Bills

Appropriation Bill 2014

Second Reading

Debate resumed.

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY (Leader of the Opposition) (12:39): In relation to a letter that the Premier has sent to all 440 statewide boards, my understanding is that they have to justify their existence. From a primary industries point of view, there are a number of boards. One that springs to mind is the South Australian Sheep Advisory Group (SA SAG) which has PIRSA departmental people on the board. It has several million dollars of assets or cash in the bank. I am a little concerned about the abolition of those boards because that is growers' money. It has been levied on the sale of livestock.

If the board is to be changed I would hope it is not abolished and that PIRSA or the state government wholly and solely administers the growers' funds. If it is to be abolished then the grower's fund should go with growers and they should be able to manage it their own way. I think minister Bignell said it would all be finalised by 30 October; I think that is the deadline announced by the Premier, but we are concerned—with some of those funds and some of those boards that actually administer growers' funds—with where those funds might end up.

I hope that one day our primary industries are treated with the respect they deserve, but I doubt very much that it will come in this budget cycle or even in the next 3½ years. In 12 years this Labor government has not changed its stripes and I do not expect it to do so any time soon.

Tourism has also faced some significant cuts in recent years. It has been hit with a significant cut to its marketing budget. We must also not forget that the government has brought forward its marketing budget from this financial year to do the Adelaide Breathe campaign, which was primarily shown in Adelaide, in South Australia, prior to the election. So, that is also very disappointing. My feedback and understanding is that the Kangaroo Island ad was a very good ad and the Barossa ad has been very good, but I am not sure that the Adelaide Breathe ad has really breathed any life into Adelaide.

I have recently been researching other states' tourism expenditure and the return on investment in relation to their budget spends. Unsurprisingly, South Australia has the lowest return on investment of all mainland states. In the 2014-15 budget, Queensland will spend almost $100 million on tourism, which will generate some $27.8 billion of economic benefit to the state. That means that for every dollar spent on tourism they get about $281 returned to the economy. In New South Wales the return on investment is about $255 and in Victoria it is about $247. In comparison, South Australia is investing $55.1 million on tourism and its return on investment is only $125.60. So, you can see that we are less than half of every other state.

Additionally, Queensland's tourism budget is twice the size of South Australia's, but it only has 50 per cent more staff. In Western Australia, their budget is 33 per cent larger than South Australia, yet their return on investment is much higher and their department is run with fewer staff. South Australia's departments are not only facing drastic cuts, but there appear to be a number of inefficiencies and it is quite concerning how low our return on investment is.

Tourism in South Australia is failing to reach its goal. The government's own tourism plan—it is interesting, minister Bignell said in estimates, on the Tuesday or Wednesday, that it would be released in the next couple of weeks; I think he was mistaken, that it was going to be released in a couple of days because it was two days after that it was released—has admitted that if current market share is maintained then visitor expenditure will grow to only $6.7 billion by 2020. This falls $1.3 billion short of the $8 billion target that Labor expects to reach by 2020.

If you look at that growth to $8 billion, their own plan says that it will not reach it, but if they were to achieve it it begs the question of why you would have ministers and governments talk about aspiration goals, it begs the question why you have an aspiration goal if it is so totally unachievable. The growth they are expecting in the next four years, from 2014-15 through to 2020, is five times the growth per annum than we had over the last five years. So, it is ridiculously ambitious, it is delusionally ambitious.

It is interesting, if you look at the tourism plan over the next five years, at current budget levels we are looking at about $250 million that will be spent on tourism over five years. I think it is an opportunity for them to take a big deep breath and look at how you would best spend the $250 million. Maybe it is time to review the whole structure of how everything operates and have a look at how we can get best value for that $250 million over the next five years.

It is also interesting, we have seen the Visitor Information Centre, when minister Rau was tourism minister, go from King William Street to Grenfell Street, and then I think when minister Gago was minister it went from Grenfell Street to North Terrace in the Service SA building, and now with minister Bignell it has gone into a volunteer shop in a side street off Rundle Mall. The other day it was shut; one of the volunteers was sick and nobody could keep the place open. In estimates, minister Bignell said, 'Oh, well, we have fixed that because if somebody is sick we will send somebody down from the SATC head office to look after it.' Now, there is a level of training and competence and I know that some very skilful people work in the SATC, but I am interested to know who is going to be called in when somebody is sick or unable to open the visitor centre.

