Published August 2024
Read the Hansard here.
Watch part of the speech here.
I rise to speak on the Appropriation Bill and the reports of the estimates committees. It is an opportunity for me to put on the record my thanks to all those involved in the estimates process. It is a very useful exercise for this parliament, and particularly the opposition, to scrutinise how we are spending taxpayer money and to hold the government to account. This is an opportunity for me to again talk about some of the issues I have been advocating for locally in my own electorate during this budget process, some of which we explored during the estimates committee process because some of it, happily, we have achieved, including in particular an announcement about road safety.
I was very delighted to see in this state budget funding of $80 million for road safety initiatives. I am particularly interested in this topic, not only as the new shadow minister for road safety but also in my capacity as a local member. We had this issue brought to the forefront in my electorate very soon after I became the local member, when there was a shocking accident out the front of a school in my electorate, Marryatville High School, when two children who were looking to do no more than get to school that day were struck when a truck failed to stop at a red light.
So I have been advocating in this place for improvements to road safety infrastructure right around this state, particularly at school crossings. I am pleased that these calls have been heeded by the minister for road safety, in particular the announcement of a package for road safety funding near schools, as well as the consideration of something that I have been advocating for for a couple of years now, which is the consideration of 40 km/h speed limits at schools on main roads.
Of course, we all know that there are 25 km/h school zones in most side streets, but it is an unusual thing indeed, if we are hurtling down Kensington Road in my electorate or if we are hurtling down Portrush Road in my electorate past a whole number of schools, whether it be Seymour College, Loreto College or Linden Park Primary—and the school crossing there was found last year to be the most dangerous in the entire state—that there is really no warning that you are approaching a school zone or a school crossing, and there is certainly no change in speed limits.
So I am pleased to see in this budget the announcement that there will be a school crossings package, and that will include the rollout of 40 km/h school zones on main roads near some priority schools. That is the big question I now have for the minister: where are these priority locations for the rollout of 40 km/h school zones and improved school crossing packages? I have a long list in the eastern suburbs that I urge him to turn his mind to. That is something I am going to continue to pursue not only as the local member for Bragg and representing schools like Marryatville, Glenunga, Seymour, St Peter's Girls' and Loreto, and primary schools like Linden Park, Burnside and Rose Park, but also now in my new capacity as the shadow minister for road safety. It is something that I look forward to working with the government on.
The other aspect in the budget that I look forward to working with the government on from a local perspective is around the apparent crackdown on illegal vaping and tobacco stores. Again, it is something that I have been bringing to the attention of this house for certainly over a year now. I see now again that those calls have been heeded, and I am pleased that we could secure $16 million of funding to counter the illegal trade of tobacco and vaping. This is a phenomenon we unfortunately see growing right across the state and, concerningly, perhaps see growing in my own electorate.
I think it is particularly concerning when we see a lot of these stores opening up near schools and targeting schoolchildren with particular flavours of vapes or whatever it might be. So I am pleased to see the $16 million of funding to Consumer and Business Services to fund the enforcement of our laws, because I do not really like vape and tobacco stores being anywhere near schools, but I certainly do not like illegal vape and tobacco stores being near our schools.
I have written to the minister again just recently about stores that we have seen opened in Stonyfell near St Peter's Girls' School and also in Marryatville near Marryatville High School and Marryatville Primary School. There is also a store on Glynburn Road that I have identified for the minister. If Consumer and Business Services are looking for ways to spend their $16 million enforcement fund, come and have a look in the eastern suburbs, because we do need to crack down on illegal vaping and tobacco stores in our local community. It is an area of huge concern to my constituents.
There are three other local issues I want to touch on that we explored in the estimates process through various committees, and unfortunately it is not such happy news. It is happy news on the road safety front, happy news on the tobacco and vaping front, but there are three things that I thought were missing for the people of the eastern suburbs in this budget. The first is something that I have spoken about many times in this place before. It is the need to get trucks and heavy vehicles off our local roads, including in particular Portrush Road in my electorate but also Glen Osmond in my electorate.
