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Legislative Council - Fifty-Fourth Parliament, Second Session (54-2)
2021-05-12 Daily Xml
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Federal Budget

The Hon. D.G.E. HOOD (15:16): My question is to the Treasurer: what infrastructure funding commitments for South Australia were announced in the federal budget last night?

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS (Treasurer) (15:16): I am very pleased to respond to that question because there have been a number of ill-founded claims being made by members of the opposition and other commentators in relation to infrastructure.

I am very pleased to be able to reveal that the commonwealth government, through a letter from the commonwealth minister to the state minister, has made clear what their total infrastructure spending commitments to the South Australian government will be for each of the financial years 2021-22 through to 2024-25, the forward estimates. In 2021-22, it is about $786 million; in 2022-23, $954 million; in 2023-24, $1.1 billion; and in 2024-25, $1.07 billion. It averages $980 million or almost a billion dollars a year in infrastructure spending.

The ill-founded commentary that in some way there is going to be this gap in funding in the first couple of years of the forward estimates, the money doesn't come until the end of the forward estimates and beyond, is ill-founded and doesn't address the fact that this government has already locked in existing federal commitments for this year, next year and the year afterwards, and what is being offered is to actually top up that spending in the third and fourth year and beyond the forward estimates. What we have actually locked in—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order, the Hon. Mr Hunter and the Hon. Mr Hanson! They have been quiet today but they are out of order, both of them.

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS: They are bleating from the backbench. They are squealing like stuck pigs because let me just put the—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS: —figure on the table. In the last year—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. J.E. Hanson interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order, the Hon. Mr Hanson!

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS: In the last year, under the former Labor government, 2017-18, the exact—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: The Hon. Mr Wortley is out of order.

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS: —same letter from the commonwealth to the state Labor government outlined—

The Hon. I.K. Hunter interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order, the Hon. Mr Hunter!

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS: —that over the next four years, should the Labor government have been re-elected, that they would get $465 million a year, less than half—

The Hon. I.K. Hunter interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order, the Hon. Mr Hunter!

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS: —the $975 million—

The Hon. E.S. Bourke interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: And the Hon. Ms Bourke!

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS: —that has been negotiated by this current government. This government has negotiated double the annual funding per year over the forward estimates than the former Labor government did in 2017-18.

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS: Double the funding. So it is untrue for the bleating from the backbench to claim that there is no funding—

The Hon. I.K. Hunter interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order, the Hon. Mr Hunter!

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS: —next year or the year afterwards. There is $1 billion a year approximately going into infrastructure spending in South Australia.

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order! The Treasurer should conclude his remarks very soon.

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS: That is more than double the funding that was provided under the former Labor government in their last budget, in 2017-18.

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS: They can squeal like stuck pigs for as long as they want—

The PRESIDENT: Order, minister!

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS: —but they don't change the facts.

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