It is interesting that if you are walking from the east down the mall and look towards James Place, there is something painted on the pavement in front of the Myer Centre, but if there are people walking there you cannot see it. There is not one sign that you can see when you are walking from the east heading west that you can look at and see that there is a visitor centre, so I think it is a bit rich for the minister to say, 'This is a great new location that is really vibrant.' He says he walks down there to get lunch some days, but I do not think the visitor centre is there for the minister or people who work in and around that particular precinct. Visitor centres are there for any visitor who comes to Adelaide and they should be able to find it easily.

I am reminded of places like Melbourne, Sydney and others. Melbourne has a large one in the Bourke Street Mall and an extremely large visitor centre in Federation Square. We do not have a Federation Square and maybe Victoria Square is not the right location, but I would hope that this is not seen as a permanent arrangement because the next step, if it is run by volunteers and the volunteers say they cannot do it, is to shut the door and not have a visitor centre.

I know there has been discussion around the digital age and everybody does things on their iPhones and their iPads and with apps and I am sure we are heading that way, but there are still a large number of people, and I often see it when I am out in the regions, and the one that springs to mind is the Whyalla Visitor Centre—

The Hon. T.J. Stephens interjecting:

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: The Hon. Terry Stephens interjects. In fact, some of the ladies who work in the visitor centre still remember him when he was a young man in Whyalla and speak very highly of him as well, I might add. I was surprised at the number of four-wheel drives and caravans and, if you like, the grey nomads. They are the ones that still use those facilities. They are in that sort of space. My daughters and that generation will very quickly do everything online, so we are in a bit of a transition. What I do not want to see is us totally switching off from the generation who still requires a brochure, to talk to somebody and to have a bit of interaction. Having a visitor centre that is run by volunteers and not open full time is always a concern to me.

Finally, forestry, is another area I have some interest in and again it comes back to priorities. We saw in the forestry industry that a round table was established during the sale of the forest process which was chaired by Mr Trevor Smith, a member of the CFMEU and well known to members opposite. I am not quite sure why we had that round table because, of course, in the end, the government had made its decision to sell the forests. It was really a way of keeping all the critics in the tent quiet. Nonetheless, the sale went through and that round table was morphed into the Forestry Industry Advisory Council.

The budget papers show that some $300,000 was spent—I think minister Bignell confirmed that—on that particular committee or Forestry Industry Advisory Council annually. I cannot come up with any reason why you would spend, given our current budget situation, that sort of money on an industry council such as that. I do not have any evidence but, anecdotally, I hear that when you look at the board's remuneration, Mr Smith gets paid more than the chair of the board of ForestrySA, the body that was actually empowered to run the forests.

The Hon. T.J. Stephens: Nice job for the comrades.

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: My colleague the Hon. Terry Stephens said, 'Nice job for the comrades.' It appears it is because the chair of the board of ForestrySA is paid just a fraction over $50,000 for sitting fees and Mr Smith is paid about $56,000; it shows that he gets the same amount of pay. That board is effectively managing $0.75 billion worth of assets and they are getting paid less than the person who chairs this advisory council. I know that they are expecting to come up with a blueprint for the future of forestry in the South-East.

Through DMITRE we have had the fibre chain value study. Several million dollars have been spent on that with Mr Göran Roos and others. We have the Forestry Industry Advisory Council getting 300 grand a year to come up with a blueprint. It appears to me to be a significant waste of money, given these tough budget conditions. I think it again emphasises the lack of priorities from this government.

In closing, I want to address a couple of issues in relation to forestry and in relation to a business down there, Carter Holt Harvey's panels business. For everybody who is trying to understand, it basically makes kitchen bench tops. It puts a high-quality finish on a particle board product. Carter Holt Harvey has a business in Tumut in New South Wales that does about the same, and I think their long-term plans are to upgrade one and probably have a major focus, wherever that is, and close the other one.

