Rowan Ramsey (Grey, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

To go on from where I left off: the government has also committed to a $20 million jobs, infrastructure and training package for the Upper Spencer Gulf. At the same time, we have committed to a long-term naval shipbuilding industry based in Adelaide, and this will present a huge range of opportunities to the Whyalla works over the extended period. These commitments have helped make the Whyalla assets more marketable, and the administrators, Korda Mentha, have been working hard to bring about a sale to somebody who wants to keep the assets producing and is prepared to invest to bring the plant up to world's best practice. It has also not gone unnoticed that the workers in the steel plant in Whyalla have after reconsideration agreed to accept a 10 per cent wage cut.

I pay tribute here to Minister for Industry, Innovation and Science Greg Hunt, who has made the future of Whyalla his No. 1 priority from the day he was promoted to the position just after the election. He has visited Whyalla, talked regularly with the SA state government and, importantly, provided a letter of comfort to any potential new buyers, setting out the areas in which the federal government may be able to provide further assistance.

I was very pleased three weeks ago, I think it was now—perhaps it was two—when the minister rang me from a train in Korea to report on the very positive meeting he had held earlier in the day with POSCO. The great news, of course, is that, while there has been some excitement about POSCO's interest, they are not the only parties that see value in Arrium's assets. Last Friday I had the privilege of meeting with Sanjeev Gupta, from Liberty House Group, who was visiting Whyalla on the Saturday. I met with him in Adelaide on the Friday night to discuss the possibility of Liberty House becoming an investor in the Whyalla and Arrium operation more widely. Let me say about the company Liberty House that they have a long track record—over 20 years—of investing in steel production plants that have been run down or gone broke, reinvesting, reinvigorating their management structures and making a success out of those particular business. Over that time, they have not sold any businesses; they have kept them all going. That is the kind of positive news that we need along with POSCO's genuine interest. I expect at least another two prospective buyers to come to Whyalla over the next few weeks to have a look at what is on offer there.

All in all, I feel very confident about the future, but we cannot stop, and nothing is delivered until the ink is dry.

On other fronts, I believe the government is making great strides as well. Only three weeks ago I opened the new Port Augusta drug and alcohol treatment centre, a never-delivered dream from the Rudd-Gillard years that Liberal Party commitment delivered well within the time frames of its first term in office. I also attended and opened the Lucky Bay Harbour extension, and am looking forward to the establishment of a grain export facility there.

The last two rounds of the Stronger Regions grants have been very generous to Grey, and even though we can always find new projects within our community that we would like to get off the ground with a little assistance, I am very pleased with those results. The last around saw an allocation of almost $9 million to the Peterborough community, a town with the lowest socioeconomic outcomes in the electorate of Grey. The town has relied on a septic tank and soakage systems in the past. The infrastructure is old and crumbling, and I have been very concerned about the health risk that has been escalating.

Further south, the Gulf St Vincent community was thrilled to learn of the Commonwealth's commitment of $1 million towards a $3 million project to build a new artificial reef, and that investment is enough to tip the balance and bring that project forward. Certainly the declarations of 19 near-coast marine parks by the state government—virtually all in the waters adjacent to the electorate of Grey—have caused great concern to the commercial and recreational fishers alike, and there will be a need to further invest in projects which will expand the biomass.

In the earlier rounds of the Stronger Regions grants, $5 million was allocated towards the Port Pirie sporting precinct, and I saw the finished plan just the other day. Almost $5 million was allocated to refurbish the Copper Coast sporting complex, $1 million to the Barunga nursing home at Port Broughton, and almost $5 million for a fish unloader at Thevenard.

In other action, ARENA has backed the establishment of a $20 million solar-wind project with batteries and diesel backup at Coober Pedy. Coober Pedy—I have told the House on many occasions—has an off-grid electrical system and so, of course, anything that can provide sustainable, long-term electricity becomes much more viable in a place like Coober Pedy. I think this should be a good project for the future of the town even though there are some issues around pricing would which are still causing some concern in the community.

I look forward to the construction of the passing lanes between Port Augusta and Whyalla, with the federal government contributing 80 per cent of the construction costs. At the moment, the program is in the hands of the state government and I am very hopeful—indeed, quite anxious—that they will start soon, but I can assure the electorate that the funding is locked in. To the north of the state, the Commonwealth is investing $85 million bringing the main road accessing the APY Lands to first-class standard.

This list is by no means exhaustive, but it demonstrates that the seat of Grey is attracting the kind of support that we need to lift our economic performance to the top shelf. In fact, I would go so far as to say that South Australia desperately needs Grey to lead it out of its economic doldrums. While economic opportunities arise all around the electorate in the form of agriculture, resources, fishing, aquaculture and tourism, there is a significant shadow hanging over all of South Australia—that is, the penalties that are now being inflicted upon our economy by electricity prices.

Since the closure of the coal-fired power station at Port Augusta in May, the South Australian wholesale price for electricity has doubled. Unfortunately, this outcome was predictable, perhaps even inevitable, because of the rush in South Australia to renewable electricity without the accompanying planning and strategic investment to ensure that the state had a base-load capacity of around 25 per cent of the grid demand. There is no greater supporter of renewable energy than me but, in this, the transition period, it is important that as well as delivering renewable electricity, it is also reliable and competitive. In South Australia, unfortunately, it is neither. I have been saying for quite some time that if South Australia is to pursue a fast transition to renewable electricity, it must be accompanied by appropriate amounts of storage—in other words, capable of providing base-load electricity. On that basis, I say there should be no new renewable projects approved in South Australia unless they have storage.

It is a great concern to me that the state government pays no heed to these calls and continues to approve new wind farm developments in our state without insisting on that storage—it is just so important that we get this right. There are some very significant lessons to be learned for the rest of the world and for the rest of Australia from what has happened in South Australia. It is causing great anxiety amongst our business community, our large consumers—those people that actually employ people in their economy at the moment. It is, I think, the No. 1 issue facing our state at the moment. We need some quick traction on some possible solutions. At this stage, it seems unlikely that the coal-fired power station will be fired up again even temporarily, but it is very important that somebody, some organisation—and I suggest that could be led by the state government—should place a long-term order for electricity with some of the generators that have spare capacity in their gas turbines. This, in turn, would enable those generators to actually go into the gas market and tie up those long-term gas supply contracts, which they need to be able to substantiate that supply. It is a bit of a chicken and egg situation, but it is really the most important economic issue facing South Australia at the moment.

We cannot afford to have the most expensive electricity in the world. Quite simply, we need to compete not only with overseas products; we also need to compete with the eastern states. There are those who speak of building a new interconnector through to New South Wales. I understand how this might alleviate the problem, but it does actually beg the question, then, that if we have moved in South Australia to support renewable energy in order to shut down our CO2 emissions, to shut down our coal-fired power station, that at the first sign of difficulty of power supply we would build a billion-dollar interconnector to New South Wales so that we could access their coal-fired power stations. It does seem to be something of an anomaly—one of those things that was not clearly thought out before.

I suspect that the answer lies within South Australia, and we need to support that generation capacity that can provide base-load electricity. That can be renewable, but it can also be gas. That is the task that is in front of us now. But overall, I must say that I am very pleased with the government's efforts within my electorate. Certainly my No.1 issue, like Greg Hunt's, is the sale of Arrium and I apply myself to that virtually every day in this job. I believe we will get there and then, of course, we need to fix these electricity issues in South Australia. Thank you very much.

See this speech in context