Andrew Southcott (Boothby, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I am pleased to have the opportunity to rise on this year's Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2015-16. I wanted to address a couple of subjects during my speech.

The first one I wanted to touch on is Commonwealth funding to South Australia. Residents of Boothby—residents of South Australia—will have seen any number of taxpayer funded ads coming from the South Australian government, and I would like to set the record straight on Commonwealth funding. It is a simple fact that over the next four years the total annual Commonwealth funding to South Australia is increasing by around $2.4 billion including GST. Despite tight budget conditions, the Commonwealth is increasing annual funding to South Australian hospitals by 19 per cent over the next four years on top of growth of 12 per cent in 2014-15. That is a $208 million increase over the next four years. We are also increasing funding to South Australian schools by 26 per cent over the next four years on top of growth of seven per cent in 2014-15. That is an extra $280 million for South Australian schools.

In addition to that extra money for schools and extra money for hospitals, we are investing $2 billion to build the infrastructure of the 21st century for South Australia. That includes $944 million for the upgrade of the north-south road corridor and also $232 million for the Goodwood and Torrens Junction rail upgrades. These are some of the benefits that South Australia is seeing from the budget.

I wanted to speak on a particular local issue because, at the same time that the South Australian government is receiving more money than ever before for their hospitals—they are seeing their hospital funding going up by 19 per cent—the response of the South Australian government has been to close hospitals. This has been particularly felt in my electorate, where they have made a decision to close the iconic Daw Park Repatriation General Hospital. This is a 300-bed local hospital. It employs 1,250 staff. The South Australian government are shutting it down, selling the land, walking away and vacating the site.

Despite what the state government says, everyone knows that this is a cost-cutting exercise. There are currently 300 beds at the Repat. Under the Weatherill government's proposal, when the Repat is closed, 55 rehab beds will be added to the Flinders Medical Centre. So they are taking almost 300 beds out of the southern suburbs. David Pope has said that there are 41 clinical services at Repat and they simply will not all fit into the Flinders Medical Centre.

I will give you an example. We have the National Bowel Cancer Screening Program. It is a very good program, and we would like more people to do it. If you have a positive test, it does require follow-up by colonoscopy. At the moment, the Repat is providing the role of doing the overflow colonoscopies from Flinders Medical Centre. When the Repat is closed, what will happen to that extra work? This is an important part of the follow-up from the National Bowel Cancer Screening Program.

What we see is a net loss of anywhere between 180 and 250 beds, and that is a big drop in the number of beds. The opinion of my electorate has been very clear: they would have preferred to see the hospital upgraded rather than closed. The Australian Medical Association has warned that other hospitals do not have the capacity to absorb the extra workload, because they are already overstretched. When you look at the fact that hospital funding is going up 19 per cent and there has been a 36 per cent increase in GST funding over the next five years, it really does make local residents wonder why the state government has not continued to upgrade the site. Over the last decade, the federal government has given South Australia tens of millions of dollars to fund new facilities at the Repat. For that matter, they have spent some of their own money as well. Most recently the federal government invested $40.3 million to fund 20 brand-new subacute beds at the Repat. These are state-of-the-art facilities. They were only opened last year. The irony is that, within six months of them opening, the Minister for Health announced that the hospital would be closing, and now those beds and that facility will be sold to the highest bidder.

The new fourth-generation rehabilitation clinics, the recent rebuilding of ward 18—these are very modern facilities at the Repat. State Labor continually says that this is an old, run-down facility. That is not true. When you walk through, you are amazed by how good the rehab facilities are. There are old buildings there, and many of them are used for office space, not for clinical work.

Last year, the Repat provided more than 136,000 outpatient consultations across a broad range of specialist clinics. The clinics treat conditions like heart disease, sleep disorder and arthritis. That equates to more than 2,600 South Australians getting help as a Repat outpatient every week. Also last year, a quarter of all orthopaedic and neurological elective surgery performed in Adelaide was done at the Repat. It also plays a very important role, as I said before, in those overflow colonoscopies from Flinders, which is a critical step in the National Bowel Cancer Screening Program.