I became aware a few weeks ago that Carter Holt Harvey had had some discussions with the New South Wales government and I was concerned that we have some money in a fund that was set aside to invest in forestry value adding in the South-East. I think it has about $10.5 million still waiting to be allocated, although the minister can confirm that only about $7 million of that is available. They are going to hold up $3 million; I am not quite sure why. Surely you would just leave it in the fund and try to spend it to get that investment. It has been transferred, I think it is from DMITRE to PIRSA, but not all of it has been transferred.

I raised some concerns about what the government was doing. I saw a proposal from Carter Holt Harvey before the election of what they would like to do and so I know that the government is well aware of that, and now we hear that New South Wales has been speaking to Carter Holt Harvey. Naturally, another competitive government is keen to see investment in its state.

I raised these concerns about potential investment going out of the South-East. I am trying to get the minister to focus on it. He was in Mount Gambier for four days over that period, but he did not visit Carter Holt Harvey, and then he came out in the paper and said that I am scaremongering. All I have done is raise concerns that New South Wales is speaking to Carter Holt Harvey. Our minister, the government, has a pack of money that it has said it will invest in businesses in the South-East to get more productivity and value add. It just really surprises me that when an opposition member gets some information that a company is wanting to expand in South Australia but is not getting any answers from the government and he raises concerns about that, he is accused of scaremongering.

Mr Brad Coates is of course the local CMFEU representative. I am not quite sure of Brad's actual title within the CMFEU, but the newspaper describes him as a heavyweight, so I guess he is pretty important. 'Green Triangle forestry union heavyweight Brad Coates' is how the paper describes him. Interestingly, back early in July, Mr Coates said in relation to my comments that I had demonstrated a lack of understanding of the timber industry and a contempt for workers in the industry. He said I was more interested in politicising the industry with my 'scaremongering'. Clearly, when he starts using the same words as minister Bignell, you have to ask yourself, 'Is he in bed with Mr Bignell?' I certainly know he is in relation to the left of the Labor Party. The article continues:

Meanwhile, Mr Coates said CHH also had questions to answer as to why they refused the $27m offered by the Weatherill government in 2012.

He criticised the company's decision not to support their South East operation, then turn around and throw their hat in the ring for funding from the government adjustment fund.

Mr Coates said:

'CHH is in no position to dictate how that money is allocated, and neither is anyone else.'

He is referring to me there. He went on:

'The funds should be distributed on the basis that jobs are created…'

It is interesting. This last week, another article stated that Mr Coates had said:

Mr Ridgway's comments this week reaffirmed his lack of understanding of the industry and if CHH was unsuccessful in getting funding then it could squarely blame Mr Ridgway for his 'inappropriate' and 'uninformed' public comments.

Only about a fortnight before they said Carter Holt Harvey should not be dictating and should not be getting any money, and now it appears that it is my fault if they do not get any money. It is setting up the community, I suspect, for more of a concern about Mr Coates and his friends in the Labor Party, and especially in the left with Mr Bignell. I suspect there is another agenda down there and they are now trying to massage the message so that if funding is not forthcoming for Carter Holt Harvey then it will be my fault, not his fault.

I reiterate the point I made to the local newspaper, and that is that I want nothing more than for Carter Harvey Holt to be successful in getting an allocation of some of that money to upgrade their processing mill. From day one, all I have ever done is to make sure that they hold the government to account. There is money in a fund, and they have a business down there that employs a lot of people, and that it will underpin them for another 30 or 40 years. Now we see both the minister and the union heavyweight looking after themselves, almost arm-in-arm in bed together, trying to portray it that, if there was no funding, it would be my fault and not theirs.

I can tell you, Mr President, that it is this government that has managed this state budget, it is this government that has sold the forests and that, if there is any fault for any decisions or any lack of funding, it will lie fairly and squarely with minister Bignell, treasurer Koutsantonis, Premier Weatherill and his team of motley ministers. With those few words, I support the bill.

Debate adjourned on motion of Hon. T.J. Stephens.