deal remains open to consideration—and we are open to consideration. We are open to consideration in good faith, and we want the information. We will consider, between the houses, whether this committee is the mechanism to do that, or potentially one of the mechanisms to do that. We have not had a chance to consider this because it was, as I said, presented about 10 minutes before I stood on my feet today.

I will comment in relation to the issue of timing. I advised the house that not much information has been provided and that is the case; however, the 19-page document that was released on Sunday and is on the university's website, in terms of their transition plan, talks very clearly about legislative requirements.

The universities want the legislation in place before they can consolidate their accreditation with TEQSA. The universities want the legislation in place ahead of the middle of next year, which will enable them to have sufficient time to advertise to international students who might be seeking to start in 2026. They want a decision one way or the other in the first quarter of next year, so they have time to prepare for that approach.

If it is to start at the beginning of 2026, which has been the government's time line, the universities want to be able to advertise 18 months ahead of that to get international students on their journey to come to Australia and they need TEQSA accreditation to do that and they need the legislation. They need the legislation by the end of March next year.

We tested this with the vice-chancellors. I tested it with the Deputy Premier on Monday and her argument as to why the end of March was not optimal from her point of view was that she thought the parliament might potentially take longer. Our view has been that we have a committee and we form a position and we do not seek to filibuster beyond that. There is going to be an answer one way or the other after the committee if the committee has sufficient opportunity to get the information we need to form our view.

The Premier and the Deputy Premier have clearly determined that the committee needs to report by 17 October, so, depending on what the Legislative Council do, that sounds like a three-month inquiry. Indeed, it is less than that. If it were passed today, it would be a three-month inquiry, but the Legislative Council does not make a habit of passing things in one day that they were told about at 12.01pm on that day, so when parliament comes back we are effectively talking about a six-week inquiry, thanks to the extraordinarily long winter sitting break that the government has chosen to provide. It is an extraordinarily long time between sittings. That does not strike me on the face of it as sufficient time—

Members interjecting:

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: I remind members who are shouting across the chamber that the Labor Party is seeking the support of the opposition on this matter because, unless the Greens or the SA-Best party change their position, the Liberal Party has expressed the most open-mindedness of any party in the parliament about this proposition from the government. It is unusual to shout at the people whose support you are asking for, but that is how the Labor Party has conducted the politics on this matter.

Mr Brown: Is that right?

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: Yes, keep going. Keep going, that is very helpful. A colleague of ours in the Legislative Council has put forward a motion to members that he is likely to give notice of a motion. We will consider that and we will consider this motion as well. But I think the conduct of the government in the way they have carried this from a political point of view, always seeking to get advantage, is unbecoming of them.

In regard to the timing, we will consider it, as I said, but I am utterly unconvinced that the timing is sufficient. The period between the end of October and the end of the parliamentary sitting year has about three or four sitting weeks, I think. I think the government will say their purpose is that they want the legislation by the end of the year. There is no question that the government have the numbers in the House of Assembly. They could introduce the bill at any time and, without even going around normal process, they could have it through within a couple of weeks. They could do that this year.

As long as the bill is released publicly, a Legislative Council committee or a joint committee is able to consider it as part of the terms of reference and that is what we have called for the government to do, but it is the government's decision not to release any information until the last weekend before the winter break when there is only one sitting day left and it is the government's decision not to release the bill publicly before now. They have been working on this for a long enough time that they could have done it before the budget. They could have done it in an earlier sitting week.

We could have had this all sorted out in a much more orderly way, but, for whatever reason, it was done on the weekend with one sitting day left before the winter break. That timing is on the government. If this was so urgent that it needed to be dealt with today with a suspension of standing orders, it could have been urgent enough to be introduced last week. The chance that there were final details that had not been resolved between Wednesday of last week and Sunday morning is nil. I just do not believe it. The chance that that is something that was decided between Wednesday night and Sunday morning, on the government's side is just non-existent. I am certain that they had the information in time so that we could have been looking at this during the last sitting week.

I will tell you another thing: if the government were serious and fair dinkum about this as a state-building measure rather than a political measure, it would not have hurt them to give us a call to try to bring us through it. They want our support and that is a way by which partisan policy is often undertaken. It would not have hurt the government to give us a heads-up that, rather than supporting a parliamentary inquiry—which I understand they have been engaging with the Greens on in recent days, that they were proposing to do their own thing—they were even planning on doing this suspension of standing orders motion today. It is unbecoming, it is political and it does not help the case they are seeking to make.

