Tom Venning (Grey, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

South Australia is a big state, and the electorate of Grey is a very big electorate. It is 910,000 square kilometres, representing an area bigger than New South Wales, and, in that, there is some productive farming land and there is some unproductive farming land. It would make sense for us to preserve our productive farmland. Well, no; the opposite is, indeed, happening. Periurban Adelaide is pushing into the electorate of Grey, and the state government has changed their rules around what is considered agricultural land. The township of Roseworthy once was a small farming community; now it is destined to have around 60,000 to 80,000 people as Adelaide expands. This is prime agricultural land, and it will be for generations and generations to come.

I've had suicidal farmers come to me because of what's happening to their land in this part of South Australia. Why is it that we are building homes on prime agricultural land? If you understand where Adelaide sits in the state of South Australia, there is plenty of unproductive land right near the city. So why are we building homes on productive farming land? Let's have the Gold Coast of South Australia between St Kilda and Port Wakefield. This is unproductive land. We should be developing houses here, not on prime agricultural land.

The same goes with renewable energy zones. Again, we could be building solar panels and wind turbines where we do not have productive farming land. Instead, the Labor state government continually is putting pressure on farming. In South Australia, only seven per cent of land is considered productive, and unfortunately we are turning that into developments.

Volunteer grants are open. Please apply to my office today. We have grants available of $1,000 to $5,000 for community groups in the electorate of Grey. Small communities run on volunteerism. In Bute—as I said in my maiden speech—a township of only 250 people, 34 individuals run the Lions Club. As we know, without volunteers, our communities wouldn't run, whether it is running the school bus, running the canteen, helping the footy club, helping the netball club or, indeed, driving the elderly around to get to their appointments at the nearby hospital or in Adelaide. So please reach out to my office. Volunteer grants are open.

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