Not only has the Commonwealth government spent tens of millions of dollars at the site; but Flinders University has as well. One of the frustrating things about this closure has been that all the partners—the Commonwealth government, Flinders University—have been investing significant money at this site. The Repat is a major site for clinical placements for Flinders University students. Something like 60 per cent of health science students at Flinders University will rotate through the Repat. Flinders University researchers based at the Repat have attracted more than $75 million in research funding.to South Australia.

I could go on and on about this, but it is very clear that this is one case where the state government is not interested in the opinion of the local community. I have had listening posts, we have done surveys and we have run petitions, and it is very clear that my constituents do not want to see the Repat close. More than 80,000 people have signed a petition calling on state Labor to keep the Repat open.

As I said before, the Repat has seen many upgrades over the last decade, and everyone else had been working on the basis that we would continue those upgrades rather than shut down such an important part of our health system.

I next want to turn to one of my pet projects, which is the Darlington upgrade. I have had a longstanding interest in the upgrade of South Road and particularly in the upgrade at Darlington. I first started lobbying for funding for this eight years ago during the Howard government. It was an idea that was originally proposed by the major motoring organisation of South Australia, the RAA.

The government is strongly committed to the north-south corridor, and we are giving the South Australian government $162 million over the next year to get construction moving on this important project, including $82 million for the Darlington upgrade.

The Darlington upgrade—and the north-south corridor more generally—is a great example of what can be achieved when the state government works with the federal government. We see the South Australia Minister for Transport and Infrastructure, Stephen Mullighan, working with the federal government, with Assistant Minister Briggs, instead of constantly picking fights with us, as some of his colleagues like to do.

In that plan, what has happened is that a good plan has been improved—through consultation and through the expert advice from traffic engineers—for the same investment. The previous design only gave motorists coming off the Southern Expressway access to the non-stop motorway, but this new design allows motorists coming from Flagstaff Road and Main South Road to also access the motorway and avoid three sets of traffic lights. That involves something like 15,000 commuters every day. So I welcome that revision to the plans.

For my electorate, this means that constituents living in Aberfoyle Park, Flagstaff Hill or anyone who uses Flagstaff Road will see a much improved and smoother commute, whether they are going into the CBD or even if they are just going to the inner southern suburbs.

The government has a strong commitment to the north-south corridor and the $620 million Darlington project in particular—to the extent that we have funded 80 per cent of this cost, or $496 million. Normally, we would expect a 50-50 split with state governments. But, even though we had to drag the South Australian Premier and the South Australian Treasurer kicking and screaming into this project, we did; because we deliver on our election promises, and our election promise was very clear in 2013. We were committed to the Darlington upgrade.

Contrast that with the previous government. They had been promising to upgrade Darlington since 2007. They promised it in 2010 and they never delivered. This is an important investment in South Australian jobs and economic growth. It will support about 370 jobs a year during construction. It will reduce travel times and it will boost freight efficiency. We expect some further announcements coming up over the next month or two. A shortlist of tenderers will be announced and a major contract will be awarded later this year. Major works are expected to commence by the end of the year, with construction to be completed by the end of 2018.

They are some of the important projects that are being delivered in the electorate of Boothby. I commend the Treasurer on a very sensible budget. This budget has a focus on small business, on families and on really supporting pensioners. I think it is very telling that the opposition attack on the budget faltered after a few days; they have already moved on to other issues.

The support for small business has been very well received in my electorate. I had Bruce Billson visit, and we were able to talk with small businesses at the Marion Shopping Centre. We found a high level of awareness about the changes, specifically the accelerated depreciation change and the five per cent reduction in taxation up to $1,000.

Similarly in child care, we reformed the delivery of child care so that now there will be a childcare subsidy which will cover, for lower income families, 85 per cent of the cost of childcare, tapering down to 50 per cent on higher income families. This budget is good for small business. It is good for families, and ultimately it will be good for jobs.

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