Parliamentary Debates (HANSARD)
THIRTY-NINTH PARLIAMENT FIRST SESSION 2014
LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY
Thursday, 23 October 2014
Legislative Assembly
Thursday, 23 October 2014
THE SPEAKER (Mr M.W. Sutherland) took the chair at 9.00 am, and read prayers. LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY DAILY PROGRAM — CORRECTION Statement by Speaker THE SPEAKER (Mr M.W. Sutherland): Before we start, I want to tell members that there is a typo on the pink slip. Question time will be from 2.00 pm to 3.00 pm, so there is no need for undue concern. PAPERS TABLED Papers were tabled and ordered to lie upon the table of the house. WORLD WAR ONE — 100TH ANNIVERSARY — ALBANY AND FREMANTLE COMMEMORATION Statement by Premier MR C.J. BARNETT (Cottesloe — Premier) [9.02 am]: I rise to inform the house that in just over a week, Albany and Fremantle will come into the national and international spotlight when we pause to mark the 100th anniversary of the departure of the first convoy of ships that carried the Australian Imperial Force and the New Zealand Expeditionary Force to the First World War. One hundred years ago, more than 40 000 men and women from Australia and New Zealand were about to set sail from Albany and Fremantle for the battlefields of the First World War. These men and women would take their place in history and become known as the Anzacs. Almost all Australian and New Zealand troops who departed for Egypt, and then Turkey, in 1914 left from Albany. The Western Australian contingent left from Fremantle after training at Blackboy Hill near Midland. They included the men of the 11th Battalion, which was the first battalion to be raised in Western Australia and among the first ashore on 25 April 1915 at Anzac Cove. For many, it would be the last time they would see Australia, with one-third of the men being killed during the war. The experiences encountered on those battlefields shaped the two young nations they left behind and have left a legacy of national characteristics, such as courage, dedication to duty, humour and mateship. Over the next four years, the Anzac Centenary will commemorate those men and women, and the eyes of the nation will shortly turn west and focus on the historic port cities of Albany and Fremantle. The state government has worked closely with the Western Australian branch of the Returned and Services League of Australia, the commonwealth government, the Cities of Albany and Fremantle and the Shire of Mundaring on a program of events to appropriately commemorate the departures. From 30 October to 2 November, we will commemorate the 100th anniversary of the departure of the first convoy of ships with a series of activities in Albany, Blackboy Hill and Fremantle. These events will mark the national launch of the Anzac Centenary, which will be commemorated between 2014 and 2018. The state government is funding a series of events to mark the departure, including a community event at Greenmount Primary School, the site of the Blackboy Hill training ground; overnight cadet bivouac; a departure service at Blackboy Hill; a heritage train journey from Blackboy Hill to Fremantle; and a commemorative service in Fremantle. Tens of thousands of visitors are expected to make the journey to Albany to experience and participate in events, including a troop march, a commemorative service, a symbolic departure of naval ships and supporting community events, including a free concert with the West Australian Symphony Orchestra. The state government has committed more than $9 million towards Anzac Centenary infrastructure initiatives in Albany. A significant component of this allocation is the upgrade to the Padre White Lookout, the Desert Mounted Corps Memorial on Mt Clarence and the National Anzac Centre funded by both the commonwealth and state governments. The National Anzac Centre will officially open on 1 November 2014 as part of the commemorations. It is envisaged that Albany will become a place of pilgrimage for people wishing to commemorate those who died in the First World War for many years to come. It is my sincere hope that the upcoming Albany commemorations will prompt our community to learn more about Australia’s military history and the courage of those who have served this country in times of conflict. ROAD SAFETY — SPEED MONITORING SURVEYS Statement by Acting Minister for Road Safety MR J.H.D. DAY (Kalamunda — Acting Minister for Road Safety) [9.05 am]: To monitor the effectiveness of the government’s efforts to reduce excessive speed–related road trauma, speed monitoring surveys have been conducted by Main Roads WA on an annual or biennial basis since 2000. Main Roads has completed 2013 speed surveys for the Perth metropolitan and Western Australian regional road networks. The 2013 compliance survey
[ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] 7865 has shown some encouraging results, with the highest ever metropolitan compliance rate of approximately 64.3 per cent, which is 11.3 per cent higher than in the baseline speed survey from 2000. There has been a two per cent increase in compliance on rural roads from the previous year, which was 10.2 per cent higher than the 2000 survey. Interestingly, the survey found that the greatest compliance with speed limits in metropolitan Perth occurs between Mondays and Wednesdays, falling on Thursdays and Fridays, with a significant reduction in compliance on Saturdays and Sundays. In country regions, the best compliance occurs between Tuesdays and Fridays; however, there is no significant reduction in compliance on the weekend. There is no doubt the improved behaviour can be attributed, in part, to the Liberal–National government’s $24.5 million enhanced speed enforcement program. The program, which commenced in 2010, included the introduction of speed and red-light intersection cameras in Western Australia. Located at 30 sites, the intersection cameras have resulted in a 60 per cent reduction of serious injury crashes at the intersections at which they have been installed. In addition, mobile vitronic speed cameras are able to measure the speed of up to four different lanes of traffic concurrently, significantly increasing the efficiency of mobile deployment. The enhanced program has directly led to a significant increase in the number of drivers monitored for speeding over the past five years. For example, in August, more than 4 217 490 vehicles were monitored for speeding. This is more than triple the five-year average for August of 1 370 221 vehicles. Most importantly, the increased compliance is resulting in reduced road trauma. In 2013, Western Australia experienced the lowest number of fatalities in which excessive speed was a factor since records began. Although the results of the 2013 speed monitoring survey are encouraging, it is clear that more needs to be done to ensure that drivers comply with the speed limit and trauma on our roads is reduced. I make the observation that the number of fatalities in the current calendar year has tragically increased, which highlights the point that more needs to be done in this area. CORRECTIVE SERVICES — FOETAL ALCOHOL SPECTRUM DISORDER SCREENING TOOL Statement by Minister for Corrective Services MR J.M. FRANCIS (Jandakot — Minister for Corrective Services) [9.08 am]: Foetal alcohol spectrum disorder, or FASD, is a terrible disorder that can rob young people of their future. FASD is caused by foetal exposure to alcohol. It is a spectrum disorder that can produce a range of symptoms, including behavioural issues, learning problems, physical problems and deformities and intellectual impairment. FASD does not discriminate; indeed, it can affect young people living in the affluent suburbs of Perth just as easily as it can ruin the lives of young people from the most remote parts of our north. Research from Australia and other parts of the world tells us that young people with FASD are much more likely to come into contact with the criminal justice system than are other young people. Once they come into the system, they do not tend to fare well. Young people with FASD often have poor impulse control and short attention spans. They can be hyperactive and frequently suffer from nervousness and anxiety, which means that they are more likely to miss appointments and fail to stick to rehabilitation regimes. Generally, they are also more likely to be led astray. All this adds up to a simple fact; that is, a child with FASD is much less likely to be diverted away from the justice system and is much more likely to end up in detention. We do not know how many young people in the justice system are affected by FASD. Anecdotal estimates put the figure at around 30 per cent, but we do not know for sure because no FASD screening tool is available in Australia. Detailed diagnostic tools are available in Australia, but these require rigorous specialised testing that needs to take place within a medical setting. This sort of testing is neither feasible nor useful in a youth justice setting. A FASD screening tool is needed that can be used by Department of Corrective Services staff to identify FASD in young people as early as possible so that the justice system can deal with them more appropriately. I am pleased to inform the house that a team of researchers from Telethon Kids Institute is undertaking, in partnership with the Department of Corrective Services, to develop a foetal alcohol spectrum disorder screening tool. This screening tool will be unique in that it is being developed specifically for use on the Australian population. The department is finalising the scope of the research, and it is anticipated that a pilot will commence at Banksia Hill Juvenile Detention Centre in February 2015. The Youth Justice Board will be provided with updates as the project progresses. The research is being funded by a grant from the National Health and Medical Research Council. All medical and research ethics requirements have been satisfied. Although community safety will always be paramount, I see no point in simply punishing young people with FASD instead of attempting to identify and treat them. This research marks the beginning of such an approach. ABORIGINAL HERITAGE ACT AMENDMENTS — HERITAGE AND SACRED SITE DECISIONS Grievance MS J. FARRER (Kimberley) [9.11 am]: My grievance is to the minister representing the Minister for Aboriginal Affairs and is in relation to the proposed amendments to the Aboriginal Heritage Act 1972. As an
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Aboriginal person, I am extremely concerned that the proposed changes will mean less involvement by Aboriginal people on crucial decisions relating to heritage. The people of the Kimberley are angered by the proposed changes. This government’s intention is to threaten over 60 000 years of Aboriginal heritage. The significance of Aboriginal heritage is being ignored by this government’s bureaucracy. It is outrageous that a single person, a chief executive officer in the Department of Aboriginal Affairs, will be given total power by this government to make judgement on such significant and cultural issues as heritage and sacred sites. At the stroke of a pen, this CEO will decide whether or not there is an Aboriginal heritage site on a piece of land. Shockingly, there is no requirement for this CEO to be an Aboriginal person or to even have the relevant qualifications in Aboriginal heritage, archaeology or anthropology. The CEO will decide what is included on or axed from the register of Aboriginal sites and objects, and there will be no tribunal or way for Aboriginal people to challenge the decisions of the CEO or minister. The CEO can make declarations of his or her own initiative, without any consultation or advice, and once made they cannot be undone. The minister stated that the changes were needed to keep up with rapid development, but it should not be to the detriment of Aboriginal people. How about the government fast-tracking consent determinations for native title? The government must support Aboriginal people having a voice in decision-making, particularly in matters involving heritage, economic development, mining and construction. Another example of the government’s lack of willingness to support Aboriginal people and engage in meaningful decision-making processes is the government’s recent discontinuation of the state activities funding agreement—SAFA—with the Kimberley Land Council. The agreement, which began in 2012 and had the possibility to remain until 2016, set out an agreed heritage process for ensuring the protection of significant sites and traditional country. The funding agreement established a dedicated KLC team to manage the engagement and consultations with traditional owners regarding all state government future acts, Indigenous land use agreements—pre and post-construction—special projects and Aboriginal heritage matters. It seems the government wants to bypass the KLC and deal directly with prescribed body corporates; that is a ridiculous notion. How will the government be able to effectively engage directly with PBCs without the assistance of the KLC, when not all Aboriginal native title groups have a PBC? Further, the Aboriginal native title groups that have a PBC do not necessarily have an office at all, so there is really nothing in the Kimberley—no phone lines and no staff. Numerous KLC staff are now unemployed because of this government’s mindless decision, and I am very worried about what will become the government’s new method of Aboriginal engagement. As an Aboriginal person, I wholeheartedly agree with my colleague Ben Wyatt, the member for Victoria Park, who said — It is extraordinary that the government’s proposed amendments actually contemplate a reduced involvement for Aboriginal people than the original Act drafted in 1972. The act in its existing form is weak, as we know. It is not effective and fails in protecting Aboriginal heritage. Changes do need to be made—changes to strengthen the act, not weaken it. I will read a few clauses of the draft Aboriginal Heritage Amendment Bill 2014 that are particularly disturbing to me as an Aboriginal person. Clause 18C provides that the CEO can declare that an area of land does not contain any sites of significance for Aboriginal people. The CEO can do that without any referral to or consideration of the views of the traditional owners. That is outrageous and completely diminishes the value of this act as one to protect Aboriginal heritage. The ability for traditional owners to be involved in the scrutiny of decisions under the act will be diminished. Traditional owners are not identified as stakeholders under clause 19D. Clause 57A prevents private prosecutions for breaches of the act. Clause 50B has the effect that traditional owners are not required to be consulted about the information included on the register. The government must protect Aboriginal heritage sites and objects for all future generations. This is essential to all Aboriginal people across Western Australia. The proposed changes to the Aboriginal Heritage Act 1972 are an insult to Aboriginal people, and they are an insult to me. Opposition members: Hear, hear! DR K.D. HAMES (Dawesville — Minister for Health) [9.17 am]: Members may or may not know that I was the minister responsible for Aboriginal heritage for six years in total—outside that, after I lost my seat in 2001, I set up an Aboriginal heritage company undertaking Aboriginal heritage surveys for four years. In fact, under the Labor government, I got a contract to do a 700-kilometre by 250-metre wide corridor from Geraldton all the way through the front door of Murrin Murrin, so I wonder who had some influence down there! During that time, I oversaw the consultation with seven different Aboriginal groups. I can tell members that there are significant problems with the act from the point of view of both Aboriginal people and developers. I think the draft bill sets out to fix those things for both groups, and in fact the government has consulted Aboriginal people on this for two years, trying to get agreement. I think what currently exists in the draft is successful, and I will just address some of the points made.
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Mr B.S. Wyatt: You don’t believe that for a minute, do you? Dr K.D. HAMES: I absolutely believe that, and if I had half an hour, I would convince the member for Victoria Park, I am sure. The areas that affect Aboriginal people that are not covered properly in the act are the desecration of Aboriginal sites, and the inadequate punishment for those who do it. As a typical story, I was driving towards Sandstone coming from Leonora with Peter Muir, Dolly Muir’s partner, when we came across two sites—one was on the side of the road and it was clearly an area of Aboriginal significance. Peter explained the significance of that site, but it was not registered because no-one had ever done a survey because a developer did not find any metals there that it wanted to survey the area for. The department had no funds to do that survey and get it registered, so we got it registered. We went across to Sandstone, where a bulldozer had been in an area digging out ground for road maintenance. That was an Aboriginal site. The process of getting that person to court and punishing him was tough enough, but it was too late to get reparation of that site to what it was. He had significantly damaged that Aboriginal site. The legislation will have a significant increase in penalties for those individuals or organisations who damage heritage, and there will be an ability for the court-ordered remediation of damaged sites. I think that is a huge step forward from what is in the current act. Let us now go back to what happens with Aboriginal sites. On many occasions, a survey is done in an area with the traditional owners and it is identified that there are no sites there. If there are no sites in an area, there are no sites in an area. If a few years later someone wants to do something in that area, they have to do a survey again to see whether there is an Aboriginal site—and again and again. That is just not logical. If there is not a site in the area, there is not a site in the area. The chief executive officer will be able to talk to the Aboriginal Affairs Coordinating Committee looking at the evidence of what is there. If the survey has been done before — Mr B.S. Wyatt interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Victoria Park! Dr K.D. HAMES: This is a proposed review of the act and if the member does not like components of it, he should move amendments to it. The reality is that something is needed to stop the necessity of doing that. Several members interjected. Dr K.D. HAMES: I had only seven minutes and I have only three minutes left. The SPEAKER: This is something that must be spoken to the Chair about and dealt with. We cannot have this constant to-ing and fro-ing. Dr K.D. HAMES: I am trying to stop it, Mr Speaker, but I cannot! If someone came along to the area on the Swan River where the bridge was built with an application to rebuild the bridge because it was falling down, they would have to go through the full survey process to rebuild the bridge—even if it were being put back in exactly the same spot. There has to be some commonsense in all of this. As members know, there is no requirement to have the director general of the Department of Aboriginal Affairs involved, but there has been an Aboriginal person in that role for about 70 to 80 per cent of the last 15 years, and there is currently an Aboriginal person in that role putting forward this proposition. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: I do not want any more interjections. Dr K.D. HAMES: An Aboriginal person has responsibility for running it. The member spoke about the Kimberley Land Council. I have got on well with the Kimberley Land Council, but the worst mob to get on with was the Yamatji Land and Sea Council, which refused to do a survey. Mr B.S. Wyatt: From your perspective. The SPEAKER: Member for Victoria Park! Dr K.D. HAMES: From my perspective, it was the worst one I had to deal with. Mr R.H. Cook interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Kwinana, I call you to order for the third time. Mr R.H. Cook interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Kwinana, I call you to order for the second time. Point of Order Mr R.H. COOK: The grievance from the member for Kimberley was very specific. It was about the act, not about a character assassination of the people of the Yamatji Land and Sea Council. This is an outrageous slur on
7868 [ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] that particular organisation. The minister should be told to stick to the point in front of him, which is to defend the indefensible. Dr K.D. HAMES: Further to that point of order, the discussion around organisations such as Yamatji Land and Sea Council fed on from the member’s own comment about the Kimberley Land Council and its relationships with doing surveys. This specifically relates to issues around the Aboriginal Heritage Act. The SPEAKER: Carry on please, minister, and just get to the point as soon as you can. Grievance Resumed Dr K.D. HAMES: The issue is that I was acting for another Aboriginal person, Joan Martin, who was pilloried by a particular group. I was helping her to try to do a consultation on what was provably her own country, yet she was refused support from the Yamatji Land and Sea Council. The act needs to be changed to assist Aboriginal people in getting proper protection — Mr B.S. Wyatt interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Victoria Park, I call you to order for the first time. Dr K.D. HAMES: The act needs to be changed to assist Aboriginal people in getting proper protection for their land. Proper punishments need to be in place for people who desecrate Aboriginal land, and I personally regard that as the most important part of the legislation. Mr B.S. Wyatt interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Victoria Park! Dr K.D. HAMES: Aboriginal people are still significantly involved in all of the section 18 — Mr B.S. Wyatt interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Victoria Park, I call you to order for the second time. Dr K.D. HAMES: Under section 18, anyone who wants to do a new development on a site that has not been surveyed before still gets the opportunity to participate and comment. Mr B.S. Wyatt: Rubbish. Dr K.D. HAMES: They do. The legislation will come before Parliament. It will clearly be closely scrutinised and members opposite will have the opportunity to make any changes they believe are appropriate during the time. I, for one, if I have any responsibility for the legislation in this house, will be happy to discuss areas — Mr B.S. Wyatt: You had better disclose conflicts as well. Dr K.D. HAMES: I do not think I have a conflict at all. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: I can see some people having a very early rest today. Dr K.D. HAMES: No, because they were past employments and past associations, in fact, with someone who has passed away. All the people the member was closely associated with at the Yamatji council have probably moved off into private enterprise. EYRE ELECTORATE — HEAVY FIREFIGHTING UNITS — DISPOSAL Grievance DR G.G. JACOBS (Eyre) [9.25 am]: My grievance is to the Minister for Emergency Services. I thank him for taking it and for the assistance his staff have given me in working through this issue. It is one of decommissioning and disposal of heavy firefighting units in my region, particularly in the southern mallee in and around Grass Patch. The issue was first brought to me by a deputy chief officer of the fire brigade at Grass Patch, who is a man who has farmed in the area all his life and been involved in firefighting for over 40 years. The old units are being replaced by the new emergency services levy fire units. I think the letter that Mr Hallam wrote to the minister around 25 June says it best and most succinctly; it states — Dear Sir, I am a long term member of the Esperance Shire Councils Bushfire organization. I write to you to express my concern at what is happening with the lack of flexibility, in the disposal of existing heavy units, when a brigade receives a new ESL funded fire unit. Brigades spend considerable funds on these older units to keep them up to a high standard of safety, roadworthiness, etc. I consider that it is a shame that local farmers are not given the opportunity to purchase these older units as added fire protection in the Esperance Shire.
