Andrew Southcott (Boothby, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Primary Healthcare) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would like to speak about South Road. From the entrance of the Southern Expressway to Sturt Road is only a short distance. It would only be one kilometre of the 22-kilometre stretch of South Road from Darlington to Winfield which I would like to one day see as a non-stop expressway, and yet it is one of the major bottlenecks on South Road. Every commuter from the southern suburbs would use this stretch of road, even those who do not use the Southern Expressway but come from Happy Valley, Aberfoyle Park and Flagstaff Hill travel this road. For such a small part of the road it has attracted an enormous number of commitments, promises and announcements from the state and federal governments. I have tallied at least 10 commitments and announcements from state and federal governments going back to 2006 about planned work on this stretch of road, and after 5½ years nothing has happened. The Department of Transport, Energy and Infrastructure has an animation of light rail running up to the front door of Flinders Medical Centre and car park 1 of Flinders University. It looks great, but is totally unfunded and will not be delivered by the South Australian government.

The latest broken promise from the South Australian government involves switching a promised $75 million interchange with a pre-existing traffic light. What was to be a fully funded infrastructure development has now been cancelled. The excuses which have been offered by the state government and by their minister, Pat Conlan, are laughable. They hope for federal funding. Apparently it is due to the GFC, the floods in Queensland or the dog ate it, but here briefly are some facts. Firstly, the federal government has provided $500 million to the SA government for South Road, including this stretch of South Road. That money has been spent elsewhere. That was the state government's decision—it was Pat Conlan's decision—and they knew this when they promised this interchange 18 months ago.

Secondly, what the state government also would have known is that federal money comes in five-year cycles. The next major funding cycle will not arrive until after the 2014 state election, and Pat Conlan and the state government knew this 18 months ago as well.

Thirdly, what they said at the time was that the interchange between South Road and the Southern Expressway is fully funded by them and does not rely on Commonwealth funding. Pat Conlan and the state government are damned by their own words, and he has been caught out. After nine years of cynical spin the public now cannot believe any of their promises.