The Deputy Premier in her contribution talked about the purpose of the government's election policy, which was to enable the question relating to whether or not it was in the state's interests to form a merged institution and to have the government contribute to that support. She used the term 'exhaustively asked'. I put it to the house that we have reservations about whether the committee, as proposed within the time frame as proposed, will be able to exhaustively ask these questions. We will explore the terms of reference further between the houses and we will explore our thoughts on the date proposed between the houses and the mechanism.

We think that it is useful for the bill to be released as soon as possible. We spoke about this in estimates on Monday, and the Deputy Premier confirmed that it was not far away. I think she said that the government was looking to consult on the bill over the winter break. That is a fair enough proposition. That would enable the bill to then be considered with the benefit of whatever consultation the government does over the break by a committee of one form or another in that September/October/November period, alongside those other questions about the research fund, about the low SES fund, the land purchase at Mawson Lakes, the land purchase at Magill and the impact on the community there, the proposed international students fund and, indeed, concerns that have been raised by stakeholders of different natures around South Australia.

Some of those concerns have been identified by the vice-chancellors and are seeking to be met. I commend the vice-chancellors. I understand that Peter Hoj has already conducted the first of his virtual town halls, engaging for several hours the other night with hundreds and hundreds of interested staff through Zoom. I understand that David Lloyd may have overdone that either yesterday or today, the first one. They all have a series more of direct consultations with their direct stakeholders. That is important work for them to do, and I commend them for the way they are doing it. I commend them also for the way in which since Sunday they have engaged with the opposition constructively and openly. We look forward to continuing that constructive engagement with them as we work our way through our processes.

But it remained significant that the question of the bill, which has not been released, is the main subject of the terms of reference here. We are being asked to pass terms of reference relating to a bill which nobody has seen, which will be significant and which do not, of course, include the rest of the funding package. The information and evidence the government took to form the basis of their funding package needs to be tested. The information and evidence, as much as can be released reasonably by the universities to inform us on whether this investment is going to have the value that it has claimed to have needs, to be tested.

There is merit in that for the South Australian people, and we would urge the government and, of course, the universities as well to cooperate with such committees, whether they be this joint committee. The key difference is that I think the government would prefer a committee they control as well as one that has the time frame they want. If it is a government committee with government-dominated numbers, then that enables the report of that committee to say one thing. I think the government is concerned about a committee that has an uncertain outcome.

As I understand it, the Legislative Council committee proposed was to have two Labor members, two Liberal members, a Green member and another crossbench member in order to come to a balanced view. The composition of that committee, the question remains unresolved, because there are people with strong views either side of the debate and there are people in the middle with open minds under that composition.

That would be a genuine inquiry, where the composition of the committee itself would not necessarily have a predetermined outcome and use the committee in order to form the bullock of their argument to achieve that predetermined outcome. There is something to be said for having a committee of that nature. Perhaps a joint committee could be established in a way that did not have a government majority and did not, indeed, have a majority of members with a predisposed position already on this bill. That is something the opposition would take into account between the chambers.

With that said, I express my disappointment that the government has conducted itself in this way. I reiterate that the opposition is open-minded about the prospect. I urge the government to do several things. I urge the government to release the bill as quickly as possible. I urge the government to take into account the way in which I have described their conduct because it does not need to be a partisan debating point every time this issue comes up.

If the government are fair dinkum about putting this forward as a measure that they believe is in the best interests of the state, then the way to go about it is to try to collaborate with people, even if they are your political opponents—because it is Labor's political opponents that they are seeking to convince on this argument, and they have made no effort to do so. Every single step of the way this week they have sought to shut out the opposition, and the various posturing has been directly unhelpful to the outcome. We will not oppose this motion on this occasion. We will reserve our rights between the chambers to consider this motion, which we are now just reading for the first time.

The Hon. P.B. MALINAUSKAS (Croydon—Premier) (12:41): Naturally, I rise in support of the motion and I take this opportunity less to speak to the merit of the new university policy proposition more broadly than to speak to the question that is before the house, and that is around the establishment of a committee. Notwithstanding the Deputy Leader of the Opposition's contribution to this debate most recently, I can assure the Deputy Leader of the Opposition and the opposition more broadly that at the heart of this proposition is a joint committee that reflects the gravity and the significance of the legislation and the proposition more broadly.

It is a truly historic event to have these two outstanding institutions come together in conjunction with the government to formulate a view that it is in the state's best interest for a new university to be created. Those universities have done that separately to each other but also together and also in conjunction with the government. It is a big deal, it is historic, and the Deputy Leader of the Opposition, who echoes the remarks of the Leader of the Opposition, is right to say that any proposed bill, along with the proposition more broadly, deserves scrutiny.