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The size of this Shire and the large areas of fence to fence cropping, I believe it is warrented that these heavey duty units stay in the Shire. Over the years the responce to training courses in the Esperance Shire has been excellent. With this high acceptance of training I believe the additional units held privately in the Shire would be beneficial in the event of any emergancy situation. The cost of transporting these heavey units to Perth, and then stripping most of the equipment on them, seems to be an unnecessary waste of good serviceable fire fighting units. The proponent puts forward that this process of decommissioning and disposal devalues the asset and is wasteful and a loss to the district. I thank the minister and the CEO for providing the information that gave an explanation of the disposal of the replaced emergency services vehicles direct purchase guidelines and lists a process of assessed serviceability. Serviceability is retained if the unit is serviceable. If it is past being serviceable—that is, unserviceable—it is decommissioned, its lights and sirens are removed, it is deregistered and it is then put to public auction. The explanation from the department was that occasionally there are requests from local governments, private brigades and individual parties to purchase decommissioned units. This has happened in the past. However, the explanation goes on to say that this course of action is discouraged because of a number of factors. Firstly, they have a poor or absent maintenance record; however, the feeling on the ground is that these units are very well maintained and that there is surety of safety. Secondly, it is felt that if they are unserviceable for the department, they are unserviceable for anybody else. Thirdly, a person can get one if they want by going to Perth and bidding in the auction. Fourthly, if the local government, under the resources-to-risk model profile, believes that they are not required within the district and if the shire does not want them, they must not be used and are not needed, so they can go through this process and not be retained in the region. Most returned vehicles are past their use-by date, are unserviceable and should go. As I have said, if they are no good for the Department of Fire and Emergency Services, they are no good for perhaps a farmer or a private user to supplement the firefighting infrastructure in the region. One of the other arguments put forward against this commonsense and practical process is a fear that these vehicles will be de facto DFES units with de facto crews. That is not the way it works. It has not worked like that in the past. The units are privately acquired, they are registered under a private farmer or a private organisation, and they are supplemented by volunteers who, as we have seen, are trained and have local knowledge. The process, as it has been put to me, is that these units are trucked to Perth and could be bought by a middleman, stripped, resold at auction and then lost to our system, when they could be useful for firefighting in the middle of summer when we have a very big fire in the southern mallee region. The resource-to-risk process is basically academic. I will make several points. Minister, we want a commonsense and practical approach, not a centralist, professional firefighter approach. We want a model with rural realities, cognisant that we have trained, well-equipped volunteers who have got skin in the game. If the argument is that we want to have the cake and eat it too, we are not talking about the serviceable vehicles going back into the minister’s asset, but, basically, the ones that need to be disposed of and decommissioned but are useful, practical units in the region owned by private well-meaning and well-deserving volunteers fighting the risk of particularly ravaging fires during summer. MR J.M. FRANCIS (Jandakot — Minister for Emergency Services) [9.32 am]: I thank the member for Eyre for raising this issue. He has raised it with me a couple of times now. In fact, when I was in Esperance earlier this year for our community cabinet night, it was certainly raised with me by a couple of volunteer firefighters and people involved in this area in the member’s part of the world. In my travels across the state and during my time in the job, this is the second community group that has raised the issue with me, which warrants asking the question: what happens to old fire trucks, whether they be the big ones or the light tankers? Predominantly, an awful lot of them are the light tankers. The LandCruisers—the ones with the 600-litre tanks on the back—are being phased out. The six-cylinder ones are being replaced by the new turbo V8 ones, which a person can pick out on the road. I am a bit of a freak when it comes to picking out different vehicles on the roads when I drive around. I can actually tell which ones are the old DFES or FESA light tankers that are now being used as tradie utes, with their trays on the back and all the equipment removed from them. However, it is a good question and it is worth looking at what happens with them. Obviously, appliances are used by brigades across the state and they are extremely capable appliances, even down to the light tanker Land Cruisers. However, they are worked very hard—many times off-road because they are four-wheel drive—predominantly in rural and regional areas, and they are maintained to a very high standard. At the end of the day, there comes a point when they reach their effective use-by date due to either serviceability or the fact that they are worn out and on the verge of no longer being safe. The safety of firefighters in the community is obviously my key priority when it comes to emergency services. We are replacing older vehicles with newer vehicles. In fact, we have replaced more old fire trucks in the last three years
7870 [ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] than has ever been done in a significant period of time. We have a fairly new modern fleet, and in future I expect that to be rationalised in the number of different units anyway, but that is a different issue. When it comes to the disposal of retired firefighting appliances, the department has a fairly clear policy on that. That is being reviewed and looked at because the member has raised this issue with me. As I said, all appliances are constantly assessed for serviceability and maintenance. If an appliance is capable of continued service, it remains with the department. If the appliance is beyond its economic or serviceable life, it is decommissioned. The appliance is then deregistered to ensure that the new owner is responsible for making sure that the appliance is compliant with Western Australian transport roadworthy rules, and it is disposed of through public auction, which I will talk about shortly. The other key thing is that many of the appliances have new equipment on board, such as pumps, reels, hoses, lights, sirens or radios. Radios are a key part of this equipment because they are a secure communications network, unlike what we saw in Parkerville. Our wish is to ensure that people cannot access the same frequencies. An awful lot of equipment has to come off a fire truck before it can be put out to auction and privately registered. The other thing is that a truck could be at the end of its use-by date, but it may have a brand-new pump on it, which may well be of better use to the taxpayer as a spare part or if it is put on a different vehicle. There are a number of reasons for not selling the whole unit straight to the public, but it is predominantly because we do not sell vehicles with lights, sirens and radios, and there are also a number of other different parts on them. At the moment, the state fleet has more than 900 appliances, many of which are light tankers. These are used by career and volunteer firefighters. Obviously, the volunteers have the white trucks and the career firefighters have the red trucks; they are pretty easily distinguished. The fleet also has 119 vehicles, which are generally retired from brigade service, in a stand-by fleet that moves around the state. If, for example, an Esperance brigade has a new vehicle replacing an older vehicle, and that older vehicle is still serviceable, many of them will go to a standby fleet and be used in the northern half of the state during winter, when there is a fire risk. Right now we will start to see them rolling down throughout the south west, and many brigades will be given extra appliances during the fire season depending on where the risk is deemed to be greatest. As we speak, I know that a number of appliances are being redirected from the north from that standby fleet. The vehicles also live at the DFES workshop at O’Connor so that if a brigade anywhere in the state has, for whatever reason, an accident or a truck has a significant failure, we can lend it a vehicle while it is waiting for the replacement, so all the vehicles are used if they are serviceable. Vehicles that have reached the end of their existence as roadworthy vehicles are disposed of under the State Supply Commission’s supply policy, which covers the disposal of goods and hazardous goods, and the department is also required to abide by that. The member has obviously raised some valid points. Although the department supports the sale of some retired fire appliances, it has to be done in an open and accountable way as well, which is why they are auctioned off — Dr G.G. Jacobs: We are not asking for any special deal here. We still recognise the process — The SPEAKER: Member for Eyre! Mr J.M. FRANCIS: Correct, at market value, and market value is determined in a publicly accountable way by disposing of the vehicles at a public auction. Dr G.G. Jacobs: They can do that by the tender process locally — The SPEAKER: Member for Eyre! I want this answer through the Chair. Mr J.M. FRANCIS: As I said, the issue is that if the member were to do that and he wanted to save on the shipping of the vehicle—a light tanker—from Esperance to Perth, at the end of the day it still has to come here to Perth to have removed from it all the equipment that is of use to the department. It may be modern, new equipment that can be reused, such as, essentially, lights, sirens and radio communications. The vehicle can then be put into a saleable space, but that cannot be done cost effectively in regional Western Australia. FREMANTLE HOSPITAL — RENAL CLINIC Grievance MR R.H. COOK (Kwinana — Deputy Leader of the Opposition) [9.40 am]: My grievance this morning is directed to the Minister for Health, and concerns the renal clinic at Fremantle Hospital. Before I begin, I acknowledge the presence in the gallery today of patients and families of patients who have come along to hear the minister’s remarks on this matter, and I also acknowledge the member for Fremantle’s ongoing interest in the future of Fremantle Hospital. This is a story of an opportunity lost, patients abandoned, and doctors and medical staff betrayed. The minister and the bureaucratic behemoth that we know as the Department of Health have constantly assured staff and patients at Fremantle Hospital and other hospitals that in the transition between Fremantle Hospital and Fiona Stanley Hospital, services will be guaranteed, careers and aspirations for those careers would be met, and staff
[ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] 7871 would be looked after to make sure that the transition to Fiona Stanley Hospital is as smooth as possible. We have already seen some concerns about the pain clinic at Fremantle Hospital, and today we have concerns about the renal clinic. In what looks to be an act of breathtaking incompetence, patients at the renal unit at Fremantle Hospital are left to wonder and worry about the future of their care. These patients have very complex issues. Some of them have been seeing their doctors for between 10 and 15 years. I know of one patient who moved to Western Australia so that she could be treated by one of the leading clinicians in this unit. The four most senior consultants at Fremantle Hospital will not be employed at Fiona Stanley Hospital, and it appears that they will not be employed at all. We are losing over half a century of clinical experience from these doctors, and this represents a significant blow to the patients in that unit and their families. These doctors and consultants look after 180 haemodialysis patients, 70 peritoneal dialysis patients and 150 kidney transplant recipients, in addition to several hundred patients with advanced kidney failure. All need to see their consultants every four to 12 weeks. Many of them have spent over a decade forging relationships with their consultants, who know them implicitly. These patients have records that run into volumes, and go back many years. They have built a trust and liaison with their consultants such that they are confident that they may be able to avoid ongoing dialysis, and ongoing medical attention through expensive drugs and eventual kidney transplants. This is a leading national team in renal care, and is internationally recognised. These four consultants, as I said, with over half a century of experience between them, have all been told that they can apply for 0.4 positions somewhere else in the hospital system. This unit created and developed the award-winning Australian kidney exchange program. For those members who are not familiar with the kidney exchange, it is a program that involves live donor kidney transplants. It helps patients seeking kidney transplants whose potential living donor is unsuitable due to blood group or tissue incompatibility. The kidney exchange matches them up with other potential live kidney donors around Australia, with whom they may be compatible. At one point, the kidney exchange facilitated the transplant of six live kidneys in one sitting—that is, 12 patients being operated on simultaneously to facilitate the removal and transplant of kidneys into six patients. Such is the importance of this program that these consultants are contracted by the commonwealth to provide this service. What is to become now of the Australian kidney exchange, which is coordinated nationally from Fremantle Hospital by clinicians who have been told that they have no future in Western Australia’s health system? These patients have been told that they will not be able to continue to see the same consultants they have been seeing for over a decade in managing their complex issues and their chronic conditions and ultimately saving the taxpayers many millions of dollars in ongoing expensive treatment. I understand that a proposal has been put to the government that perhaps these consultants can find employment, if not at Fiona Stanley Hospital, then at Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital. Perhaps the government wants to employ fewer qualified and experienced consultants in the renal unit at Fiona Stanley Hospital, but for God’s sake, do not lose an incredibly important human resource in our health department. [Interruption from the gallery.] The SPEAKER: Members of the public are quite entitled to sit and listen to the debate, but they are not entitled to shout out and clap, or make any noise in the gallery. Mr R.H. COOK: Thank you, Mr Speaker. As I said, a solution has been proposed to the department, which looks in this case to have comprehensively stuffed up workforce development in the South Metropolitan Health Service. The member for Eyre’s committee has identified that several times during the development of Fiona Stanley Hospital. A solution has been proposed, but the department has not even had the dignity or the courtesy to respond to that proposal. These patients deserve the best possible care. They deserve to be able to continue to see their world-leading consultants, who are already in our health system. Those consultants, who have been caring for Western Australian patients for many years, deserve to be treated better than this. The minister needs to look into the eyes of these people in the gallery today, and explain to them why there is no future for their ongoing health care with these consultants, and why there is no future for these consultants in our health care system. DR K.D. HAMES (Dawesville — Minister for Health) [9.47 am]: As usual, nearly everything that the shadow Minister for Health has said today is not true. I will go through the process that occurred. Remember that we are following the Labor Party blueprint, established by the Reid review, for redesignating services at hospitals. Under that model, Fremantle Hospital was to be significantly downsized to a secondary hospital, not a tertiary hospital, and Royal Perth Hospital was to be stopped as a tertiary hospital altogether. These are tertiary services we are talking about, not secondary services. Under the Labor government’s model, tertiary services were going to leave Fremantle Hospital and go to Fiona Stanley Hospital. Let us establish that as a fact right from the start. We have high-quality services at Royal Perth Hospital and Fremantle Hospital. We have a brand-new $2 billion hospital that will be the focus and location of tertiary renal services in this state, for transplants and dialysis. That
7872 [ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] is where the main services will be. As would be expected, a statewide first-class service will be run out of that hospital. In 2012 surveys were done of all doctors in the health system, asking who wanted to go to Fiona Stanley Hospital. Knowing that the tertiary services were going from Fremantle Hospital, the four doctors said that they did not want to go to Fiona Stanley Hospital, even though they knew that only a secondary service would be offered at Fremantle. [Interruption from the gallery.] Dr K.D. HAMES: Mr Speaker, I am still being interrupted. Those doctors did not put in to go to that new service. In fact, since then, there have been advertisements — Mr R.H. Cook interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Kwinana, you are on two calls. If you want to take an early rest, continue interjecting. Dr K.D. HAMES: About a year ago advertisements were placed for the head of department in the renal dialysis service at Fiona Stanley Hospital. We would think that one of the four eminent members that we talk about would have applied for that position but they did not. They were given a second opportunity to apply for that position. [Interruption from the gallery.] The SPEAKER: If you want to stay in the public gallery, you do not make a noise. If you make a noise again, I will ask security to remove you. It is up to you now. You are quite welcome to stay. You cannot shout out. [Interruption from the gallery.] The SPEAKER: Where is the Sergeant-at-Arms? Dr K.D. HAMES: None of those specialists applied. Those specialists are employed by the system; they are still employed by the state. Attempts are being made to move them to another location. As we speak, three of those doctors that the member says do not have a job anywhere else do have jobs somewhere else. Three of them have been given jobs. Mr R.H. Cook interjected. Dr K.D. HAMES: None of them were employed full time before. Three of those doctors have been found positions elsewhere. We are still talking with the fourth doctor to find a location for that doctor. The patients who had been seeing those doctors for all this time will still be able to do that. We are more than happy for all those patients with files as thick as the member says and whose doctors know their history and know their story, including all those in the gallery, to continue to see the doctor they are seeing now. Ms S.F. McGurk interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Fremantle, I call you to order for the first time. Let the minister finish. Dr K.D. HAMES: I did not hear what the member said. The patients who are seeing the doctors in Fremantle will still be able to see those doctors in their new location. They have not lost anything in that sense. The doctors who will be running the new state-of-the-art service in Fremantle Hospital include doctors who have the same sort of experience that the member talks about. These doctors are experts in the shared transplant program, kidney transplant and renal dialysis. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Maylands, I call you to order for the first time. Member for Fremantle, I call you to order for the second time. Dr K.D. Hames interjected. The SPEAKER: Minister for Health, I call you to order for the first time. When I am on my feet, I do not want to hear from anybody. Dr K.D. HAMES: It is no good the members saying that I should look at the patients in the gallery—although I am happy to do that—and listen to what they are saying; they are saying that their doctors do not have jobs in the new hospital. That is true because they did not apply for jobs in the new hospital. They are saying that they cannot get to see those doctors. That is not true. We will ensure they can still see the doctors that they love and want to keep seeing. If those patients are not able to see their doctors as yet, it is because we are in the transfer process. We have not moved to Fiona Stanley Hospital yet. Those services will not move until later in the year. They will still see their doctors at Fremantle Hospital. When the doctors move to their new location, wherever it is, we will inform the patients and they will be able to make an appointment with the doctor who they have been seeing at their new location. All of those things will be addressed.