We know that there are thousands of trucks coming down the South Eastern Freeway every single year. They spew out onto our local roads, whether it be Portrush Road running through my electorate and the member for Dunstan's electorate, Glen Osmond Road running through my electorate and the member for Unley's electorate, or Cross Road running through a whole range of electorates, mainly on the other side of the house. I am surprised I do not see the same advocacy from that side of the house for a solution to this problem because it is not only a traffic congestion issue but, again, it is a road safety issue.
I think it is devastating that we only ever seem to talk about this issue when there is some spectacular or tragic accident, often at the bottom of the freeway. We have seen it time and time again. We saw it very soon after I became the local member when there was a huge crash involving buses and trucks and about half a dozen cars, I think. I understand it was about the fifth major accident at that intersection within the last decade. What are we waiting for? Do we need to see another tragic accident before we turn our minds to this issue again? Let's not wait for the next accident before taking action on this issue.
There is a solution in the form of a Greater Adelaide Freight Bypass. This is something we have talked about for a very long time in this parliament and others have spoken about it in previous parliaments. But for the first time, in the previous government, there was actually some money on the table to start this project with the Truro freight route, which I saw as not only a really important project in and of itself but also a really important first step in a wider greater Adelaide freight network that would get trucks off of our local roads.
That funding has been cruelly ripped away by Labor governments at both state and federal levels. As long as there is no Truro freight route, we are not going to see a Greater Adelaide Freight Bypass and we are not going to see trucks being taken off of our local roads. It is something I will continue to advocate for constantly in this place until we do get trucks off of our local roads.
The second disappointment from a local perspective for me in this budget was the lack of investment in schooling capacity in the eastern suburbs. We have a problem in the eastern suburbs. It is a good problem to have in the sense that our schools are really good; in fact, they are the best, but they are so good that they are bursting at the seams. We have Glenunga International High School as well as Marryatville High School. Both are subject, I think, to capacity management plans and both are over capacity at the moment.
The picture is no better for our local primary schools, being Rose Park Primary, Burnside Primary and Linden Park Primary as well. Nearly all of them are subject to capacity management plans. I am helping, I think, about a dozen constituents at the moment who are trying to get into Glenunga International High School who live in the suburb of Glenunga. One of them lives basically opposite the school and is being sent to a different school much further away because our local schools are full. We need investment in schooling capacity in the eastern suburbs because local kids deserve to be able to go to local schools.
I think it is really concerning that we see this pressure on our local schools now, before we have even had a big influx of urban infill that is being proposed by the Labor government. The third thing that we considered, particularly with the planning minister, through this estimates process was his plan to increase urban infill in the eastern suburbs and his plan to build, or at least initiate a proposal to build, 20-storey towers in my electorate. I have spoken about that proposal before. At the moment, the proposal that is on the table is to change a medium-density development in Glenside, at the corner of Fullarton and Greenhill roads, into a very high-density development and a very high-rise development, changing eight-storey towers into 20-storey towers.
There has been a lot of concern in my local community about that proposal. The concerns fall into two main themes. One is that this is really bad planning, and it is bad planning because it is not the plan. The plan was a series of eight-storey towers. That was going to add 1,000 new dwellings to that local area in Glenside, a huge contribution to housing supply. Many people have bought in good faith on the basis of that plan.
Once those thousand dwellings have been sold, what is now trying to occur is to fundamentally change the plan on these people. They bought into a development where there were going to be eight-storey towers and now the very same developer is changing it on them to 20-storey towers. Some of these people only bought in as recently as the start of this year on the basis of a really different plan. There are a lot of constituents who feel like they have been the victim of a bit of a bait and switch here. They have been led to believe one thing and they are going to end up with another.
The broader concern is that this whole proposal is happening without any reference to investment in public infrastructure in the eastern suburbs. I have already spoken about road infrastructure in the course of this contribution. I have already spoken about schooling capacity in the course of this contribution. There is also concern about open space, about sewerage and about car parking. All of it is happening divorced from discussion about public infrastructure to support high-density, high-rise and unrestrained urban infill, which seems to be the policy of this Labor government, and it is a really concerning thing for my constituents.
