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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2024-05-02 Daily Xml
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Service SA Centres

Ms SAVVAS (Newland) (14:24): My question is to the Minister for Infrastructure and Transport. Can the minister update the house on Saturday openings of Service SA centres?

Members interjecting:

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS (West Torrens—Minister for Infrastructure and Transport, Minister for Energy and Mining) (14:25): What you just saw there were the proverbial tyre tracks over all of his colleagues. Throw them right under that bus—it wasn't me. My young friend, he just works here. He wasn't part of the Marshall government, he was an independent Speaker. He was just watching it all unfold before him.

Members interjecting:

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: That's right. Strapped into the back, like a child. Next week marks one year since Service SA centres at Elizabeth, Marion, Modbury, Prospect and Seaford Meadows opened on Saturdays between 9am and 5pm. When the former government announced they were closing Prospect, Modbury and Mitcham centres, they got it wrong.

Members interjecting:

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: Yes, I know the Leader of the Opposition yells out 'shame' as well. There was zero consideration for the thousands of people affected by closing them. These centres recorded high customer visit numbers and the public backlash was instantaneous and loud.

Despite the overwhelming opposition to those closures, it remained the former government's priority to close those centres. I do point out to the house that every one of those members representing those electorates was defeated at the last election.

Members interjecting:

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: It could be one of the reasons. What we have done is we have honoured our election commitment, we have listened to the people of South Australia, and 89,918 transactions have occurred since 6 May 2023. People are interacting face to face with a real person: applying for a licence, renewing a licence with a new photograph—which I need to do very, very often (actually, I try to keep the old one for as long as possible)—transferring interstate and overseas licences, submitting a certificate of fitness, applying for a concession and applying for a disability parking permit with the convenience of a Saturday, as there are now new types of ways that families interact with services.

Additional friendly, hardworking full-time staff have been allocated to Service SA. On behalf of the South Australian government, I would like to thank them for their service, their work and their kindness in working on weekends. I look forward to updating the house on the continued success of Saturday openings.

I know that members across the parliament on both sides of the chamber realise the error of the former government's ways and we are seeing now these Service SA centres operating on Saturdays. I would like to see how this works over a couple of years so we can get a better understanding about how well it's working and how well South Australians are interacting with Service SA centres.

That doesn't mean that our work is finished. A lot of people want to do work online and not have to go into the Service SA centres, but we should have both those options open for people according to their needs. We will be doing the work to make sure we can do more online servicing for people who don't want to have to go into a Service SA centre, and those in our community who feel more comfortable or are required to by us in this house to attend in person, we will make sure it's open and as accessible as possible.

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