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As usual, the member has blown out of proportion something that is just not true. The doctors are not going to the new hospital but I wish they had applied. They are eminent doctors but they did not apply to go to the new hospital. Mr R.H. Cook interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Kwinana, I call you to order now for the first time. Have you finished, minister? Dr K.D. HAMES: Yes. BRISTILE KILNS AND STACKS — RESTORATION Grievance MRS G.J. GODFREY (Belmont) [9.54 am]: My grievance is to the Minister for Planning. The Bristile kilns, more commonly known as the Ascot kilns, are an important part of the history of Belmont. They are recognised in the City of Belmont’s coat of arms. They are a group of kilns situated on Grandstand Road in Belmont, opposite the Ascot Racecourse. Unfortunately, they are in poor structural condition. These kilns were built between 1929 and 1950 and are thought to be the largest such group surviving in the country. The essence of their significance and rarity is the concentration of kilns and stacks in the one area, forming the largest collection of extant circular downdraft kilns, often known as beehive kilns, and associated stacks in Australia. For many years, the Ascot residents and the City of Belmont have expressed their concerns about the state of the kilns and its stacks and the general appearance of the site. On various occasions, local residents have organised public meetings to discuss the future of the kilns and stacks. To update the community, I organised a public meeting on 13 October 2012. During my election campaign, this topic was raised often as the current state of the kilns make the site an eyesore so close to the beautiful area of Ascot Waters, Ascot Racecourse and the Swan River. The Premier and I had a meeting with Ascot residents to hear their views and ideas on this issue during my campaign. The owner of the land on which the kilns and the stacks are situated is the state government, represented by the Department of Planning. The department is responsible for the conservation and maintenance of the kilns and stacks. The Bristile kilns have been added to the state Register of Heritage Places on a permanent basis but that does not mean that the site must be preserved intact. Development proposals can be considered by the Heritage Council of Western Australia and would add great value to the area around Ascot Racecourse. The restoration of the kilns and potential site development has been at an impasse for many years due to a number of difficulties in the contractual agreement between the Western Australian Planning Commission and Ascot Fields Nominees Pty Ltd. The kilns and stacks are rapidly deteriorating and being vandalised. Unless a decision about the site is reached, the structural adequacy of all the structures is at serious risk. In addition, the stacks close to the road network currently pose a risk to public safety. The cost of the kilns’ restoration is one of the issues being considered, with some stakeholders having the view that any potential development of the site will involve demolition of some kilns and stacks to achieve a viable proposal. A decision on this site is also important due to its implications for future development of the surplus land owned by Perth Racing as it owns adjacent and nearby land that can accommodate various land use scenarios. As this does not relate solely to local planning, the City of Belmont has no real power over the issue. During my tenure as mayor, the council regularly contacted the Department of Planning, Ascot Fields Nominees, the Heritage Council and the previous member for Belmont to emphasise the deteriorating state of the kilns and stacks and to enquire about the progress of a resolution for this impasse. With all of this in mind, I ask the Minister for Planning to give Belmont constituents an update on the current developments regarding the restoration of the Ascot kilns and the potential development of the site. Hopefully, I will be able to go back to my electorate with good news. MR J.H.D. DAY (Kalamunda — Minister for Planning) [9.57 am]: I acknowledge the strong interest of the member for Belmont in getting a resolution to the issues around the Ascot kilns. It is an issue that she took up when she was elected as member for Belmont but I know that she was also very much involved in seeking to get an outcome long before that. It is something that has been of long-term interest to her and she has certainly been representing the views of the local community very strongly. I acknowledge that the kilns are of significant heritage value. So far, redevelopment of some land in the area and the preservation and restoration of the kilns has been unable to be implemented despite the wider development around the area—that is, the Ascot Waters project, which is regarded as having been very successful. The primary issue has been that the trust land is owned by the City of Belmont and the community commercial land that houses the kilns is owned by the WA Planning Commission. Although these parcels of land are owned by the city and the WAPC respectively, the Ascot Waters joint venture company holds some development rights over the land through a deed of agreement with the city and the WAPC. Despite the deed of agreement and the city and the state government endeavouring to facilitate the development of the kilns site, the Ascot Waters joint
7874 [ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] venture has been unable to establish a viable project. Therefore, the Ascot Waters joint venture is prepared to relinquish its rights under the deed of agreement. The city has previously advised the Department of Planning that it has no desire to accept management of the kilns complex, even if it is restored, nor is the ongoing management of such structures a core role of the WAPC. Therefore, at this stage, the best outcome would be to have the kilns site included in a private sector development. The Department of Planning and the Western Australian Planning Commission, in consultation with the Heritage Council of Western Australia, are currently negotiating an outcome that will facilitate the private sector development of the kilns site. This will be achieved in two parts. Firstly, the WAPC is in negotiations with the Ascot Waters joint venture on relinquishing its rights over land on which the kilns are located. The Department of Planning has recently informed me that these negotiations are underway, and I understand they are progressing well. Secondly, the Department of Planning and the WAPC are working to review the boundary of the existing improvement plan 20. The review will consider the development potential of land in the same vicinity that was acquired following the creation of the Grandstand Road dual-carriageway roundabout. Through the extension of improvement plan 20, and with the agreement of the Heritage Council and the City of Belmont, it is anticipated that this will create a land parcel attractive enough to invite a private sector tender for its purchase and development. Any such sale would be undertaken subject to conditions of sale to ensure that the kilns complex is appropriately preserved. I understand the member for Belmont’s desire to see a resolution to this matter. It is a desire that I share, and I acknowledge that she has raised this matter with me on several occasions in the interests of achieving a positive outcome for her electorate, as I mentioned earlier. I am pleased that there appears to be strong willingness and cooperation between the state, the local government and the private developer, and I look forward to providing the member for Belmont with an update on further progress as soon as I possibly can.
ECONOMICS AND INDUSTRY STANDING COMMITTEE Fourth Report — “Annual Report 2013–2014” — Tabling MR I.C. BLAYNEY (Geraldton) [10.01 am]: I present for tabling the fourth report of the Economics and Industry Standing Committee entitled “Annual Report 2013–2014”. [See paper 2323.] Mr I.C. BLAYNEY: It is my pleasure to hand down the Economics and Industry Standing Committee’s annual report for 2013–14. During this period, the committee was focused on its work for the report on floating liquefied natural gas production. During the time covered by the report, the world has moved on, as it does. The heat has well and truly come out of the resources sector, which has huge implications for the state and federal budgets. The price now being achieved for iron ore—in the region of $80 a tonne—was unthinkable at the start of the period covered by this report. In March 2013, the spot price for 62 per cent iron ore fines that landed at Tianjin was $140 a tonne and the Australian dollar was worth $1.04. In June 2014, the iron ore price was $90 a tonne and the Australian dollar was worth 94c. When one considers that a 1c movement in the Australian dollar moves the state budget bottom line by $80 million and a $1 movement in the United States price per tonne of iron ore moves the state’s budget bottom line by $49 million, the impact of these swings on the state budget is quite profound. The impact on GST returns, however, is subject to a lag effect, which will result in a lift in a few years’ time. The logic of running a modest deficit for a year or two in this situation is clear. It has often been said that budgets should have a clear aim to be roughly in balance over the long-term average. As Australia progresses to become a clear world leader in the area of gas production, the price of oil and gas will increasingly become as important as the price of iron ore. One interesting thing to watch is the degree to which our achieved gas price is more directly related to the price of crude oil, as it has traditionally been done in our major market, Japan, or to the price of domestic gas at the Henry Hub in the United States. Unfortunately, the state will not benefit greatly until onshore gas starts to flow. I note a useful increase in domestic gas production from recent finds near Dongara and the discovery of the golden rocks at the Browse Basin, and I await, hopefully, the successful emergence of the Canning Basin as a new gas province. In the committee’s FLNG report, it revisited the issue of a gas reservation policy in Western Australia. This is a real bone of contention with both the federal government and local gas producers. The committee has been following the situation on the east coast, where a decision has been made in some places to ban onshore gas production, and the development of the gas export industry in Queensland is starting to impact on domestic gas prices, with no relief, only price increases, in sight. I think the committee will stand by its decision to endorse our current policy. Sixty per cent of Western Australia’s power is generated by natural gas, and a desire for secure access to gas has been indicated by interest by major domestic consumers in Apache Energy’s assets, which appear to be on the market. As quite a high proportion of the Browse gas is now Western Australian due to the discovery of the golden rocks, I hope that this can successfully be used as a lever to make sure that our domestic gas supply is safe for the future—a lot of domestic jobs hang off it.
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The committee has undertaken some travel to Karratha in the north west of the state and to Darwin in the Northern Territory. This travel was to look at the current state of the gas market and the industry. I also thank the Speaker for his consideration in allowing the committee to travel to Europe to look at safety and opportunities in the oil and gas sector and to Korea to look at the construction of the first FLNG vessel, Shell’s Prelude vessel, in the Samsung Heavy Industries yard at Geoje and to visit a gas import terminal. The committee will split for this travel, and if members want to visit both, they will cover the other leg with their parliamentary travel allowance. Two members have chosen to do this, and I think such a useful cost saving to the Parliament and the government is to be acknowledged. During the period covered by this report, 1 July 2013 to 30 June 2014, the committee had 14 briefings, 39 deliberative meetings and 51 formal evidence hearings, and 119 witnesses appeared before it. The committee tabled two reports that had 68 findings and 33 recommendations. I appreciate the willingness of witnesses to appear, and I would like to acknowledge the helpfulness of and ease of access to people from Shell in particular. The committee has completed the work it had started at the time covered by this annual report into the management of the state freight rail network, which I personally found a lot more complex and difficult to deal with than the work on FLNG. I look forward to completing the committee’s work on FLNG safety, probably in March, and the opportunity to report hopefully by June next year. I would like to acknowledge the hard work of my fellow committee members: the deputy chair, Hon Fran Logan, the member for Cockburn; Peter Tinley, the member for Willagee; Shane Love, the member for Moore; and Jan Norberger, the member for Joondalup. Our committee staff have been diligent and hardworking and I thank Dr Loraine Abernethie and Michael Burton for their efforts. MR F.M. LOGAN (Cockburn) [10.07 am]: I have just been abused at the hands of the member for Albany and the member for Collie–Preston, who are trying to undermine my erudite contribution to the chamber! I would like to add a few words to the statement that has been made by the member for Geraldton, the Chair of the Economics and Industry Standing Committee. Like him, I also thank the chair, the member for Willagee, the member for Joondalup and the member for Moore for their work and the huge efforts they have put into the work that the committee has undertaken so far. As members have heard from the chairman, the member for Geraldton, the committee has undertaken two inquiries and has tabled both reports in the house. The first report is on the inquiry into the floating liquefied natural gas infrastructure that is about to be put into Western Australia and its impact on the state, particularly on jobs, finances and gas supplies. The second report is on the inquiry into the freight rail network in Western Australia. Both inquiries were very serious investigations into the long-term economic impacts for the state of Western Australia, both were complex and detailed and both had significant technological issues that members of the committee had to get their heads around. Both reports have come out with significant findings that the Liberal–National government should act upon. I put to the house that the response we have received so far from the government on the floating liquefied natural gas inquiry is way too insufficient. The government’s response to the threat identified in that report to state finances, state gas and jobs in Western Australia is completely insufficient. We can see from the government’s response to our first inquiry that it has been written by public servants within the Department of State Development. We can tell from the way the responses have been worded that it is a straightforward public service response. I put it to the house that I do not think the minister had any input whatsoever into the response to our inquiry. Nothing in the response shows that the government is willing to stand up for Western Australia’s interests, but that was the whole point of the inquiry and the recommendations that came out of the report. The state government has to stand up and fight for its interests on the impact of the installation of floating liquefied natural gas technologies here in Western Australia on the economy of Western Australia. I am afraid to say that that battle, that effort, which is needed to protect the state’s interests, is clearly not in the response to our Economics and Industry Standing Committee report. The second issue I want to address is the inquiry into our freight rail management. Page 24 of the business section of The West Australian today shows one of the issues that the media has eventually identified and that was mentioned in our committee’s freight rail management inquiry report, tabled only last week. The headline of the article in today’s paper is “Secret deal hands PTA slice of grain rail profit”. Our inquiry exposed that the Public Transport Authority entered into a secret deal with Brookfield Rail for a profit-sharing arrangement in exchange for the maintenance investment in tier 1 and tier 2 rail lines, a significant part of which was funded by the federal government, and the closure of tier 3 rail lines, one of the very issues that was a bone of contention for Western Australian farmers. It formed a significant part of our Economics and Industry Standing Committee inquiry. We identified, ultimately, through the documents we eventually got out of the Public Transport Authority and the minister’s office that it is not surprising that the PTA was very, very reticent to provide documentation. It was not surprising that the Minister for Transport, himself, supported the PTA in trying to stop the release of documents to the committee. As we found, it was due to a nasty little embarrassing secret: namely, that the PTA, the regulator of the rail network and the regulator of Brookfield Rail, the monopoly operator of that rail network, is in a financial profit-sharing arrangement with the company that runs the rail network. I think
