Supply Bill I
Mr VAN HOLST PELLEKAAN (Stuart) (16:32): I appreciate the chance to rise and speak on the Supply Bill. Of course we will support it. As you know we will support the Supply Bill because that is the convention and that is what is required to keep the state operating. It certainly would be remiss of me not to point out what a difficult, dreadful situation the state is in financially. I would go so far as to say that I do not believe that there is one member of parliament with a place in this chamber who actually does think that the state is in a good financial position.
Members and ministers can talk about the services and the different things that they are providing but, if you look at the state, if you look at the debt, if you look at where we are heading, if you look at the trends, I do not think that anybody could say that the debt that we have—heading towards $2 million a day worth of interest—could be acceptable by anybody's standards. The state has had rising income throughout the term of this government but spending has been going up even more, and it really is a situation of mismanagement with regards to finances.
There is difficulty everywhere. If you look at the results of the last budget—and I do not think that anybody would have ever seen the sort of backlash from unions, such a broad cross-section of unions against the government and against the budget. There is difficulty in the city. The unions and the public service cuts and the deceit with which they were handled, I think, is really shameful. The vehemence with which the public sector unions, particularly, but certainly many others, felt about the way that they had been treated was very clear on the steps of parliament house week after week.
Another city example—and as members know here I do not normally stray into city issues, I normally concentrate on the country—is what occurred with the Parks Community Centre. That was just dreadful, and I think it really highlights how difficult this is and what a bad situation the government is in with regard to managing its finances. You would never, ever have expected the government to do that to the Parks Community Centre. To its credit, it turned around only because it had such a dreadful backlash from its own voter heartland.
I know a bit about the Parks Community Centre. I lived in Croydon, in fact, for a few years when I lived in Adelaide. I used to go to the Parks Community Centre very regularly to use the gym and the exercise facilities, and I saw all the other good work that went on there, so I feel quite comfortable, while I am the member for Stuart, talking about that place. I think there are two good examples—the dealing with the Public Service and the Parks Community Centre—that highlight what a difficult situation things are in when that is required in the city.
I would like to focus on two key directions that this government is pushing towards because of the financial situation that it is in at the moment. One is with regard to red tape. When finances are in a dreadful situation, as they are, the government has no choice but to reduce services unless it wants to increase taxes, and we are already the most highly taxed state in Australia, so I do not think it saw any option there.
The government must find a way to reduce its services, and one of the things this government has done is move towards the user-pays system, and I can understand. I have got a strong business background and I have done lots of things in corporate life and in my own small business involvement. I do understand that you need to try to put the costs where the costs belong, but what this is leading to at the moment is an extraordinary impost on industries and an enormous amount of red tape.
The reason for that is the government is still setting all of the regulations but trying to put the cost of administering them and imposing them on industry. Consequently, it does not have a vested interest in keeping that cost down. The government, broadly speaking, needs to provide the regulations and provide the money to put them in place, or allow industry to set the regulations and cop the costs. Either one of those things will get a far more efficient outcome than what we have at the moment, where the government still seeks to impose the regulations and oversee and set the rules, but tries to push all the costs towards the industries.
I give two specific examples of where this has really gone haywire. We have a situation at the moment where the government is proposing a biosecurity levy, but the primary production industry will have to pay. In reality, biosecurity is an issue that affects the whole state. Every single person who lives or travels through the state is affected, potentially could cause harm, hopefully benefits from far more than that.
Biosecurity affects the entire state, and yet the cost of the levy will just go to primary producers and agriculture and industry. Yet, on the other hand, you have got the River Murray levy, where people who do not draw any water from the River Murray at all are paying the levy all over the state. So, you have got one situation where industry pays and everybody benefits, and you have got one situation where everybody pays and lots of people who do not benefit at all are included in having to pay. That is causing all sorts of red tape and inefficiency, and I really do think that is an outcome of the state being in a very dire financial situation. As I said, poor finances, having to decrease services, trying to push a user pays system, and the government is trying to still impose all of the regulations.
The other direction that I really want to focus on, that comes out of being financially strapped, is priority setting. It is no different to a household or a child's pocket money, all the way up to a state or federal budget. There is never enough money, I accept that. There is never enough money to do all of the things that you would like to do, and that would be true whether it was a Liberal or a Labor government. But when you are really under pressure your choice of priorities really comes under pressure as well. What we are seeing at the moment is that the government, which typically favours the city over the country and the outback areas anyway, is really pushing shamefully down that path.