That is going to go through a code amendment process now. The minister did not seem too interested in talking about it during the estimates process, which is surprising given the whole thing was announced with a great big front-page story of him smiling in front of what are going to be his new 20-storey towers. I respect his decision because he says, 'I am the sole decision-maker, so I need to make my decision in due course.'
What I say is that we all know he is the sole decision-maker. We are all going to remember the decision that he has made, and it is now up to him to determine whether it is Labor Party policy to build 20-storey towers in the eastern suburbs. The first of them is proposed in Glenside. Perhaps the second will be in Kent Town, in Norwood or along The Parade. Is this Labor Party policy to build 20-storey towers in our eastern suburbs?
With the time I have left, I want to touch on a couple of portfolio areas from the committee process that I took a particular interest in. The first was the environmental portfolio. It was an honour to serve very briefly as the acting shadow minister for the environment, and it was an honour during that time to be able to celebrate not only what I see as one of South Australia's greatest assets, being our natural environment and our built heritage, but also the very strong record of particularly the previous Liberal government in this space: our record investment in national parks, our record expansion of national parks, a huge increase in park rangers.
They were very significant reforms. There was single-use plastics reform, the latest stage of which we see rolling out just this week. These are really important practical and sensible environmental initiatives that were spearheaded by the previous Liberal government. I am pleased, and I am going to continue, to take a very active interest in this area throughout my time in this parliament.
Over the past couple of years it has been a pleasure to continue that tradition of the Liberal Party taking sensible and practical action to protect the natural environment, to try to get away from simple virtue signalling, which I think is the easy way out for those on the other side of the house, and take actual practical action to protect the environment. We saw that perhaps most recently in work that the Liberal opposition led around our Adelaide Parklands, protecting and preserving our Adelaide Parklands as the great asset that they are, as well as our work around tree canopy that we have been advocating for on this side of the house and also our work around our heritage laws.
One of the first things I did when I was the shadow assistant minister for heritage was come up with a plan about saving our suburbs, protecting our heritage homes, preserving our heritage buildings and, indeed, growing our important tree canopy as well. I am going to continue to take a very active interest in that portfolio to celebrate our natural environment to protect and preserve what makes our state so great.
I have also had the opportunity now, as the new shadow minister for police, corrections and community safety, to reflect on the estimates process that has taken place before the time of my appointment. What became really quite apparent through reading that is that crime is skyrocketing under Malinauskas Labor. Indeed, since the election there have been really disturbing increases in crime in this state right across the board. There are some really startling figures, with shop theft being up 51 per cent since the election of this government, assault on police up 48 per cent, robbery up 26 per cent, homicide up 25 per cent, and sexual assault up 12 per cent since the election of this Labor government.
My starting position as a very new shadow minister is that South Australians deserve to feel safe. They deserve to feel safe in their homes, they deserve to feel safe in our suburbs and on our streets. Indeed, I think it is the core business of government to keep South Australians safe. That is never going to happen unless this government acts to appropriately resource, recruit and retain our police officers, because one very disturbing fact that emerged from the estimates committees is just how under-resourced South Australia Police is. Indeed, we have a shortfall of nearly 200 officers currently in South Australia Police, and what the estimates process revealed was that current recruitment strategies are only yielding, net, about 16 officers a year.
So the recruitment strategy is not really working and, importantly, the retention strategy is not really working. It seems just as we have a new recruit enter the door through the front we have a really experienced officer exiting the back door, for a gain of 16 net per year. At that rate, it is going to take about a decade, on this government's current plan, just to get up to that base level that is required for police officers.
So I say we need more cops on the beat to deter crime. The crime wave is really concerning and it is going to keep happening unless we retain, recruit and resource South Australia Police. That is something I am going to be really focused on as the new shadow minister for community safety, because South Australians deserve to feel safe in their own homes, safe in our suburbs and safe on our streets.