7876 [ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] the question that should be asked of the minister in this house is: did the minister know about the profit-sharing arrangement or did his department keep it secret from him? The signatory at the bottom of the little deal is not the minister; it is the signature of the director general of Transport, Mr Reece Waldock. He signed off on the deal, not the minister. I wonder whether the director general of Transport told the minister that his organisation, a public organisation, a wholly owned part of the Western Australian government, had entered into a commercial secret, financial deal with the monopoly operator of the government-owned rail network in a profit-sharing arrangement, while at the same time appearing to the farmers, the government, the Parliament and the general public as the independent body regulating the rail network. It is a disgraceful situation, uncovered by our committee only because our committee members continued to dig down and demand documents so that we could get to the bottom of what the PTA was doing in its relationship with Brookfield Rail. That is the type of work our committee has been doing over the last two years—serious investigative work into the impacts of technology and commercial agreements on the state’s economy and the state government finances. Yet when we put in our request for funding for travel to support our investigations, we had trouble, unfortunately, with the Speaker. He believes that the budget for committee travel is too much. In fact, we have struggled with the Speaker to get the finances we need to carry out the type of investigations we wanted. As I pointed out, this is serious stuff; this is not travel for the sake of travel. MR R.S. LOVE (Moore) [10.17 am]: I rise to speak briefly on the work of the Economics and Industry Standing Committee over the reporting period. I commence by thanking the chair of the committee, the member for Geraldton, who has done an excellent job of leading that committee. Its members have worked together, for the most part, in a non-partisan way. It has been a tremendous experience working with the fine gentlemen who make up the committee. I also acknowledge the work of our principal research officer Dr Loraine Abernethie and research officer, Michael Burton. I will highlight very briefly some of the work we have been doing. The inquiry into the changes that floating liquefied natural gas makes to the landscape of the gas exploitation system in Western Australia has been fascinating. Certainly, a number of our past assumptions about what the gas industry means for the Western Australian economy have changed greatly. It certainly needs to be taken into account by the government, moving forward. We need to capture the opportunities that might come from floating liquefied natural gas and, therefore, the committee aims to do further study into that in the future. Briefly on the freight rail network inquiry the committee has completed, I am pleased the committee chose to undertake that work. As a local member in a regional area with rail systems operating in my electorate, the changes that were to occur and the lack of information the community seemed to have about what exactly the arrangements were to do with the management of the rail network, were a matter of some concern to me. I was therefore very pleased that, at my suggestion, the committee took up that work and I think that report is a testament to the need to have undertaken the inquiry. It is in fact a document that points to some of the problems that can befall a government when it privatises an asset that is an essential part of the infrastructure of the state and one that lends itself to a natural monopoly. It certainly demonstrates the problems that exist for regulators in trying to keep themselves at arm’s length from the organisation that they are trying to regulate, and where some of those procedures may have fallen down. It is a very valuable report, and I hope the government will take the findings and, of course, the recommendations of that report very seriously. I will not take up much more time. In closing, I would like to thank the members of the committee, once again, for the good spirit in which they have been working through these inquiries, and I look forward to doing further work in the future with this committee. MR P.C. TINLEY (Willagee) [10.20 am]: The Economics and Industry Standing Committee, of which I am a proud member—I suppose that would be the right word to use—has undertaken one significant inquiry in the reporting period; namely, its inquiry into the economic impact of floating liquefied natural gas. Work is also in progress on a report that has since been delivered on an inquiry—which in my estimation is turning into a significant investigation—into the grain freight network, tiers 1, 2 and 3. When the member for Moore brought the grain freight network to the attention of the committee, I thought it would be an interesting fill and we could have a little, light, once-over look at something — Dr G.G. Jacobs: Fill in some time! Mr P.C. TINLEY: Yes, fill in some time while we gathered more evidence on our ongoing investigation into the very weighty subject of the impact of floating liquefied natural gas on the economy of Western Australia. However, we discovered as we got into the grain freight inquiry—with the support of the chair of the committee, the member for Geraldton, who as a reasonable member completely understood, better than I as a metropolitan member ever could, the impacts of the grain freight network on the economy of Western Australia—that this is probably one of the biggest rorts in the contemporary era of this state. I do not use that word lightly. The use of the word “rort” can be fairly dramatic. It can imply that individuals are corrupt. But in this case, I suspect that the system is corrupt. I say that because what it showed to me is that the grain freight network is a case study on how not to privatise and how not to introduce a profit motive into the delivery of essential economic
[ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] 7877 infrastructure in this state. There is only one train line network in this state. The old adage is that when we privatise a monopoly, all we do is privatise a monopoly. A monopoly does not change once we sell it. This is no reflection on Brookfield Rail. It is at the end of a very understandable chain of profit-motivated listed and unlisted companies, and dealmakers—spivs, if we like. The culprit in this particular case is indeed the government of Western Australia. I use that word in a non-partisan way, because the privatisation of this network started some time ago, and both sides of this house are duly implicated. But nothing is more implicated than the governance model that has been put in place for the grain freight network. This privatised monopoly has been governed by a department that I can describe only as recalcitrant. When the committee held its inquiry into floating LNG, everyone was falling over themselves to participate in that inquiry. They came to the committee with very understandable motives and presented their evidence and tried to shape the committee’s responses and the committee’s dealings. That was completely understandable. Even slightly covered agendas were very transparent in the end. But there was nothing more duplicitous and nothing more covert than what I saw in the conduct of the Public Transport Authority at our committee. It was absolutely outrageous that we had to, in the end, subpoena, and threaten on many occasions to subpoena, quite ordinary documents. The level of obfuscation, prevarication and outright defiance that has taken place actually talks to a wider issue. It talks to the erosion of the sovereignty of the Parliament of Western Australia. The committee sits, by extension, under the standing orders of this Parliament, yet the very departments of this government are deciding what, how and when information will be presented to the Parliament of Western Australia. The Parliament of Western Australia is only one of many victims in this saga. The wheat growers in the wheatbelt, the operators, and their cooperative—Co-operative Bulk Handling Ltd—are also victims in this. What we found out with this dirty little secret identified in our inquiry is that the landlord is in cahoots with the tenant. The profit sharing on the tier 1 and 2 lines identified by our committee is a complete and utter rort. The fact that that was the one thing, of many, that the PTA did not want us to discover is of itself most instructive. The landlord, in cahoots with the tenant, is a beneficiary of closing lines and is a beneficiary of concentrating the same tonnages onto the tier 1 and 2 lines. That needs to be the subject of further investigation. The government and the Minister for Transport need to take very seriously the allegations I have made today about this department, and principally its senior leadership, in both its conduct at the committee and its participation in this collusion with a privatised monopoly. I would like to thank the committee staff for their support. It has been nothing short of outstanding, in my opinion. The principal research officer, Dr Loraine Abernethie, PhD, has been a tower of strength and a dogged pursuer of the truth, ably supported by the research officer, Mr Michael Burton. Michael is a student of law and of international economic law and trade, and he has been an outstanding support to the committee and the committee’s work. I recommend that members on both sides of this house take a very close look at both these reports. The report on the economic impact of floating LNG is a significant indicator of where this state’s economy is going. We will talk more about that when we get to the order of the day that deals with the amendments to the leasing arrangement for Browse. I recommend also that members look at the report on the grain freight network. We can look at that report in a couple of different ways, as I have said. Principally, we can look at it as a governance problem. But we can also look at it more broadly as a problem of the privatisation of a public good or a public asset when there is only one of those assets. The federal equivalent of that is, of course, the privatisation of Telstra, when it took with it the poles and wires, if we like, and it took $11 billion to get that back in-house. The privatisation of the grain freight network to a single provider has also created a problem not envisaged at the time of the original disposal of the asset, and that is the loss of flexibility. One of the principal problems that we have on this side of the house with privatisation is not only that we insert a profit motive into the delivery of services in Western Australia and therefore usher in a potential ratcheting and gouging of price, and many of the other things that occur through privatisation, but also that we lose the flexibility in the out years to deal with the unanticipated consequences of things that we may or may not want to do, or with the market forces themselves. The committee found through the evidence that in the last 10 years grain growers in the wheatbelt have nearly doubled their yield for every millimetre of rain. Technology and business efficiencies by farmers have had a significant impact on the output of grain crops, which is entirely enjoyable to hear. At the time of privatisation, it was never anticipated. The increases in yields and the spikes in the requirements for the tonnages to be carried were not contemplated. What was also not contemplated was the above and below rail operation split involving the infrastructure being sold off in two parts. I should reserve one comment about the co-op, which is an interesting business model and not identified as one that produces a profit: as a consequence of that, Co- operative Bulk Handling Ltd, in its model, did not pursue the efficiencies and was not as alive to the issues of what was happening with its own distribution network and supply chain as it perhaps ought to have been. I am sure if it had had its druthers, it would have been a participant in the purchase.
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LOCAL GOVERNMENT AMALGAMATIONS — LOCAL VOTING RIGHTS Standing Orders Suspension — Motion MR M. McGOWAN (Rockingham — Leader of the Opposition) [10.30 am] — without notice: I move — That standing orders be suspended so far as to enable the following motion to be debated forthwith — That this house rejects the Barnett government’s model for forced council amalgamations that does not allow the opportunity for a local vote of ratepayers in suburbs such as Willetton, Riverton, Cannington, Belmont, Mundaring, Bassendean and Mt Lawley, and that the house further rejects any attempts to implement forced amalgamations for regional councils. The reason the opposition has moved to suspend standing orders is that the maps and boundaries that the government intends to enforce upon the people of Western Australia only came to public attention yesterday afternoon. This is our first opportunity to debate the important issue of local democracy and the government’s broken promise at the last state election. It is also our first opportunity to bring to attention the fact that the government is creating first and second-class citizens in Western Australia—those who are entitled to a vote and those who do not get the right to local democracy. This is the government’s doing; it needs to explain it. We asked the Premier yesterday about that and he refused to explain. Why do some people get a vote and others do not? This is an opportunity for members of this house to explain to their electorates by the most obvious technique available where they stand on this issue. That obvious technique is how members vote in this house. The members of the electorates of Belmont, Kalamunda, Darling Range—the electorate containing the Shire of Serpentine–Jarrahdale—and Mount Lawley, Mr Speaker, will have the opportunity to tell this house where they stand on their citizens having a vote on their local future. The National Party will be able to say where it stands in relation to the regions. This is a great exercise in democracy that this government should allow to happen. It is also an opportunity for the government to explain a few interesting developments that have come to light after the maps were released yesterday. The interesting development that the government needs to explain very well is why it is abolishing the City of Subiaco and creating a new City of Subiaco incorporating the existing Town of Cambridge, and not creating the new city of Riversea. In so doing, it appears to have left 3 000 ratepayers without a local authority. How is it that all those people living around the University of Western Australia in the suburb of Nedlands, and all those people living in Mt Claremont, formerly part of the Town of Cambridge, who are now not being incorporated into the new City of Subiaco, are now not being incorporated into the new city of Riversea, which does not exist? How come they are left stateless! How can it be that 3 000 citizens of Western Australia, those people living in Nedlands and Mt Claremont, will now not have a council? Will those people be collecting their own bins, putting them in the trailer and running off to the tip? Will they be out there stirring up the asphalt and filling in the potholes? Will they be doing that? There appears to be anarchy in the western suburbs. In the member for Nedlands’ electorate and in the member for Churchlands’ electorate, the government is creating anarchy. Point of Order Mr J.H.D. DAY: The Leader of the Opposition has moved a motion to suspend standing orders. He should be speaking to the procedural motion. However, I can indicate that the government will agree to 20 minutes for each side. If the Leader of the Opposition sits down, I will move an amended motion to that effect and he can carry on, I suppose, in the same way he has been. Debate Resumed Mr M. McGOWAN: I thank the Leader of the House for allowing me to carry on for 20 minutes at the conclusion of this. I look forward to an explanation about the forgotten people of the western suburbs. The SPEAKER: Leader of the Opposition, I think 20 minutes each side has been agreed to. Standing Orders Suspension — Amendment to Motion MR J.H.D. DAY (Kalamunda — Leader of the House) [10.36 am]: I move — To add after “forthwith” — , subject to the debate being limited to 20 minutes for government members and 20 minutes for non-government members Amendment put and passed. Standing Orders Suspension — Motion, as Amended The SPEAKER: Members, as this is a motion without notice to suspend standing orders, it will need the support of an absolute majority for it to proceed. If I hear a dissentient voice, I will be required to divide the Assembly. Question put and passed with an absolute majority.
