Rod Sawford (Port Adelaide, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My grievance is water or, more to the point, the lack of it. We live in the driest continent on earth. I live in South Australia, the driest state in the driest continent on earth. You cannot build a strong house without a strong foundation. You cannot have a civil society without the rule of law. You cannot grow an economy if there are limits on the use of water. Yet over the last 30 years lack of effort by governments—federal, state and local—to plan for the conservation of water coupled with irresponsible urban development and doubtful agricultural practices have led us to the sorry state we are in today. Our premier city, Sydney, is an appalling example. For the last 30 years as far as water conservation is concerned state governments of both persuasions have been negligent. Local government authorities choosing revenue and remuneration for their executives have relinquished responsibility for future citizens’ rights by their capitulation to ruthless developers.

The consequence of this evasion of responsibility is that Sydneysiders have been reduced to the appalling situation of having to hand water gardens twice a week. The consequence of this evasion of responsibility is the reality, despite its temporary shelving, that Sydney will have a major desalination plant with all its associated problems. The consequence of this evasion of responsibility is the loss of billions of litres of stormwater to the sea and rivers with little or no open space to build stormwater retention schemes or set up wetlands and little ability to make use of deep-well technology. The consequence of this evasion of responsibility will be an over-reliance on underground water in normal rather than drought years without the benefit of replenishment of water other than from natural sources.

The situation is replicated in Melbourne, Canberra, Perth and Adelaide and in many regional areas. There is an answer, and that answer is stormwater and wastewater conservation and retention, the setting up of wetlands to feed the aquifer and the use of deep-well technology. The fact that in parts of provincial Australia we produce rice and cotton in the wasteful way we do is unforgivable. However, I will deal with that debate at another time. My state of South Australia is probably the national leader in stormwater retention and deep-well technology. The example set by world expert Colin Pitman and the City of Salisbury, which is partly in my electorate, is outstanding. However, other examples do not go far enough and there are few converts in other local municipalities. Some municipalities could be described as just negligent and a poor copy of their Sydney peers, choosing the rate revenue and remuneration of CEOs option at the expense of the future.

The Sydney style developers are moving into Adelaide and its metropolitan areas, which is extremely worrying. That it could be further exacerbated by state and federal governments turning a blind eye to those happenings, as New South Wales governments and other state governments have done during the last 30 years, should be a great worry. In particular, I speak of the last piece of open space in the western suburbs of Adelaide, other than the Adelaide airport—and that is the Cheltenham Racecourse, the old Actil site, the St Clair Centre and the surrounding parklands. This major area, of 46 hectares, includes the Cheltenham Racecourse, which has accommodated horseracing for well over 100 years. It is without doubt the best wet-weather horseracing track in Australia. Until the late 1970s and early 1980s horseracing was conducted very successfully by the Port Adelaide Racing Club, largely under the chairmanship of a great South Australian, Wyndham Hill Smith. The Port Adelaide Racing Club at the time and through the leadership of Wyndham Hill Smith had a very healthy relationship with the then local municipality, the Woodville Council. In return for subsidised rates, the council and the racing club agreed to preserve the open space that was Cheltenham and its surrounds.

For 1961 that was an extremely far-sighted and enlightened decision. Since European settlement the area surrounding the racecourse has been extremely susceptible to flooding. However, wisely, the council had acknowledged that the area was far more important than just a race club. It helped reduce urban pollution. It would, at some time in the future when money became available, be a space where flood avoidance measures and stormwater retention could be carried out.

As I said, for 1961 those decisions were extremely wise and enlightened. They remain wise today. However, there is no doubt that they are currently seriously under attack. The South Australian Jockey Club, which administers Cheltenham, seems to be one of the most poorly managed organisations in South Australia. Nothing whatsoever appears to sustain them. Huge tracts of land at Cheltenham and Morphettville—that is, the other main course—have been sold. The state’s TAB was sold. The club has a licence for 80 poker machines. Nothing seems to work. The club now wants to sell one of its two major assets to—wait for it—Sydney style developers for a most unneeded housing and retail development in order to invest in another racetrack, Victoria Park, which it will never own. At the same time as this is being planned, a $1 billion urban regeneration project is taking place in Port Adelaide. How welcome that is. But a housing and retail development being built concurrently five or six kilometres down the road at Cheltenham-Woodville cannot be sustained. Recently, the state government in South Australia put in an administrator to run the poorly managed sport of basketball in South Australia. It was a good decision. It was a good thing to do. It ought to do the same thing with the South Australian Jockey Club.

But it is not just horseracing that is at stake. The flood risk is extremely high and even small rainfall floods roads, businesses and houses on a regular basis. A big flood is regarded as inevitable. It would affect 7,400 individuals, 6,000 homes and hundreds of businesses and it would put the Queen Elizabeth Hospital—that is, the major public hospital in the west—at risk and out of action. These statistics were not made up. They were published in an article in the Adelaide Advertiser in December last year. Were they disputed? No. In exactly the same article those facts were also acknowledged by the current CEO of the Charles Sturt council, Peter Lockett, and the current mayor, Harold Anderson. ‘So far so good,’ one might think. In addition, on the books of the Charles Sturt council is a motion opposing the sale of the Cheltenham racecourse. ‘Even better,’ one might add.

Yet not everything is as it appears. At the same time as all of this is happening, there are some very smart and clever brochures going out proposing development of the whole area under the imprimatur of the council, which seems to suggest very strong support for the sale. The following, you would simply say, also supports that contention. My branch members were so worried that the secretary of my branch, Pat Perry, wrote to all the Charles Sturt councillors asking them if they would publicly oppose the sale of Cheltenham racecourse. Not a big ask, you would have thought, with a motion opposing the sale already on the books. Surprise, surprise! Only one councillor out of 21 responded and that was the councillor for Cheltenham, Robert Grant. Everyone else appears to have run for cover. The obvious question to ask is: why? Is there something they are not telling anyone? Is there something they know that residents do not? That is certainly looking a very strong possibility indeed.

The sale of Cheltenham and its surrounding area is an environmental disaster just waiting to happen. There is agreement that the inevitable big flood will occur, and when it does it will cost hundreds of millions of dollars in future compensation at the very least. In fact, damage could exceed $1 billion. The state government and the Charles Sturt council must be aware of this huge risk. Ignorance could not and would not be an excuse. They have to know the risk. Replicating the negligence of their peers in Sydney, Melbourne, Perth and Canberra to flood avoidance and stormwater retention is not acceptable in Adelaide when all the facts to be known are in fact known. There will be no excuse whatsoever. As with the lack of due diligence with the State Bank of South Australia, there will be a huge cost unnecessarily burdened on the citizens of South Australia. The credibility of the participants in their projected folly will be permanently trashed, just as occurred with the State Bank. That is a future scenario that should not be foisted upon the people of South Australia. That, in conclusion, is a future scenario that should be rigorously avoided by the state government and the Charles Sturt council. Time will tell, but I think that time is fast running out.