The Deputy Leader of the Opposition would be well aware of the raw volume of work that has been undertaken to get us to this point. That is work that has had to be done between the various parties and has been done in an iterative process that in many respects has had to be done with confidence because our negotiations and discussions have been occurring on a without-prejudice basis. That is standard operating procedure, particularly for something of this magnitude and size.

But none of it would come as a surprise to them because this has been a stated public policy objective of the parliamentary Labor Party going right back to 2020, when this policy was first announced in full public view on the front page of the Adelaide Advertiser.

The Hon. V.A. Tarzia interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Member for Hartley!

The Hon. V.A. Tarzia: I said 'not to close campuses', sir.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: No, you are interjecting.

The Hon. P.B. MALINAUSKAS: Ever since then, the government has adhered to our policy objective and we continue to pursue it accordingly.

The Hon. V.A. Tarzia: What are you talking about? Magill is closing under this plan.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! The Premier has the floor. The next person who speaks out of order will be leaving the chamber.

The Hon. V.A. Tarzia: For how long, sir?

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Out of the chamber—under, what was the rule? 136?

The Hon. V.A. Tarzia: 137A.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Yes, that's fine—until 12.50pm.

The honourable member for Hartley having withdrawn from the chamber:

The Hon. P.B. MALINAUSKAS: As the Deputy Leader of the Opposition is aware, an historic agreement was reached in December last year, and we stated at the time there would be a lot more work and discussion to occur between the various parties between then and, we set a time line, on 1 July. That time line has been complied with. We are now in a position to be able to release all of that information, as much as we reasonably can, in the public realm, and it strikes us as an eminently reasonable proposition to use a parliamentary inquiry as a vehicle to achieve that. In our view, a joint house committee is a good option, because a joint house committee affords none other than the shadow minister for education, the deputy leader himself, the opportunity to be on that committee, which he may or may not choose to do.

The sincerity of the government's position in respect of affording a genuine parliamentary inquiry is underpinned by the fact that we are not seeking to have a majority on the committee. I am happy to say that we are open-minded to a non-government Chair of the joint house committee, should the parliament resolve that that is what it wants to establish. We simply as a government are seeking for a thorough examination to be done on an objective, evidentiary-based basis and also done in a timely way.

The terms of reference that the Deputy Premier has collated seek to be as broad in scope as one could possibly hope, to allow for the full remit of questions that might be applied to this proposition to be accounted for, along with consideration of the legislation or the bill itself. The government is happy to commit that, once the bill is in its final draft form, which we anticipate to be in around about a fortnight's time, the bill will be furnished to the committee for thorough scrutiny.

It is my hope that the government will be able to enjoy the opposition's support on this proposition; in fact, it is our hope that we get support from across the political divide and representative of the crossbench as well. That would be the best possible start that a new institution could get off to. That is a question of course for the opposition itself, and I have noted, I do not mind saying, that the language that both the Leader of the Opposition and the Deputy Leader of the Opposition have used in the public realm has been one that speaks to an open-mindedness to the proposition, and we are grateful for that.

I appreciate that the Leader of the Opposition and the Deputy Leader of the Opposition have to do their level best to critique the process and complain about it—they have a job to do. If you are in opposition and you like the outcome the government has arrived at, then the next available political opportunity to pursue is to complain about the process, about how they have got a good outcome. That is their prerogative. But, there is an open-mindedness in all the public language that the opposition is using regarding this proposition.

The Deputy Premier and I are sincere about allowing the committee to do its work; a joint house select committee seems to be an appropriate vehicle to be able to achieve that. I have made it clear that we are open-minded to not having a majority on that committee, that we are open-minded to having an independent Chair of the committee. We just want the committee to be able to do its work in a timely way so as to facilitate passage of the legislation this year. Now, why is that important?

The Deputy Leader of the Opposition referred to the work that he has undertaken around time, but there is another imperative here that has to be front of mind for the parliament and each member of it, and that is that just prior to Christmas, as the former education minister well knows, kids get their year 12 results, and very quickly, in the early weeks of January, or over Christmas more or less, they start making decisions about what universities they are going to apply for. They are entitled to have a degree of confidence and certainty around what the plan is into the future regarding what the structure of the tertiary sector in our state will be. I think they should be afforded that opportunity: we enjoyed that, they should too.

If the parliament forms a view that the new university should not be established, let that be the decision before Christmas. We of course have a different aspiration: we hope the parliament decides before Christmas that it should be established, and that is the time line this government is keen to pursue so that students, young people, at one of the most important decision points of their life understand what the rules of the game will be for the state going forward.

There will be other vehicles to be able to discuss the merit of the policy itself. No doubt, there may be an opportunity for that in question time. This is a big one. I hope that we can come together to achieve it because, if we do, we will have all collectively taken ownership of what is a really special moment for the state.

Motion carried.

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