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Motion MR M. McGOWAN (Rockingham — Leader of the Opposition) [10.37 am]: I move — That this house rejects the Barnett government’s model for forced council amalgamations that does not allow the opportunity for a local vote of ratepayers in suburbs such as Willetton, Riverton, Cannington, Belmont, Mundaring, Bassendean and Mt Lawley, and that the house further rejects any attempts to implement forced amalgamations for regional councils. This is an opportunity for all members of this house to put on record where they stand on this government’s broken promise in which it is forcing council amalgamations across Perth. It is also an opportunity for members of this house to put on record where they stand in relation to forced amalgamations in the regions of Western Australia. I would expect to see those members standing up for their communities; members such as the members for Belmont, Perth and Kalamunda to actually put their money where their mouth is on this issue. All those suburbs I mentioned, and dozens of others, will not receive the opportunity to have a local say when it comes to the abolition and amalgamation of their local authority, yet some people in Western Australia will get the opportunity and others, in the Premier’s own electorate, are being excluded from the process altogether. The Premier is creating a four-tiered society—councils in his own electorate do not have to go through this process. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: I want to hear the Leader of the Opposition. Mr M. McGOWAN: Then those other areas subject to so-called amalgamations in South Perth, Cockburn and Kwinana, and Fremantle and East Fremantle will get the opportunity to have a local say under the poll provisions of the existing act. The people in all those other areas—dozens of suburbs—represented by the members for Swan Hills, Morley, Mount Lawley, Perth, Kalamunda, Darling Range and Belmont will not get a say. Why are they denied an opportunity for a local referendum? Why is the government creating four tiers of citizens in Western Australia? The government needs to provide the answer to that. The government also needs to put on record the future for the regions of Western Australia. We want to know where members stand on forced amalgamations in the regions. We also want to put on record—it is very important to make this point—that this process has been shambolic, chaotic and dysfunctional from the beginning. I give members one example—Perth and Vincent. The Liberal Party government, of which the Premier was a part, created Vincent in 1994 to create a central capital city that concentrated on itself. That is what Richard Court said. Mr C.J. Barnett: It was wrong. Mr M. McGOWAN: Did the Premier say that was wrong? Mr C.J. Barnett: He should have followed my advice, with the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Western Australia, and he would have been spot-on. The SPEAKER: Premier, I do not want any interjections. Mr M. McGOWAN: Richard Court got it wrong; Colin gets it right! That is what the Premier is saying. The Premier is always settling old scores. Twenty years later, he is still settling old scores. Remember, Richard said that the Premier should not be the Liberal leader, and the Premier is getting Richard back every time he can! The Court government created the greater City of Perth, and there are ministers of that government who are here today. But the Premier has said, “No, we need to undo that and bring ratepayers in, so we will go for half of Vincent.” Then the Premier has said, “Maybe we won’t go for half of Vincent; we will go for all of Vincent.” That is his third model. The fourth model is, “Oh, if we get all of Vincent in there, we’ll have all of these people who vote who we don’t like very much, so we’ll weight the voting towards one group against another group.” There have been four models and the process has been shambolic and chaotic. Then there is the case of the Burswood peninsula, with Crown Perth and the stadium in it. Yesterday in the briefing the government never mentioned that the plan is to leave it with the Town of Victoria Park, or the new city of South Park, but we learnt that in five years’ time, if the government is re-elected, it will go into Perth. That is the secret plan behind the scenes that was hidden from the briefing yesterday. Then we learnt that in creating the new greater City of Subiaco—this is an important point that needs to be answered—the government is adopting the maps provided by the Local Government Advisory Board, which rolls Subiaco and Cambridge together. The maps provided by the Local Government Advisory Board exclude the area around UWA and a part of Mt Claremont, and show that that should go into the new Riversea council. But the new Riversea council is not being created, and the government has adopted the exact map of the Local Government Advisory Board, which means that 3 000 good people in the western suburbs, according to this Local Government Advisory Board map, will not have their own local authority. There will be 3 000 forgotten people in Western Australia. It is all falling apart before our eyes. What is the government going to do? We all know, because the minister has said it a dozen times in here, that the government can either accept or reject the proposals, and the government has accepted them. What happens to those people in Nedlands and Mt Claremont? Why is the Premier treating
7880 [ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] those people so appallingly? What have they ever done to the Premier apart from vote for him? Why is he treating them so badly? It is anarchy in the western suburbs under this government. The western suburbs will not have their own authority. Those poor people will be collecting their own rubbish, trimming their own trees, fixing the roads and mowing the verges. Mr P.T. Miles interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Wanneroo, I call you to order for the first time. Mr F.M. Logan interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Cockburn, do you want me to call you? Mr M. McGOWAN: I expect the government to explain fully what is going on. I think the government forgot about them, and its plan is now falling apart. We learnt yesterday about the secret plan to move Crown Perth and Burswood into the City of Perth in five years. Now we are learning about how the people of the western suburbs, and the people who live in Broadway and in the area where all the students are living around UWA, are being treated. They will not have a council. The fourth class of person is those living around UWA. Mr C.J. Barnett: Yes. Mr M. McGOWAN: The Premier says, yes; they are not going to have their own council. What is the government going to do? How will the government manage it? The government needs to explain how this has been allowed to happen. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Members for Cockburn, West Swan and Warnbro! Mr M. McGOWAN: I want to close on this point, because I want to let other members speak. The editorial of The West Australian today pointed out that what the government is doing is expressly different from what it said before the state election. In other words, that is a nice way of saying that the government is breaking its promise; it is breaking its word. I quote, as exhibit A, a press release by the Minister for Local Government, dated 21 February 2013, which states — I recently made some remarks at a local forum that the Liberal Party supported forced council amalgamations. The Liberal Party does not support forced amalgamations, I got it wrong, it was my mistake. I apologise for the confusion this has created. That is what the Minister for Local Government had to say. It is pretty clear that that is a complete, utter broken promise. The process has been a complete and utter dog’s breakfast, a shambolic process and a mess, and it is already falling apart. MR C.J. BARNETT (Cottesloe — Premier) [10.48 am]: Clearly, the Labor opposition has a policy to try to disrupt and delay reform. It is fair enough that that is the approach of the Leader of the Opposition, but I ask the question: does the opposition have a policy for local government? Does it have a vision for local government for this century? I suspect the answer is no. Its only approach is to try to delay and disrupt. The opposition has a political strategy, but no policy at all. Ms M.M. Quirk: What about your policy? Mr C.J. BARNETT: If the member for Girrawheen listens, I will outline it right now. The reality is that greater Perth has a population of just under 2 million people, and it is growing strongly. The growth is in the outer suburbs, with high-residential redevelopment within the inner city suburbs. The greater Perth area is an integrated metropolitan area; it is not comprised of 30 little agencies or councils. It would be an easy issue to walk away from, but the Liberal Party will not walk away from it, as the opposition certainly would. I remind the house that there are 138 local authorities in Western Australia, and 30 within Perth. Some administer areas of less than five square kilometres. There are farms in Western Australia far bigger than that. In country areas there are councils with fewer than 1 000 people, some with fewer than 500 people and one with fewer than 250 people. Most primary schools are bigger than that—and the opposition thinks there is no reason for reform. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Warnbro, I call you to order for the first time. There is plenty of time for everybody to speak. Mr C.J. BARNETT: I also make the point that the minister has made repeatedly: there has been little or no change in the Perth boundaries, apart from the outer growth, in the past 100 years. The opposition keeps talking
[ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] 7881 about the forgotten people of the western suburbs. On my latest count, there are 48 local councillors in the seat of Cottesloe! If we take the wider western suburbs — Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for West Swan, I call you to order for the first time. Premier. Mr C.J. BARNETT: I am addressing the Chair, Mr Speaker. If we take the wider western suburbs, there are 70 local councillors—nearly as many members as those in this house—administering the western suburbs. The opposition tells me that we should not be reforming. Of course we should! There are local governments that cover less than five square kilometres. Get up to speed—it is the twenty-first century, not the nineteenth century. Mr J.R. Quigley interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Butler, I call you to order for the first time. Mr C.J. BARNETT: Since 1918, there has been report after report about the structure of local government. In the post-war period alone, there have been eight major reports and investigations into local government, and they pretty well all reach the same conclusion: there should be fewer and larger, viable local governments. Even the report of the Western Australian Local Government Association found that something like 80 local governments were not sustainable, including some in the metropolitan area. “Not sustainable” means they will go broke or their residents and ratepayers will have enormous future increases in local rates just to pay salaries. But the opposition thinks we should not go near it. Several members interjected. Mr C.J. BARNETT: Tell us the Labor Party policy, because the leader did not. The Leader of the Opposition gave no policy commitment at all. I look forward now to hearing the policy of the Labor Party. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Girrawheen, I do not want you upsetting yourself like this. I call you to order for the first time. Mr C.J. BARNETT: Why are we doing this? Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Members! Mr C.J. BARNETT: Why are we doing it? It is not easy, and one of the reasons for that is the way in which the Local Government Act is drafted. It is a very difficult piece of law to deal with. It might just be that a reduced number of viable, significant but more evenly sized local governments will provide more and better services to their residents. There is no doubt about that at all. There will be significant economies of scale, particularly in areas like the western suburbs. There will be cost savings. I am sure the minister will talk about it, but there will be something like $6 million of savings just by these changes. There will be less duplication, less inconsistency of local government laws and less red tape. The Minister for Planning has done an enormous job in removing red tape. The major constraint now is the 30 local authorities across greater metropolitan Perth. There will be more consistency for a family building a house, for example. The rules will be similar across the metropolitan area and the state. Ms S.F. McGurk interjected. Mr C.J. BARNETT: That is a charming comment! In looking at not only 30 small local governments, but also across greater metropolitan Perth, as the city grows we have to have good land use planning, including subregional centres of employment within Perth. We need to look at the density of Perth in different areas of development. We have environmental issues, the Swan River being one. How many local authorities are there on the Swan River, minister? Mr A.J. Simpson: Seventeen. Mr C.J. BARNETT: Seventeen. People talk about fixing the Swan River. There are 17 local authorities. Does the opposition think that is sensible? I do not. We have major infrastructure issues, particularly in transport. We are planning and developing major infrastructure, like the rail line out to Forrestfield and the airport, like the extension through the northern suburbs, like the light rail or whatever happens to the north of Perth—all those things require cooperation and partnerships between the state and local governments. Small, probably unsustainable local governments cannot partner with either the state or federal government in major issues of land, environment, infrastructure, zoning or higher residential densities. This is about planning Perth, where 75 per cent of Western Australians live. That is why it is important, that is why the Liberal Party has a policy, and that is why the Liberal Party is acting.
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Mr D.J. Kelly: Does that include the National Party? Mr C.J. BARNETT: The National Party can speak for itself, but the Liberal Party will do this—we will do it! Ms S.F. McGurk: What happens in cabinet? Mr C.J. BARNETT: I will get to that. The recommendations of the Local Government Advisory Board, under the directions of the Local Government Act and the minister, took on this task. It has come back to government with a very comprehensive report that looks at the viability and sustainability of local government and all the issues—the big picture, detailed look. The recommendation is that we go from 30 to 16 local councils, and the government accepts that. That is what we accepted. Mr M. McGowan: You excluded five. Mr C.J. BARNETT: Listen, son; listen. Mr M. McGowan interjected. Mr C.J. BARNETT: I am speaking to the Chair. The recommendation is to go from 30 to 16, and we have accepted that. We have agreed, and we have released the report. I am asking the opposition to please listen, because it is not listening. We have released the report, as we said we would. We have accepted that we will go from 30 to 16 local authorities, and we have accepted the boundaries put forward by the Local Government Advisory Board—with two exceptions. There is one principal exception relating to the City of Perth and the consequential effect on the western suburbs. We started this process three to four years ago. While standing on top of one of the towers in Perth, I made the point that we are going to establish a capital city with the major institutions of the state within it, and that that was our prime objective as a government. The Local Government Advisory Board, I think, took more of a metropolitan view; that is fine. The state government’s policy is to create a City of Perth, a true capital city for our state—if you like, Australia’s west coast capital. That should be the status of the City of Perth. It is a unique situation. That is the unique council amongst all others, and it has therefore been treated differently. The City of Perth will be established through legislation giving it the status of a capital city. There may be different rules that are yet to be drafted, but there is capital city legislation certainly for Melbourne and, I understand, Adelaide. The major facilities of the state will be included—Parliament and the courts. We will add to existing facilities Kings Park, the Queen Elizabeth II Medical Centre and the University of Western Australia and the area immediately surrounding it. They are state iconic institutions that should and will be within the City of Perth so that it will be a true capital city. That has been state government policy—certainly Liberal policy—for a long time. Bear in mind that areas like Crawley are already in the City of Perth, so there is nothing too radical about this. Taking, if you like, the eastern edge of Nedlands and putting it in the City of Perth affects the boundaries recommended for the western suburbs, so we cannot accept the map of the western suburbs because it is consequentially changed by what we are doing for the City of Perth. I make the point that we accept the recommendation of the LGAB that the five councils in the western suburbs come together—that has not changed; they will come together, whether it is called Riversea or whatever else. So, they are not exempt or excluded. All we have is a practical requirement that facilities like UWA go into the City of Perth, and therefore the LGAB recommendation cannot stand. Perhaps we will resubmit how the process will work — Several members interjected. Mr C.J. BARNETT: It does not matter if we do. We will have to resubmit, but the five local governments — Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Girrawheen, I call you to order for the second time. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: I am on my feet! Mr C.J. BARNETT: In the western suburbs, yes, there will be a resubmission. That may just take a few weeks because we are not disagreeing with the objective—that is, the amalgamation of the five western suburbs. So it will not be another two years. The process may be five or six weeks. Mr B.S. Wyatt: Resubmit. Mr C.J. BARNETT: So what—because we cannot accept the boundary — Mr P. Papalia interjected. Mr C.J. BARNETT: I am pleased the member is concerned about the western — The SPEAKER: Member for Warnbro, I call you to order for the second time.
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Mr C.J. BARNETT: I walk the dog every morning and people say to me, “Hi, Col. Keep up the good work.” I have not had one person say to me, “Gee, don’t amalgamate the western suburbs.” I have not had one person come into my electorate office for six months on the issue because they do not care; they just want a good municipal service. The state government would prefer that the Burswood Casino and the new Perth Stadium were in the Perth capital city. The Local Government Advisory Board has recommended that we retain the natural boundary of the river. We have conceded that; we have agreed to that. At the briefing yesterday with the councillors and the local government representatives, I made it very clear that the casino area is already under the administration of the state. It will remain under the administration of the state covering the casino and the Burswood precinct so that the Town of Victoria Park—or South Park—has no role today. I explicitly said that in five years we will come back and have another look at that. In the meantime, the status quo is maintained and the Town of Victoria Park will continue to collect and retain the rates from the casino. I was quite clear about that. I could see a beaming smile on the Mayor of Victoria Park when I said that. We are now at the point at which the government has accepted the boundaries, with the exception of the City of Perth arrangement. We are now at the point of going into full implementation, and that will take a little while. There are local issues and particular points to deal with, but we are now into implementation. Can I again remind the house, as I did yesterday, that the cabinet of Western Australia made a decision. It is now — Mr M. McGowan: Part of the cabinet. Mr C.J. BARNETT: No, the Leader of the Opposition is not listening to the point. I am sure the Leader of the National Party will again explain his position. Several members interjected. Mr C.J. BARNETT: No; he can. That is the alliance arrangement. The National Party ministers were not present in cabinet; they left cabinet and cabinet made the decision. Whether the National Party ministers were there or not is of political interest — Mr P.B. Watson interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Albany! Mr C.J. BARNETT: It is of political interest. If legislation comes to the house, it may be of legislative importance, but in terms of a government decision, the cabinet has decided. As Premier, I have signed off on that. That is binding on every single institution within government. It is a formal cabinet decision and it has been signed off. That is the reality for every agency on planning, on development and on everything. As Premier, I say that that is the position. That is the case. We now move into implementation, and that will apply to put that plan in place. It will not happen overnight. It is complex under the Local Government Advisory Board. There will be a mix of legislation, amalgamation and boundary changes. We will work with those councils being most cooperative and they will gain benefits for their residents out of this process. If it takes one or two years, so be it, but it will be put in place. I wish the Nationals were with us on this but I guess they are sitting to one side. But the Liberal Party will put this in place. Through a range of programs and particularly royalties for regions, this government has provided enormous benefits to country and regional Western Australia that have been long overdue. I think that people in country areas think that the city has a right to make its decision. The children and the grandchildren of country people who probably mainly live in Perth will believe that it is a good idea to modernise local government and to move on from what has been in place for 100 years. The Labor Party has virtually no country members—there are a couple here—but it will be interesting to see whether the opposition members can develop a policy for local government in metropolitan Perth, or will they be the small — Mr B.S. Wyatt: Can you? Mr C.J. BARNETT: We have just outlined it. That is what we are doing. Will the Leader of the Opposition just be the small-minded person he appears to be and simply try to disrupt and delay? Do you have a policy? Mr M. McGowan: Do you have a policy? Mr C.J. BARNETT: I have just outlined exactly what we are doing. MR D.A. TEMPLEMAN (Mandurah) [11.04 am]: What a balls-up! What an absolute balls-up this is. The SPEAKER: Member for Mandurah, I think that you should tone down your language. There has been some very colourful language used in here of late, and I do not think it is very parliamentary—but continue.
