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Legislative Council - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2023-10-31 Daily Xml
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Marine Scalefish Fishery

The Hon. N.J. CENTOFANTI (Leader of the Opposition) (14:35): Supplementary, Mr President.

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: The Hon. Mr Martin, don't blot your copybook.

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. N.J. CENTOFANTI: Given the minister's comments around the former government's reform—

The PRESIDENT: What's the question?

The Hon. N.J. CENTOFANTI: —does the minister not support the reform of the marine scalefish fishery sector?

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Attorney-General, if you want to answer the question, stand up; otherwise, sit down and be quiet.

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: The Hon. Ms Girolamo and the Hon. Mr Hanson, can we please listen to the minister. It's her time.

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN (Minister for Primary Industries and Regional Development, Minister for Forest Industries) (14:36): The reform was undertaken under the previous government. We have come into government towards the end of that transition. I am happy to work with the industry, as I have been doing very collaboratively, about how to finalise some of that transition. We do know, of course, that the former government made a huge mess of it in many ways.

We heard that the former Minister for Primary Industries had made exceptional circumstances decisions with no legislative framework. If we remember, that was the determination that was made: there was no legislative framework, according to SACAT. So they made a huge mess of what admittedly is a complex and difficult process. However, the fishery now has individual transferable quota that means that there is an asset for those licence holders to either use—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: The Hon. Mr Hunter and the honourable Leader of the Opposition!

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN: —to catch fish or, indeed, to trade or to sell. When it comes to the overall intent of having the reform—that overall intent, which clearly has missed those opposite—it's about sustainability of the fisheries. I would hope that there would be bipartisan support for sustainability of the fisheries.

The Hon. N.J. Centofanti interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN: If we don't have a sustainable fishery, no licence holder will have an economically viable business. Without sustainable fishery stocks, no business will be able to survive and we will have to have in place things that restrict the ability to fish. That's not what anybody wants. We have seen that with the snapper fishery. It was allowed to deplete to the stage where bans had to be in place—first of all, bans under the former government and then bans under this government—because of the status of the stocks. The overall goal of sustainability for fisheries—

The Hon. N.J. Centofanti interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN: —is to make sure that we protect the resource, which is, after all, a community-owned resource. The fisheries of our state belong to the people of South Australia and we of course want to support the sustainability. That's why the reform was done, and of course I support sustainability.

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