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Legislative Council - Fifty-Fourth Parliament, Second Session (54-2)
2021-05-04 Daily Xml
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Flammable Building Cladding

The Hon. T.A. FRANKS (15:27): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before addressing a question to the Treasurer on the topic of flammable cladding.

Leave granted.

The Hon. T.A. FRANKS: The 2014 fire at the Lacrosse apartment building in Melbourne's Docklands, and of course the tragic Grenfell fire in London in June 2017, highlighted the fire safety risks arising from the noncompliant use of combustible cladding. In Victoria and New South Wales the state governments are providing funding and loans to fix cladding on private buildings. No such support has been established in South Australia.

As members may be aware, residents in twin apartment blocks on the Lefevre Peninsula—those being the Tarni Court and Pilla Avenue buildings—are currently faced with the challenge of removing flammable aluminium composite cladding from the buildings, which currently poses a quite high fire risk. These buildings were put up 13 years ago, and residents are now facing potential evacuation if the cladding is not removed from them.

Despite the presence of the cladding not being the fault of these residents, they are currently facing a cost of some $1.6 million to remove that cladding. Port Adelaide Enfield council has given the 166 apartment owners a 12-month deadline to remove the cladding, but the community corporations for these buildings have indicated that they can't afford that within that time frame. That is not to mention, of course, the fact that these buildings are now classified as high risk, meaning that many contractors will not carry out the work due to lack of insurance cover.

Residents have been asking the local council and the state government for help, and it is very cold comfort indeed that state governments elsewhere are providing funding or loans yet the residents in our state have been left high and dry. My question is: why is the Marshall government not providing support to South Australian residents unwittingly caught in this terrible predicament to remove that dangerous cladding from the buildings?

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS (Treasurer) (15:29): My recollection is that the responsibility for this particular area is with the building minister who, in a past life, was my former ministerial colleague the Hon. Stephan Knoll. In recent months, that responsibility rests with the Attorney-General, who has taken over responsibility for that particular area, together with, of course, responsibilities that local government have in relation to these issues.

My understanding of the position, and if I am wrong I will correct the record later on, is that not all state and territory governments have provided assistance along the fashion that the member has outlined—one or two might have. My understanding also is that the legal advice to the government is that there is no legal responsibility on the state government in relation to this particular issue. So it is certainly correct to say that the state government has not provided either grants and/or loans in relation to the circumstances that the member has outlined.

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