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Mr D.A. TEMPLEMAN: What an absolute cluster. What a disastrous experience we find ourselves in now, less than 24 hours since the announcement of what was proposed as the biggest reform in local government in 100 years, and government members blew it. In less than 24 hours, they blew it. They already know that they will now have to go back to the Local Government Advisory Board because 3 000 people in two pockets in the metropolitan area, under the maps that the government released yesterday, have no representation. If ever there was a chance for a Prince Leonard to ride in and create a new province, now is the time. He can ride down the Broadway in Nedlands and set up a new province. He can ride into the hills of Mt Claremont and set up — Mr P.T. Miles interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Wanneroo, I call you to order for the second time. I want to hear about Prince Leonard. Mr D.A. TEMPLEMAN: He can set up a new province in Mt Claremont and establish himself as the emperor of that little regime. Let us be very clear about this. At the election in March 2013, the major parties, the Liberal and Labor Parties, had the same policy—they would not force amalgamations. Only one party broke its promise: it was the Premier, his minister and his Liberal Party. The Premier promised no forced amalgamations and then as soon as the election was over, he went ahead and through his process has forced amalgamations on the councils within the Perth metropolitan area. Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. The SPEAKER: Premier, I call you to order for the first time. Mr D.A. TEMPLEMAN: Only one party lied, and it was not us. The member for Belmont and the member for Perth, and there are others, should be very careful with what they say out there now because the residents of their areas in the Town of Vincent will be listening very carefully about whether there will be vote weighting, which was a contradiction yesterday. The Premier said one thing and the Minister for Local Government said another. These are examples of the absolute shambles that this government has had with regard to this policy. Let us remember that with this most significant announcement in local government reform for 100 years, the government did not even have the decency to come into this place yesterday and table the Local Government Advisory Board’s report — Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Minister for Local Government and Premier, I do not want to hear from you. I want to hear the member for Mandurah. Mr D.A. TEMPLEMAN: The government did not have the decency to do that. It is the natural, normal thing for a government to do if it is making an announcement that is of significance over the last 100 years to local government. The government did not do that—nor did it have the decency to make a brief ministerial statement when Parliament sat yesterday at 12 noon. When the government met yesterday with the mayors and the chief executive officers and made the announcement, they were not even allowed to ask any questions. All the government did was go in there, dump the maps on them, and say that this is what it is doing, and then it scurried outside to the media to tell us how wonderful it is and what a magnificent performance has been put on by the Liberal–National government to reform local government. Then today we find out that the government could not even get the maps right because now we know that a few thousand people do not have any representation. This is an example of the absolute shambolic process that the government has embarked upon over the last five years. If the Liberal Party had gone to the election promising no forced amalgamations, as we did, and kept to it, it would not have copped all the rubbish that it has copped—all of the deserving criticism and accusations by many about a lack of trust and doublespeak that the government has given throughout this process. The government would not have copped that if it had told the truth. If the government had gone to the 2013 election and said that it will not force amalgamations but if local government does not reform itself over a set period, it will move legislatively, it would have had a mandate. But the government does not have a mandate for the process that it has embarked upon. This process has been shambolic and pathetic. The motion before us today is very specific; it clearly asks why there is a discrepancy in the government’s maps and in its announcement that allows some people to have a democratic right and a say in the future of their local governments and others do not, including the people who live in Willetton, Riverton, Cannington, Belmont, Mundaring, Bassendean, Mt Lawley and Serpentine–Jarrahdale. The hypocrisy of this issue goes to the centre of the minister himself. His community of Serpentine–Jarrahdale will have no say. He promised them before the last election that they would not be forced into an amalgamation. In fact, he was forced to correct himself at a meeting of business leaders in Armadale during the election campaign at which the member for Armadale was present. Fewer than 24 hours later, he was forced to correct himself through a media statement by saying, specifically, that the Liberal Party does not and will not be forcing amalgamations. The minister has turned his back on his own community. The government will not be giving it a chance to have a say about its future. He has dumped this on the community. This is an example of the deceit and the utter distrust that many people in this
[ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] 7885 sector have because there is support for reform. The Labor Party supports reform in the sector but we will not tell lies. We will not lie to the sector and say that we will do one thing and immediately after an election do the opposite. That is what the Premier did. The Premier went to the election telling people one thing and then embarked on a process that did exactly the opposite. He disregarded the democratic rights of people to have a say through the Local Government Act and the Dadour poll provisions. This is an absolute shambles. It is the fault of the government; it is no-one else’s fault. It is the fault of the Premier—no-one else’s fault—because of his arrogance and the way that he has tried to impose his grand vision. He forgets about the detail and the democratic principles on which our system is based. He is to blame for this debacle. He has again demonstrated his arrogance. He should be condemned for a process that now sees people not represented at all under this pathetic, shambolic state of affairs. MR D.T. REDMAN (Warren–Blackwood — Leader of the National Party) [11.12 am]: I want to make some very brief comments to put the position of the National Party on the record. I want to make the point from the outset that we have these alliance arrangements with the Liberal Party that allow us to preserve our policy integrity on a number of issues. I can count only two or three issues in which we have had conflicting policy settings. Aside from those two or three issues, we have been very effective in government in delivering a range of very good outcomes for not only metropolitan Perth but also, significantly, regional Western Australia. The National Party also supports reform but we have a different position on the strategy of how that can be achieved. We want to maintain efficiencies in local government. We also want to protect the identity of local government. We have progressed and we are in discussions with the Minister for Local Government around some subsidiary legislation that we believe, certainly for the regional local governments that we represent, is a good strategy to help in that reform process. The Nationals’ position is that we have not supported forced reform, and that is a position that we stated from the outset. At the start of this term of government, we supported that in the metropolitan area as long as there was a preservation of our policy position for regional Western Australia. That was a very difficult position for us. We have taken the position since then that we will be withdrawing from that support in metropolitan areas. I think we have been consistent in our message. I certainly see it as a strength that we are able to preserve policy integrity in those arrangements. A number of issues come up when making these decisions, whether it is during a vote in the house or legislation, and the National Party will be taking a position that is consistent with its policy settings. MR A.J. SIMPSON (Darling Range — Minister for Local Government) [11.14 am]: The opposition’s motion, for which standing orders have been suspended, is quite interesting. The “Metropolitan Local Government District Inquiries Report” has been out for nearly 24 hours and is available on the internet. I noticed that the member for Cockburn was reading it yesterday afternoon; he asked me some questions about how the process unfolded. Let us get the facts right. As I have said in this house many times, the Local Government Advisory Board received 38 proposals from local governments. There were a number of suggestions for each of the identified proposals. Mr W.J. Johnston: Is any of that in there? Mr A.J. SIMPSON: Yes, it is all in the report. Mr W.J. Johnston: Show me. Mr A.J. SIMPSON: Page 93 quite clearly explains the boundary adjustments for amalgamation. Tabling of Paper Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: The minister is quoting from a document. I believe it is an official document. I ask him to table it. Mr A.J. SIMPSON: I am more than happy to. By making it available on the internet, I will save a bit of paper because the member will not have to print it. The SPEAKER: The document is tabled. [See paper 2324.] Debate Resumed Mr A.J. SIMPSON: I have 13 new proposals in front of me. I put in 12 proposals on behalf of the government. Of those 12, only one has got up. All the other proposals have come out of the sector. One came out of a community group in Cockburn. It asked for an amalgamation with a boundary adjustment; hence, the advisory board recommended that the Town of Victoria Park and the City of South Perth be amalgamated. Mr F.M. Logan interjected.
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Mr A.J. SIMPSON: They did ask for a boundary adjustment. The SPEAKER: Minister, through the Chair, please. Mr A.J. SIMPSON: The report clearly sets out how the Local Government Advisory Board came up with the proposals. It refers to each proposal, it goes through each of the proposals and it explains how it came up with that proposal. It is interesting to have a conversation about the democratic vote and the case for a boundary adjustment versus amalgamation. That is what the sector asked for. We have adopted its proposal. Ms R. Saffioti: Who is the sector? Mr A.J. SIMPSON: The sector is the local governments that have put proposals to the advisory board. Its proposals are in this report. Ms R. Saffioti interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for West Swan, there is only a short time to go. Mr A.J. SIMPSON: They are the proposals that the advisory board accepted and recommended to me. Again, I can only accept or reject. As to the proposed city of Riversea and the little orphan suburb on the side, we made it very clear yesterday that we totally agree with the advisory board that Riversea, which amalgamates five councils, is a very good concept of local government. Unfortunately, we cannot accept that proposal because the boundary will be moved when the City of Perth act comes in. We will work through that very quickly to get that boundary sorted and go back to the advisory board. Several members interjected. Mr A.J. SIMPSON: More importantly, because the advisory board has already done the work, all we have to do is make site boundary adjustments in the original proposal. It is quite straightforward; it can be done with no dramas at all and it can go back to the advisory board to come up with a proposal. More importantly, the decision made yesterday is a milestone for local government. I have been reading all the tweets, emails and text messages. The sector is excited by it. We finally got a decision. It has been asking for a decision. We worked long and hard over 17 weeks of public submissions to get to this process. This is the right decision. We need to get on board and ensure that local government is sustainable into the future. MR B.S. WYATT (Victoria Park) [11.18 am]: After five long years, the Premier asks the Labor Party, “What is your policy? We will have to resubmit 3 000 people in the Gotham City of Perth without a government.” He probably achieved the one thing he wanted to achieve: he reduced government in two little areas of Perth. There is not a government to be seen, and after five years he says, “We have to resubmit.” What an extraordinary performance! I note that neither the Premier, the leader of the National Party nor the Minister for Local Government dealt with these abandoned Western Australians, out there now in their tax havens. Perhaps the Premier has a retirement plan to run both of them. Pieces of Perth have been missed out. What is going on? It has taken five years. The Premier’s buddy Mal could not even get that right after all this time, yet we are still waiting for an explanation. The Premier does not have a policy. This is the problem. We are still waiting for his policy. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: I have allowed some latitude. There are only three minutes to go. I do not want any more interruptions. Mr B.S. WYATT: We are still waiting for the policy that outlines when it will have to resubmit. The Premier’s western suburbs buddies went through his backbench like a dose of salts: “We will push that off to Mal to do something about them at some point in the future.” However, they can do whatever they want, apparently, with the Gotham City bits. Then the Premier asks, “What is the Labor Party’s policy?” Let us not forget that this is his vote weighting. I note that the Minister for Local Government has said that there will not be any vote weighting. The government may not call it “vote weighting”, but I can tell members that the votes will be weighted. I note that an article in The West Australian states — Mr Simpson poured cold water on the prospect but the Premier suggested he could look at capital city legislation similar to that in the City of Melbourne, which has weighted votes. The government may not call it vote weighting; it might call it the prestige of the City of Perth or the prestige of the University of Western Australia, but there will still be weighted votes. One curious thing in all of this is that a couple of different cabinets are operating. The Premier said that this is a formal cabinet position that has been taken and all those government bodies had better look out, but then the Leader of the National Party said on radio that he was not part of the cabinet decision on council reform. I do not
[ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] 7887 know who is in and who is out of this cabinet. Maybe in honour of the late Gough Whitlam, the Premier has gone back to that original strategy. He and his buddy Kim are sitting there making decisions: “We are the cabinet. Those twits will come along with us.” Of course, the Leader of the National Party is letting the Premier go for it; he has taken a few steps back, because he can see this ticking time bomb that everyone else can see, except for the member for Perth, who, in an extraordinary act of self-destruction, said to the minister, “Well done, minister, for that sterling performance during your debate”, not quite realising that the people of Vincent are sharpening their knives as we head towards Christmas. It has been five years and the Premier has forgotten some Western Australians, yet he asks, “What is the Labor Party’s policy?” Once he gets up and finally explains some things—maybe even a time frame or what the policy is—we might have something to debate. I think the one person who has worked out that there is a lack of any policy fortitude is the Leader of the National Party. He has worked this out, and all Western Australians can work out that after five years, it is nothing but a sham. Question put and passed.
PUBLIC ACCOUNTS COMMITTEE Eighth Report — “Review of Auditor General Reports No. 3: Selected Reports 2012 and 2013” — Tabling MR S.K. L’ESTRANGE (Churchlands) [11.22 am]: I present for tabling the eighth report of the Public Accounts Committee — Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Members! If you want a private meeting, go outside. If you want to shout across the chamber, I suggest that you do not. Mr S.K. L’ESTRANGE: I present for tabling the eighth report of the Public Accounts Committee entitled “Review of Auditor General Reports No. 3: Selected Reports 2012 and 2013”. [See paper 2325.] Mr S.K. L’ESTRANGE: This is the third report of the Public Accounts Committee of the thirty-ninth Parliament into how public sector agencies have responded to recommendations made in Auditor General performance audits. The committee has an important role to play in following up the audits of the Auditor General to ensure that the recommendations made are properly implemented by the audited public sector agencies. Due to the volume of Auditor General reports, the committee sought to find a balance between the effort connected to the Auditor General follow-up process and other inquiry-related committee work. The committee has therefore implemented a streamlined process of follow-up and reporting in order to better manage the workload, while still ensuring adequate scrutiny of the audited agencies. In previous reports to Parliament on the committee’s Auditor General follow-up work, the committee dedicated a discrete chapter for each performance audit. These chapters would often conclude with the committee simply noting its satisfaction with the adequacy of the agency responses without making any findings or recommendations. Under the new reporting approach, the committee will list such audits in a summary table rather than writing up an entire chapter. The committee stresses that its decision to conclude such audit follow-ups is based on its satisfaction with the general adequacy of initial responses undertaken by the agencies. The committee may opt to return to any of these audits at a later time if it believes circumstances warrant further examination of a particular agency’s actions. Under the revised reporting approach, the committee will include a chapter on follow-ups only when the topic of the performance audit is of significant public interest and findings and recommendations are warranted. Within this report, the committee notes the satisfactory conclusion of seven Auditor General follow-up processes and the referral of one audit to the Economics and Industry Standing Committee. These are detailed in chapter 1, along with a list of outstanding follow-up processes. The committee also provides an extended commentary on three audits. The first one is included in chapter 2, “Report 7 of 2012: Pharmaceuticals: Purchase and Management of Pharmaceuticals in Public Hospitals”; the second is included in chapter 3, “Report 11 of 2012: Second Public Sector Performance Report — Housing Authority’s Head Contractor Maintenance Model”; and the third is included in chapter 4, “Report 8 of 2013: Follow-up Performance Audit of Behind the Evidence: Forensic Services (2006)”. I want to highlight to the house some of the recommendations that stand out in those three chapters in this report. I will refer firstly to the Auditor General’s seventh report of 2012 entitled “Pharmaceuticals: Purchase and Management of Pharmaceuticals in Public Hospitals”. The committee’s first recommendation states — WA Health must ensure that its policy on the acceptance of gifts and travel benefits is rigorously and effectively communicated and enforced. The committee also recommends —
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WA Health needs to exercise ongoing vigilance to improving security systems and monitoring processes in the areas of hospitals where pharmaceuticals are administered to patients. In particular, WA Health should give priority to using the relevant information it acquires from the configuration of Fiona Stanley Hospital to promptly develop a solution for improving security systems in these areas at all public hospitals. In chapter 3, “Report 11 of 2012: Second Public Sector Performance Report — Housing Authority’s Head Contractor Maintenance Model”, the committee made a further two recommendations. Recommendation 3 states — Given that 35 per cent of the Housing Authority maintenance work is on jobs valued at under $500, the Housing Authority should include in its Annual Report the methodology and outcome of its audit of random samples of maintenance jobs valued at under $500 Recommendation 4 states — The Housing Authority should include in its Annual Report a comprehensive summary of the performance of the Head Contractor Maintenance Model. Using Key Performance Indicator data obtained from its Head Contractors, this summary should demonstrate the extent to which the model is driving better maintenance outcomes in the areas of timeliness, reduced costs, and quality of workmanship. In chapter 4, “Report 8 of 2013: Follow-up Performance Audit of Behind the Evidence: Forensic Services (2006)”, the committee made a further two recommendations. Recommendation 5 states — The Minister for Science, as part of his upcoming report to Parliament on the recently completed independent review of the Chemistry Centre (WA) Act 2007, indicate what actions might be taken to resolve the current difficulties surrounding the Memorandum of Understanding and funding model for forensic services between WA Police and the Chemistry Centre WA. Recommendation 6 states — The Minister for Police report to Parliament on options to resolve the current difficulties surrounding the Memorandum of Understanding and funding model for forensic services between WA Police and the Chemistry Centre WA. Finally, I thank the committee members, in particular the deputy chairman, Mr Ben Wyatt, MLA; Mrs Glenys Godfrey, MLA; Mr Bill Johnston, MLA; and Mr Matt Taylor, MLA, for their continuing dedication to the work of the Public Accounts Committee in following up the Auditor General’s reports. I also thank the committee secretariat, Mr Tim Hughes, Ms Michele Chiasson, Mr Daniel Govus and Ms Lucy Roberts, for their work for the committee in this area. MR B.S. WYATT (Victoria Park) [11.30 am]: I rise to make a brief comment on the Public Accounts Committee’s latest report, “Review of Auditor General Reports No. 3: Selected Reports 2012 and 2013”. I start by acknowledging all my colleagues on that committee, particularly as I was not in the Parliament to speak to the previous report we tabled that looked into the Public Sector Management Act and, of course, I thank our secretariat, Tim Hughes, Ms Michele Chiasson, Daniel Govus and Lucy Roberts. I commend also the member for Churchlands, who took over as chair during the year from the member for Alfred Cove, and has done so with some gusto. I do not want to speak to all the different reports that are outlined in this report; I want to focus on one in particular but also note that the committee has spent some time trying to adopt a different structure so that we do not spend all our time dealing with and following up Auditor General reports. They are, of course, important roles but not the sole role of the committee. After some conversations with Public Accounts Committee colleagues of other Parliaments, we have adopted a more streamlined approach—more of a triage model—while leaving the committee to make final decisions on the importance of the Auditor General’s recommendations. The report I would like to focus on is report 8 of 2013, which the committee followed up, titled “Follow-up Performance Audit of Behind the Evidence: Forensic Services (2006)”. This is an interesting and very important report of the Auditor General. He has done two reports into this matter: one in 2006 and a follow-up report in 2013. The 2013 follow-up report acknowledged that some of the issues the Auditor General raised in the 2006 report, and the backlog, had been rectified. However, a number of issues have resulted in two recommendations from the committee to the Minister for Science and the Minister for Police. It is interesting that at paragraph 4.6 of the report the committee found that of the 70 ChemCentre cases sampled in the audit, only 13 were analysed within agreed time frames pursuant to the memorandum of understanding. The report states — WA Police is concerned that legislative changes introduced in 2007, which allowed ChemCentre to undertake external commercial work, may be affecting the time the agency takes to process WA Police requests. It states at paragraph 4.8 —
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While WA Police is the custodian of all forensic exhibits, these items are stored in ChemCentre and PathWest laboratories. The Auditor General noted that the information systems that record the location of exhibits at these agencies are not linked to WA Police’s Forensic Register and that location details have to be manually uploaded. These are very important processes that, if not followed correctly and are not adequately resourced, may have implications for police operations and the criminal justice system. Although they appear to be falling behind due to budgetary issues, there is now an element of urgency so that a significant criminal trial may become unstuck due to trail-of-evidence issues or the ability for ChemCentre and WA Police forensics to adequately follow and control evidence. Hence our two recommendations on this matter. Recommendation 5 reads — The Minister for Science, as part of his upcoming report to Parliament on the recently completed independent review of the Chemistry Centre (WA) Act 2007, indicate what actions might be taken to resolve the current difficulties surrounding the Memorandum of Understanding and funding model for forensic services between WA Police and the Chemistry Centre WA. Further, which obviously flows from that, there is a similar recommendation that — The Minister for Police report to Parliament on options to resolve the current difficulties surrounding the Memorandum of Understanding and funding model for forensic services between WA Police and the Chemistry Centre WA. Although, in people’s minds this may fall within the general category of machinery-of-government issues for the Auditor General, the implications of not adequately funding and ensuring those ministers follow-up to ensure the MOU between WA Police and the ChemCentre of WA is adequately implemented, could, indeed, have dire consequences. I have highlighted the potential consequences for future operations of the justice system. That is the one report I wanted to emphasise in my commentary today and, again, to thank the secretariat of the Public Accounts Committee and my fellow parliamentary colleagues who are the four members of that committee. TAXATION LEGISLATION AMENDMENT BILL (NO. 2) 2014 Introduction and First Reading Bill introduced, on motion by Mr D.C. Nalder (Minister for Finance), and read a first time. Explanatory memorandum presented by the minister. Second Reading MR D.C. NALDER (Alfred Cove — Minister for Finance) [11.35 am]: I move — That the bill be now read a second time. This Taxation Legislation Amendment Bill (No. 2) seeks to amend the Land Tax Assessment Act 2002 and the Duties Act 2008. Included in the amendments to the Land Tax Assessment Act is a long overdue modernisation and simplification of the exemption from land used for primary production. The proposed amendments in the bill are based on recommendations from an informal review of the operation of the exemption by the Department of Treasury and the Department of Finance’s Office of State Revenue. It is the most comprehensive review of this exemption in over 35 years. The review was initiated in 2012, following a determination that primary producers who sold produce in a processed or converted state rather than a natural state were ineligible for the exemption. To illustrate this problem, if a primary producer used the land to grow grapes and then produced and sold wine, rather than the grapes, the exemption would be denied. This is because the current exemption in the legislation does not extend to secondary production. The review also considered the overall operation of the exemption, particularly in relation to the one-third income test and the owner–user rule that landowners in non-rural zones must currently satisfy to be eligible for the exemption. In addition, the review considered the need for the multiple appeal options currently available to landowners. Under the proposed amendments, the exemption will apply even when primary produce is sold in a processed or converted state. However, when the processing or conversion of produce takes place on the same property used for primary production, a partial exemption will apply to that portion of the land used to grow the produce, but will not apply to the portion of land used to process or convert the produce. This will ensure competitive neutrality with secondary processors that do not conduct a primary production activity. As a result, when land is being used for both primary production and secondary processing as part of an integrated business, only a partial exemption will apply. The amendments seek to also abolish the one-third income test and the 50 per cent concession for those who fail the one-third income test. This test currently requires landowners in non-rural zones to earn at least one-third of their total net income from primary production business in Western Australia. The one-third income test will be replaced with a more modern and flexible genuine business test.