The city is in trouble with regard to funding money to provide services that it deserves, but the country and in the outback areas are in a diabolical situation at the moment. It is not much fun just pointing out problems if you do not have a solution or you do not want to contribute. There are two very easy things, and these are not things that people here have not heard before but they are worth highlighting: $535 million going towards the Adelaide Oval. It is not necessary.
At a time when we are looking for money to provide services for the state, and particularly in the country, spending $535 million is absolutely not necessary. It might be necessary for the SANFL so that the AFL does not take over its football licences. It might be necessary for SACA so that it can get rid of its debt much more quickly. I can understand how nice it would be to have a city stadium and to have football in the city.
I have no trouble with that whatsoever, but it is not a priority when you do not have the money; it is not a priority when you have to try to forward sell the forests in the South-East to make it happen. Add to that the RAH. We can all consider what the costs might be, and the government has not been brave enough to bring forward its costs, even though I am sure it would have them, absolutely positive that it would have them, but it will not tell the state, the taxpayers and the parliament what they are.
What we do know is that, from the calculations that both sides did before the election, there will be about a $1 billion gap in the cost of rebuilding the Royal Adelaide Hospital on site where it is now versus building a brand new one. We can talk about how high or how low the costs might have been, and we will find out eventually, but what we know is that it is about $1 billion more expensive to do what the government has done.
Between the Adelaide Oval and the Royal Adelaide Hospital, we have got $1.5 billion being spent that does not need to be spent—$1.5 billion. Imagine what that could do for all of South Australia. Imagine what that could do in Adelaide and in the country and in the outback. If the government did not feel the need to build its icons, if the government did not feel the need to build these facilities in its own honour but provided the services or save $1.5 billion, imagine how much better off the rest of the state would be.
Imagine how much better off the finances would be, even if you did not spend any more money on extra services and things. I think specifically about my electorate, the electorate of Stuart that I represent, and I will just list a few towns. These towns are very geographically diverse, they are socially diverse, they are population-wise diverse. I think about Peterborough, Kapunda, Eudunda, Marree, Lyndhurst, Cadell, Morgan, Blanchetown, Yunta, Wirrabara and Orroroo, just to name a few.
I think of some of the smallest places like Bower and Cockburn and, of course, the biggest in the electorate of Stuart, the regional city of Port Augusta. They would all benefit enormously. All the towns of Stuart would benefit enormously if they had a small slice of that $1.5 billion, and the rest of it could be shared around the other 46 electorates in the state.
The issues that are really burning in the country at the moment and could without any doubt receive more money and benefit very well from it include country health. The government took away the small schools grants in the last budget. Why would you do that? A relatively small amount of money it had to take away from small schools, and particularly small country schools as far as I am concerned.
We do not have enough regional police. The government took away the 3.3¢ a litre fuel subsidy from country areas. Aboriginal communities could certainly benefit from more resources. In the country we have great difficulty providing mental health services and special needs teachers. That is a really big issue in the country that a lot of people are not aware of. If you have a child who needs special support for his or her learning, it is near on impossible to get the support that you need. We do have some special needs teachers who do the very best they can, but there is just not enough of them. They are overstretched and overworked, so then, of course, it is even harder to attract others to come into these jobs because there is not funding for that sort of thing.
Think about the Remote Areas Electricity Scheme. As everyone here knows, we are in the midst of the government removing a subsidy so that it will increase the cost of electricity to 13 different communities around South Australia. The Provincial Cities Association just Friday, or perhaps yesterday (I forget which), came out really strongly opposing it. Thirteen communities from tiny places like Cockburn, all the way through to significant towns by regional outback standards like Coober Pedy are really going to suffer. Their tourism is going to suffer.
Domestic consumption, obviously, is a great difficulty. Businesses are the lifeblood of these towns. People cannot live in such remote places if their businesses are not successful because they need the services that the businesses provide, but they also need the employment. If you live in a small country town or an outback town where there are no businesses, you have no jobs there. You do not just drive to the next suburb or the other side of town. You do not have the headache of saying, 'My job is the other side of Adelaide and I have a half hour or 45 minute commute every day.' You have nothing: you have absolutely no choice. I think the government really underestimates that. As I mentioned before, the proposal to forward sell the wood in the forests is going to have an enormously detrimental impact on the communities in the South-East.
I will refer to outback roads, which people here know I talk about all the time. The government completely underestimates the value of these roads, and I will give the example of the Birdsville Track. My opinion is that the government looks at that and says, 'Well, it runs from Marree to the South Australian-Queensland border and there are only so many cattle stations between here and there and there are only so many people up there, what is the issue? How much money do you really expect us to spend on those roads?' That is completely missing the point.
