Kate Ellis (Adelaide, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Early Childhood and Childcare) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Deputy Speaker, if you were to travel through Adelaide at the moment you would see a skyline scattered with cranes. You would see record investment in infrastructure and in upgrades. You would see Adelaide Oval about to become an even better modern sporting facility. You would see the $200 million federal investment in building the SAHMRI building, the South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute. You would see that there is so much happening, and we are proud that we are quite literally building Adelaide.

But we know it is not just about buildings, institutions and sporting facilities. I hear regularly from residents in Adelaide about the quality of roads and the need for upgrades to some critical pieces of road infrastructure, which is one of the reasons I was so proud of our recent budget announcing that this government would deliver $448 million to upgrade South Road in between the Torrens River and the River Torrens in collaboration with the South Australian government. I know that this project is the No. 1 priority for people in this part of the community that I represent. In fact, in over 16 street-corner meetings in that particular area of Adelaide just this year, this is an issue that came up time and time again. I advocated on behalf of the community and I am incredibly proud that we are delivering on this result.

This is about local residents getting to spend more time with their families; spending more time productively, less time stuck in traffic and less time in gridlock, particularly amongst heavy commercial traffic. The upgrade to South Road will see two major intersections removed, at Port Road and at Grange Road, which will ease congestion and move us further in our plan to have a non-stop South Road. This is a project which would be jeopardised and on the cutting room floor should there be a change of government on 14 September. Both the member for Boothby and that Leader of the Opposition have confirmed that they will scrap this project which is of utmost importance to the community that I represent.

But this is not the only road upgrade which Labor is committing to. I was incredibly pleased to see, this week and earlier this morning, announcements from the South Australian budget of $3.2 million to upgrade the Britannia roundabout, something that I have been a passionate advocate of for nine years now. I have met many times with the state government and written many times of behalf of the local community. As someone who used to live near the roundabout I know that some people are very confident and some people will go a long way out of their way to avoid going round it. I am also pleased to this morning see an announcement of $7.7 million to upgrade North East Road at Gilles Plains. Labor is building Adelaide and we are very proud of what we are doing for our road infrastructure.