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The proposed business test is based on common law and considers a range of factors in determining whether a genuine primary production business is being conducted on the land. The business test will consider factors such as the size, scale and permanency of the activity and whether the activity has a prospect of profit and is carried on in a businesslike manner, rather than as a hobby. Although rural land is not currently subject to the one-third income test, the primary production business test that currently applies to rural land will be adjusted so that the same genuine business test is applied to both rural and non-rural land. In practice, this change is expected to have no or minimal impact on the treatment of rural land. The amendments also seek to expand the owner–user rule, which requires a landowner in a non-rural zone to also be the user of the land. This rule was introduced in 1976 in response to substantial tax avoidance whereby owners of valuable land, often held on a speculative basis for future development purposes, avoided land tax via the primary production exemption. The Commissioner of State Revenue currently has discretionary power to allow an exemption in certain circumstances, and this has been exercised when the user of the land is closely related by blood or marriage to the owner. However, when the owner of the land is a natural person, the commissioner will not apply the discretion to grant an exemption to a business carried out by a related company or trust. The proposed amendments seek to broaden the legislation to allow the user of the land to include certain related family members based on the definition of “family member” in the Duties Act 2008. This will enable taxpayers to adopt modern business structures and still access the primary production exemption. Consideration was given to removing the owner–user rule entirely for land located in non-rural zones. Based on past history, it was deemed necessary to retain this rule in its expanded form to prevent tax avoidance and land banking in the metropolitan area. As the proposed amendments replace the commissioner’s discretion in relation to the one-third income test and owner–user rule, the appeal options relating to these criteria are no longer required. This bill also streamlines the appeal rights associated with the primary production exemption, bringing taxpayers into line with usual rights of objection and subsequent appeal to the State Administrative Tribunal. The final primary production amendment seeks to clarify the definition of a “rural business”. Under the current arrangements, there is potential for confusion when the term is used in the context of a non-rural zone. It is therefore proposed to replace the definition of “rural business” with the term “primary production business”. The new definition would align with the corresponding definition in the Duties Act 2008 and is expected to have no or minimal impact on the number of exemption recipients. The proposals resulting from the review were the subject of a public consultation process. Feedback on the specific amendments has been generally supportive, although some suggested the exemption should be further broadened. The amendments to the primary production exemption are to commence operation from 1 July 2014, allowing the updated exemption to apply to land tax assessments for 2014–15. Although the Department of Finance has commenced issuing 2014–15 land tax assessment notices, assessment notices relating to land likely to be affected by the amendments will be suspended pending the passage of this bill. Other amendments to the Land Tax Assessment Act included in the bill relate to the granting of partial exemptions. The then Minister for Finance foreshadowed these amendments in Parliament last November, following a decision of the State Administrative Tribunal that overturned the longstanding practice of allowing a partial exemption only when land is not being fully used for an exempt purpose. If left unaddressed, the tribunal decision would have set a precedent, putting at risk millions of dollars of land tax revenue, because a landowner could enjoy an exemption for an entire piece of land by using just a small portion of it for an exempt purpose. The relevant amendments restore the longstanding policy position that exemptions are applied only to the part of the land that is actually used for an exempt purpose. As was flagged last November, these amendments will have effect from 1 July 2003, the date on which the Land Tax Assessment Act commenced operation. They will not impact retrospectively on the matter decided by the State Administrative Tribunal or other matters that were in dispute at the time of the announcement. The bill also contains two amendments to improve the efficacy of the Duties Act. The landholder duty provisions seek to impose duty on certain indirect acquisitions of land made through the purchase of interests in corporations and unit trust schemes, including land owned by subsidiaries of the entity in which the acquisition was made. There is an anomalous difference in the treatment of an agreement for the sale or purchase of a subsidiary that owns land, and an agreement for the sale or purchase of a direct interest in land by an entity or its subsidiary. This results in an inequitable duty outcome upon the sale of a subsidiary and a potential avoidance opportunity for the purchase of a subsidiary. The amendments seek to address this anomaly by aligning the treatment of the two forms of agreements. In the case of the amendments that work in favour of taxpayers, the amendments will apply retrospectively from 1 July 2008, the commencement date of the Duties Act. Finally, taxpayers continue to attempt to shift value away from dutiable property, such as land and chattels, to other assets that do not attract duty. These situations most commonly occur in transfers of interests in mining
[ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] 7891 companies, when attempts to minimise the value of dutiable mining tenements are made by arguing that significant portions of a transaction’s value should be attributed to items such as mining information. Although the Duties Act already contains provisions that address how information should be treated, it continues to be necessary to counter such arguments from taxpayers and their representatives. The bill seeks to improve the operation of the valuation provisions of the Duties Act by clarifying that, when valuing dutiable property, information relating to the property is to be regarded as an attribute of the property and not a separate item to which an independent value can be ascribed. These amendments do not change the current policy surrounding the treatment of information. The associated explanatory memorandum contains further details on the amendments. The amendments in this bill are not expected to have a significant budget impact. I commend the bill to the house. Debate adjourned, on motion by Ms S.F. McGurk. PETROLEUM TITLES (BROWSE BASIN) BILL 2014 Declaration as Urgent MR W.R. MARMION (Nedlands — Minister for Mines and Petroleum) [11.45 am]: Pursuant to standing order 168(2), I move — That the Petroleum Titles (Browse Basin) Bill 2014 be considered an urgent bill. I would like to thank the opposition for its support and cooperation with this motion. We are bringing forward the debate on this bill as a result of the opposition’s agreement that it is happy for this bill to be dealt with today, and I thank the opposition spokesperson for that. For the information of the house, since Geoscience Australia advised the state of new high-water features that changed the delineation of Western Australia’s coastal waters, the Department of Mines and Petroleum has been working on the legislative response required. The department has been working on very tight deadlines throughout this process, and it has met each one. Parliament now needs to pass this legislation before the current retention leases, which expire on 23 December, can be renewed. I urge all members to support this motion. MR W.J. JOHNSTON (Cannington) [11.46 am]: The opposition supports the motion that the Petroleum Titles (Browse Basin) Bill 2014 be declared urgent. I make the point that on a number of occasions when the government has sought to have legislation declared urgent, it has been because of its incompetence. The Minister for Environment recently declared a bill urgent when it was urgent only because the government had spent 15 months doing nothing. However, on this occasion, that is not the case. The issues that arise in this bill became known only in May this year, and the formal advice I think was received only six or eight weeks ago. Therefore, although the government obviously began to act when it was advised of the issue, it could not take formal action until it had been formally advised by the commonwealth government. There is no doubt that this bill needs to be passed before Christmas. If this bill is not passed in this chamber this week, it will be difficult to get it through the other chamber before Christmas. This is important legislation, and, when we get to the second reading debate, we will run through why that is the case. That is why the opposition supports the motion that this bill be declared urgent. I also make the observation that we were advised that the government wanted to declare this bill urgent by way of correspondence last week from the Leader of the House to the leader of opposition business. I think the Minister for Mines and Petroleum might have not realised that he had to get this bill through this house today in order to get it through the other house before Christmas—I think he may have had wrong information about the time line in the other house. I left Parliament last Thursday thinking that we would not be dealing with this bill until Parliament resumed in November. It was only by way of that correspondence from the leader of government business that we found out that we would have to deal with this bill today. But we do accept that we have to deal with it today. I am not trying to excessively embarrass the minister for having given me the wrong advice last week. I am sure that was because of what he had been told and not — Ms R. Saffioti: You’re being very nice today, member! Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: I am! Mr P.C. Tinley: He’s warming up! Mr B.S. Wyatt: Ridiculously! Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: Yes! I am warming up—ridiculously, I know—and I will get another tweet from Gareth Parker about how I am being friendly to a government member, which is what happened the last time I said that I was not here for a fight. I think the Minister for Mines and Petroleum, when he replies to the second reading, might acknowledge Hon Kate Doust who pointed out to him that he would get it through the other house on the previously understood time line. We are happy to do it. This is an example of what these provisions
7892 [ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] are designed for—not for dealing with the repeal of defunct legislation, as we did last year and all those other times that a minister did not get his or her act together. This is one of those genuine times when the government needs to declare a bill urgent. What happens? The opposition cooperates. Question put and passed. Second Reading Resumed from 15 October.