Just north of the Queensland border is the town of Birdsville, an exceptionally successful town with regard to tourism. Tens of thousands of tourists every year go to Birdsville, and guess what? Those tourists are very often from South Australia also. Some of them come from Brisbane, Sydney and Adelaide but an enormous number of the tourists that go to Birdsville go to the Flinders Ranges and other outback South Australian places, and even as far down as the wine districts of Clare and the Barossa, for example. If they cannot get to Birdsville, some of those people will not come and be tourists in South Australia.
There is another really shortsighted view with regard to outback roads, and I use the Birdsville Track again as an example but it is relevant all over the place. The government says, 'We don't need to provide that road and spend money to maintain that road so that Queensland cattle growers can use it. That is the Queensland government's problem. Let them go to Brisbane.' That completely ignores the multiplier effect associated with the sale of beef.
I am told that, for every dollar earned through the sale of beef at the market, there is a seven to one multiplier. So that means that, if a South Australian beef producer sends their beef to market in South Australia, we get $8 of benefit in our state—the $1 per kilo that went to the grower and then the other $7 that comes from transport, slaughtering and the sale yard, all the way through to the steaks and sausages going to the butcher shop or supermarket.
If we get the Queensland cattle coming into our state, which we should be seriously encouraging, we do not get the first dollar but we get the other $7. If we can encourage them to come into our state and send their beef through our processors and local markets, we get the entire multiplier effect. So, anyone having a view that we do not need to provide that road for other state's cattle stations is really short-sighted.
I think there is an enormous undervaluation, underestimation and under-appreciation by this government of the value of regional and outback South Australia, and I think that mistake leads to under-investment and under-provision of services in country and outback areas. I looked at some ABS figures, for example (and I looked at this number very quickly so I hope I have got it correct), and it is staggering to think that something like 38 or 39 per cent of the state's mining revenue is generated in the inner eastern suburbs of Adelaide. That is not the government's fault, but we need to look very closely to try to understand exactly the full value.
If it is happening with mining—and it is very easy to pick out mining because we all know that there are no mines in the eastern suburbs of Adelaide but, understandably, that is where the head office and the accountant is so that is where the income is reported—how many industries does that apply to as well that are very hard to pick out because there might be some of that industry in the city area or the broader metropolitan area but the income is actually generated and the services and investment need to be provided in the country so that it continues?
That undervaluation of what the regional and outback areas of our state contribute to our state economy I think is leading to an unfortunate under-investment in and under-supporting of these areas and really focusing on the city. As I said before, when money is exceptionally tight, as it is because of the government's mismanagement over many years, the people that I represent, and others in the country, really miss out.
Another example is power outages. We have had really serious and extreme power outages in the Upper Mid North just lately. For the last two to three months, we have had a very high number of planned and unplanned power outages affecting about eight towns, all north of Laura and up between Laura and Carrieton and that area, and we are told quite clearly by ETSA that it is old power lines, old insulators. It is a situation where, basically, the porcelain insulators are getting dry and cracked and getting water into them. We need some investment.
What we need to do is to see the value of our country areas. We need to make sure that it is a priority—that it is a priority that the man at the Orroroo general store does not have to throw out hundreds or thousands of dollars of food from his freezer because he has had an unexpected power outage. We have to understand that people in the hospital should not have to run around in the middle of procedures trying to flick on their emergency generator and that sort of thing. We should be investing in infrastructure and spending money in country areas.
I raised the Kapunda Primary School quite a few months ago. The chair of the Kapunda Primary School governing council told me that the governing council budget has to contribute to the school's electricity bill because the budget the government and the education department gives the school just is not enough and has not been enough for years. It is something in the vicinity of $10,000 that they have to pay to top it up. There is just not enough priority.
I recently had a meeting with a delegation of mayors from the central region Local Government Association. We all know that there has been really, really unseasonal and devastating floods. They have asked the government whether it would be able to help, through the state government's resources or with support from the federal government, to get funding to support the maintenance of these local council roads. Right now, the bill for this group of councils is up around $40 million. I urge the government to support those councils. The councils absolutely cannot do it themselves. They need the government's support. I have not had an answer yet. However, if we get a negative answer, it will be another issue to add to this list of low priority in country areas.
Everywhere I go, community leaders, whether they be councillors, church leaders, sporting leaders, or whether they be the average man or woman on the street, feel completely dudded by the government, and I think that is a great shame. I understand the realities of the financial situation the government has got us into, but putting all of the priorities into the city and not focusing on the country is not acceptable.
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