MR W.J. JOHNSTON (Cannington) [11.50 am]: I rise to open the opposition’s contribution to debate on the Petroleum Titles (Browse Basin) Bill 2014. We received a briefing yesterday from departmental staff. As the Minister for Mines and Petroleum explained in his second reading speech and was explained in detail in the explanatory memorandum, this bill is required because the extent of state waters is different today from what it was understood to be in the past. We were advised by the departmental officers that this bill was introduced because two cyclones—cyclone Fay in 2004 and cyclone Greg in 2006; it might have been a bit later—blew through the Scott Reef area of the Browse Basin, the offshore Kimberley, and deposited rocks onto a number of reefs that are now, through the process of the geological survey, declared to be land. As they are land, those reefs are now state territory; therefore, the area extending three miles around that is also now state waters. One of these is Seringapatam Reef, which is over an exploration licence, and the other one is Scott Reef, which includes north and south Scott Reef. That is smack bang over the top of the Torosa gas field—one of those monster gas fields that we are lucky as Australians to have in our national economic zone. I will leave aside the exploration permits for a minute; I will just talk about the Torosa gas field. The Torosa gas field was partly already in state waters and recognised land—from a place called Sandy Islet. By the way, I am advised by the departmental advisers that even if a storm comes along later and removes the land, we keep it. Once it is given to us, it is forever considered land and the commonwealth cannot take it back. Ms R. Saffioti: They can’t tow those rocks away! Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: No. The commonwealth cannot blow them up. Maybe it would get the members for Churchlands and Willagee to go out one night and blow them up or something. But they cannot do that. It also made me think that we should get a load of sand and start dropping it over other known oilfields! Mr W.R. Marmion interjected. Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: I was thinking a couple of thousand feet to build up over a couple of other oilfields. It is probably worthwhile. Ms R. Saffioti: You should try it! Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: Yes, I could try it. Because the Torosa field has been known for a long time—about 35 years—it is held under what is called a retention lease, which is the right for that field to be exploited by a particular company. The retention lease expires at the end of this year. If there is nothing in place through this legislation, the commonwealth could not grant an extension to the retention lease, so the part of the gas field that is in what we now know to be state waters and state lands would be open to somebody else to apply to exploit that portion of the field. That would obviously be very attractive, because we know the field is there; we know it is a humungous gas reserve. We would have to beat the oil companies off with a stick to get them away from claiming that. Under normal arrangements, the companies that have the retention lease have obligations in respect of those leases but, obviously, also rights. This bill creates an equivalent state right to equal the existing commonwealth right so that the companies are not disadvantaged in any way by the fact these reefs, islands and state waters et cetera now extend over the top of the Torosa field. The exploration leases are slightly different because that is a right to look, rather than a right to exploit. If at some future date something is found, they will have to go through those other processes to get a retention lease or a production licence. We are not certain that there is anything under those particular waters. It is creating an equivalent right under this stand-alone state legislation that is exactly the same as the exploration right that gas companies have under the commonwealth arrangements. The minister can correct me if I am wrong: those two exploration leases do not quite line up in their expiry dates. This bill means the new state rights will have the same common termination date rather than different termination dates, particularly because one of those state rights will cover a very small amount of ocean, because of the interaction between the new state boundary and the existing commonwealth exploration title. This legislation goes to the heart of one of the most important natural resources we have in Western Australia— natural gas. Western Australians are justifiably proud of the fact that we are the dominating force in exported liquefied natural gas from Australia at the moment. Of course there is one LNG production train and another one under construction in the Northern Territory, but compared with the five trains on the North West Shelf project,
[ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] 7893 the one train at Pluto, the three trains under construction on Barrow Island for the Gorgon project and the two trains under construction for Wheatstone, the one and a bit in the Northern Territory is not a lot. However, Curtis Island in Queensland currently has three projects under construction and a fourth under consideration; although it is likely that the fourth project will not proceed as a stand-alone project. It is much more likely that the gas resource will be processed through either an expansion or some other way through one of the three projects currently under construction. One way or another, Western Australia is currently the dominant force in Australian LNG. Most of the gas that is processed for export is in commonwealth waters. I will start with the North West Shelf. I am currently reading Gareth Evans’ book Inside the Hawke–Keating Government: A Cabinet Diary. A lot of that is about the negotiations between the commonwealth, the state and the proponents for the North West Shelf LNG project and its original two trains. It has five export trains and two domestic trains. Domestic trains were used because back in the late 1970s early 1980s, when that project was coming to fruition, LNG was not a mature technology and the project could not work without government assistance, and government assistance was in the form of a massive take-or-pay contract for domestic gas. In fact, the price we paid for domestic gas out of the North West Shelf joint venture was higher than the export price, because again back in the late 1970s and early 1980s gas was considered a waste product, and in many parts of the world it was flared—even large volumes were being flared in the Middle East—and effectively given away free. In the 1970s, after the Arab oil embargo led to an increase in the price of oil from what had been historically $2.50 a barrel to $20 and later $50 and $100, suddenly people looked around the world for hydrocarbons, and a lot of gas, not oil, was found off the coast of Australia. At that time, the federal government was trying to get to the condensates in that gas, because condensate can be used instead of crude oil for certain products, including petrol. There was this huge resource of gas, but the gas effectively did not have any value, and there was the underlying condensate that had a high value and was going to help Australia in its energy security. That is what the federal government at the time was trying to get at. The state government, obviously, under Sir Richard Court at the time, wanted development, and this was seen as a good way to create development. Mr W.R. Marmion: Sir Charles Court. Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: I apologise; I got the name wrong. Mr B.S. Wyatt: He would be delighted by that! Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: He would be very happy with “sir”. Sir Charles Court was prepared to take a huge risk, and his risk was, of course, the take-or-pay contract for domestic gas, and, as I said, that price was above the export price of gas. All those years later, and after all the different changes—the break-up of the original take-or-pay contract, changing it to a term contract, and all the different changes that occurred—suddenly in the early 2000s there were changes in the gas price. The export price by then was generally a bit above the domestic price of gas because the original price index by inflation had not increased that much. But then came a period of expansion in Western Australia and suddenly there was not enough gas after years and years of an oversupply. If members want the details, they should read the “Economics and Industry Standing Committee Inquiry into Domestic Gas Prices”, the sixth report of the thirty-eighth Parliament, which had a great deputy chair and was a great inquiry! The report explains in detail what happened to the supply gap. Western Australia ended up having an undersupply of gas, and, therefore, the price started to spike. For a range of reasons that had nothing to do with any oil company in Western Australia; the price of gas into north Asia also went up. I have to comment, too, that not all contracts to north Asia had a high price, because at the same time in 2000 and 2001, the North West Shelf joint venture partners, through the vehicle of Australian LNG, as the company was called, negotiated the Guangdong gas contract. Again the committee report outlines that they did not index it to oil. Mr F.M. Logan: The deal of the century! Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: It was the deal of the century for the buyers. In fact, the price was so low that the news reports at the time were stating that executives of the selling companies were lobbying the Prime Minister of Australia at the signing ceremony to get him to ask for a higher price, because, of course, there was a deal between Australian and international hydrocarbon companies and an instrumentality of the Chinese government, the Communist Party of China. It was not a normal contractual arrangement because on one side were the businesses and on the other side was a state entity—whereas the deals that were done with Korea, Taiwan and Japan were company-to-company contracts. It was the deal of the century for the purchasers because the price was very low and, one way or another, the price for LNG exports to Asia spiked. It is important to understand that occurred not because of a scarcity of gas or any of those things; it is about the way the LNG industry works. If members want a brief outline of things, they should look at page 66 of the Economics and Industry Standing Committee report that explains at paragraph 234 and following paragraphs how LNG is priced. The index is called the JCC—the Japanese customs cleared crude index. So members can see how it is done, I read the report —
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The slope factor represents an energy equivalent pricing component. Energy Quest — That is a consulting firm — has defined the energy equivalent price for gas as ‘…17.2 per cent of the oil price, based on the energy composition of LNG compared with a barrel of oil.’ … The agreed slope factor can vary depending on the prevailing supply/demand balance with a slope factor of 0.172 equating to 100 per cent “oil parity”. If gas trades above this level (17.2 per cent of the barrel of oil price), it is cheaper for the buyer to revert to oil, if available, to produce the same amount of energy. I have read elsewhere that the slope factor had been 14 per cent, but one way or another they are indexing against something else; it is not being indexed against other gas supplies. Pricing gas is completely different from the way iron ore is priced. We know how much iron ore is worth, not because of the price of nickel or gold, but because of what people are prepared to pay for a tonne of iron ore. There is no such thing as an international price of gas. The United States has something called the Henry Hub natural gas spot price. There is a hub price in the United Kingdom, Eastern Europe and Norway, and a landed price for LNG in Spain—they are all different prices depending on other issues. When people in oil and gas companies say that all they are doing is trying to get an international price for their product when they sell it domestically, they are actually saying that they want the JCC price net back to domestic use. I use that term “net back” because there is a cost of freezing the gas to make it into a liquid, and obviously that does not need to be paid if it is being put in a pipeline rather than being frozen. It is a bit strange at the moment. A large effort is being made particularly by Japanese importers to break the pricing model for LNG exports to north Asia. People might have heard about the two projects in the United States that have been approved as LNG exports to countries that are not free trade agreement countries. Korea had a free trade agreement with the United States, so a company in America could sell gas to Korea because it was part of the free trade agreement; but until this year American companies could not export gas to countries like Japan because it was not covered by the FTA. There are now two projects that will potentially lead to the export of American gas to Japan. The Japanese are keen on that because they want to buy the gas at the Henry Hub price rather than the Japan customs cleared price for oil. That goes to the question about not indexing iron ore with the price of nickel, and indexing the price of gas with the price of gas rather than the price of gas with the price of oil. We have had a long history of an oil index, but why not have a coal index? It would be just as logical to say that the energy value of coal is X, the energy value of gas is Y and that we are going to index the gas price against the coal price. But of course that would not suit the people who have the right to exploit the gas. I am not suggesting a coal index; I am saying there is no more logic in pricing Australian domestic gas against the JCC price than pricing it against the coal price. In fact, maybe we should have a solar panel price index because solar panels are actually one of the big challenges for the energy system; maybe we need to index gas prices against solar panel prices. Mr F.M. Logan: Nuclear. Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: Nuclear would be way above the current price, mate—it would be higher than the JCC if we indexed against nuclear. It is a very expensive option. Mr F.M. Logan: I know, but it brings it to people’s attention, though. Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: It does. As I say, associated gas—that is, gas that comes up when oil is being withdrawn—always used to be flared, and that is the basis of much of what has happened in Qatar. Although it is now exporting gas fields, originally, if we look at what happened 30 years ago when Qatar started looking at liquefied natural gas, it was actually using associated gas. Of course, gas is still being flared on Barrow Island. In fact, that gas should be piped to Varanus to be processed and sold into the domestic market; that would help with supply a bit. It would cost almost nothing to build a small pipeline from the northern end of Barrow Island, where the gas is flared, over to Varanus. It is entirely up to the companies. There is nothing the government can do to make them do it, but it would be a good idea. It is interesting that at the moment work is being done by the government of Singapore to create a trading hub for LNG in Singapore. Pavilion Energy recently imported its first cargo, and it is potentially one of the customers for Queensland. The Singaporeans are trying to create a gas-on-gas hub price for LNG. It is interesting to find, when we read the literature on this development, some of the problems they are having, one of which is the destination clauses in the LNG contracts. If LNG is bought from company X out of project Y, it has to be unloaded in Tokyo or Osaka. Say there is a take-or-pay contract and the load has to be taken and it is shipped but it is summer and not as much gas is being burnt. If somebody has something else going on somewhere else and would like the gas, the customer has to take the cargo to Japan, unload it, reload it on another ship and bring it back to Singapore for the trade. Members can imagine all that extra cost, plus the extra liquefaction. Let us say it
[ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] 7895 was going from the North West Shelf. It would be much cheaper to take it to Singapore and trade it there, but the contract does not allow that. If we had a domestic supply contract with that as a term, it would be against the Australian competition laws and the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission would not let people do it. But our export contracts are written in that way. It is a ridiculous position that the oil and gas companies are putting us in the position of cheering for the Japanese in the negotiations with the oil companies because as Western Australians we do not share any of the tax revenues from our offshore gas projects; Western Australia does not get any royalties out of the Gorgon or Wheatstone project. We get a share out of the North West Shelf because of a deal done back in the 1980s, and of course we will get a share out of the Torosa field because it is on our land and partly in our waters. We are cheering for the Japanese because the gas companies want us to pay the price the Japanese pay. Even though it is probably not in the interests of Australia for us to cheer for the Japanese because we would prefer the Japanese to pay a higher price because that is better for Australia, if we tie the domestic price of gas to the Japanese price of gas, that is the inevitable result. I do not understand why they would like us to do that. There has been a lot of discussion about the costs of greenfields LNG projects. There is absolutely no question that doing a greenfields project—for example, Gorgon, Wheatstone, and the Browse project if it had gone to James Price Point—is extraordinarily expensive. Australia is a high-cost country, and we all accept that. One of the reasons we are a high-cost country is that particularly our iron ore exports have pushed up the value of our dollar, so the labour costs in Australia have shot up with the cost of the dollar. If we had a 60c dollar, labour costs would be 30 per cent lower. In 2012, I went to an interesting conference put on by APPEA—the Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association—and the University of Western Australia. They were talking about the labour costs being 30 per cent higher than those of the United States, and at that time our currency was $US1.10 for a dollar—now it is 91c for a dollar. Therefore, the gap in labour costs has closed by nearly 20 per cent since that conference. If our dollars fell further, that cost gap would close. I have read interesting commentary about the proposal to build a greenfields LNG facility on the west coast of Canada. They are looking at what has happened in Australia; the same thing will probably happen for that project in Canada because it is a remote project. There are opportunities for gas to be processed in brownfields projects by backfilling the five export trains on the Burrup. We do not have a national oil and gas company as is the case in other countries, and I am not proposing that we should, but if we did, the first thing to happen would be the backfilling of existing infrastructure. Indeed, the government in Qatar controls the infrastructure; the gas majors might produce and export gas, but the government controls the infrastructure. I am not aware of anything that compares the cost of brownfields with greenfields projects. I am also interested to know the cost of a brownfields project compared with a floating proposal. That is a problem for the commonwealth government, not us, but I fear the technology providers are going to ask for a technology payment for the use of the floating technology. That would be a way of ensuring the interests of the technology’s owners are protected against inflation, compared with the interests of the taxpayer. As we write off assets, obviously the amount of tax being taken from the facility goes up because the value of the capital goes down. However, if there was a technology payment, the value of it could be maintained in real terms as we go forward, rather than being written off like the capital value of the project. That is a problem for the commonwealth, not us, but there is absolutely no technological reason why we cannot have a tieback to the mainland for domestic gas from a floating facility. I went out to the Griffin Venture when it was operated off the Pilbara coast as a floating, production, storage and offloading vessels; it is not a floating LNG facility. It is the same idea but just on a smaller scale. It had a riser to bring up the gas and a pipe to take the gas back down out to the tieback and over to the coast. There is absolutely no reason why a pipeline cannot be run from a floating facility back to the mainland. I do not know how much that would cost, and a proponent would probably say it is too expensive, but I would love to see the figures. I would also like to know whether there is any plan to provide liquefied natural gas for domestic gas supply. If companies were to put in a receival facility south of Geraldton and use the Mondara facility for balancing, we would have to pay for the cost of the liquefaction. Re-gassing is probably not very expensive. I have read a lot about floating re-gas facilities that seem to be popping up around the world—it is becoming more established technology—but one way or another, we will still have to pay for the liquefaction. According to the information we had at the time of the report, that costs about $4 a gigajoule, which is about half the value of the gas. That does not sound like a plan. I do not believe that any federal or state government would ever accept domestic supply of LNG as being a solution for domestic gas needs. I want to address this domestic gas reservation issue because it gets a lot of commentary, and I will talk about the Grattan Institute’s report that it put out last week. Before I do, however, I make the point that the original North West Shelf joint venture did not have the gas reservation policy applied to it. Instead, a deal was done between the government and the proponents for the supply of domestic gas. As I explained previously, if it had not been for that, there would never have been an LNG project because it could not be financed. It was the domestic gas project that allowed the cash flow to finance the export project. I accept that the world has moved on and that that is no longer the case because major companies can now finance their LNG projects without a domestic contribution.
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The Gorgon project had a gas supply obligation that was about 15 per cent of the original project—I think it was about 12 per cent of the original proposal. However, between the time of the agreement and the implementation of the project, the proponents had changed the project and made it larger, which meant that it did not end up with roughly 15 per cent, but about a six per cent domestic gas supply. When the representative of the Gorgon joint venture, who happened to be a Chevron employee, gave evidence to our committee, we asked him—it is in the transcript—what the rate of return was and how the proponents made their economic decision. He said that it was an obligation, not an economic decision. The proponents must have done a financial analysis to see whether they would make money out of the project, and they must have accepted that a certain supply of domestic gas would not destroy the economics of it. The point is that the domestic supply was not decided upon because of its economics. Gorgon will never supply gas to the domestic market because of economic reasons, but because that was what was agreed to with the government. The next project I will comment on is Pluto. Pluto is supposed to provide domestic gas after a certain volume of export gas. There are real questions about when it will come to the table on that because it is currently not supplying that gas to the domestic market. Wheatstone also has an agreed supply obligation. I will now turn to the Grattan Institute’s report written by its energy analyst, Tony Wood. I met Tony Wood when he came over here for the Energy in WA Conference earlier this year and I was pleased to have a conversation with him. Everything I can see about him indicates that he is a very bright man with a deep understanding of the energy sector. He has a very strong curriculum vitae and is a person to whom we need to listen. I will turn to chapter 5 on page 30 of his report headed “What do rising prices mean for the gas supply sector?” The first part of this chapter is about gas producers, and he makes the argument that the producers will continue to supply the domestic sector. He writes — There are two reasons why producers won’t simply sell their gas at the highest price they could command on the export market to the exclusion of the domestic market. Firstly, losing a domestic market, perhaps to alternative energy, would not be done lightly since it is unlikely that the market would be recovered any time soon. Secondly, there is a risk that governments could intervene in the market if the consumer backlash or the loss of jobs were to become overwhelming. The first thing he says is that the suppliers would not want to lose the market share, but let us consider the example of Alcoa. If Alcoa were not able to source gas, that market would not be taken up by coal supply or wind energy because bauxite is a very common product. As with iron ore, the earth’s crust is full of bauxite. All that would happen is that those three plants would stop processing Western Australian bauxite. All Alcoa’s equipment would be packed onto a boat and moved to process bauxite somewhere else in the world. Supply and demand would then even out. There would never be an oversupply of gas and so the price would not fall; it is just that the demand would not be there. The second point to his argument is the risk that the government would intervene in the market because of the backlash. I take him to mean a domestic reservation policy. In chapter 6 of his report beginning on page 32, he makes the case very strongly that the government should reject a domestic reservation policy. He writes — Governments are already being called to act. Industry groups have begun to put pressure on governments, with some advocating a reservation policy and a national interest or public interest test. In researching this report, we also heard calls for governments to fix a domestic price—either temporary or permanent—that is lower than the international price. He continues on page 33 — The economic benefit of the gas resources is shifted from producers to particular industry consumers. This is about interventions — This redistribution “would be achieved at a net cost to the Australian community”, according to the Bureau of Resources and Energy Economics. More bluntly, economics professor Stephen King has described such a reservation scheme as “blatant, inefficient and inequitable”. Western Australia has a reservation policy with bipartisan support. Yet the Government’s own economic regulation authority recently concluded that domestic gas reservation policy “is not required; indeed, the policy is likely to inhibit development of the Western Australian gas market in the long term.” On page 34 he writes — Domestic reservation schemes impose an implicit tax on gas producers and deliver a subsidy to specific (gas) consumers. An explicit tax regime is a more efficient means of collecting revenue. It also gives governments more flexibility to decide how to spend that revenue, whereas protectionist policies confer all of the benefits on gas users. The argument that Australians have more to gain from trading LNG than they have to lose from higher prices assumes that appropriate tax and transfer systems are in place. Governments need to ensure that the public really does benefit by levying the appropriate taxes and royalties on LNG exports. A review
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of these arrangements is beyond the scope of this report, but should be seriously considered given the scale of the change. The Australian Industry Group recently made a similar argument. I want to touch on each of these discussions. As I said, I think that the Grattan Institute generally, and Tony Wood’s contribution in particular, need to be considered. Although I am a supporter of gas reservation, maybe I am wrong. I want to look at what he talked about. Firstly, I will look at the idea of fixing the price of gas lower than the international price. I do not agree with fixing the price. As I have said to gas producers and gas users, I would like a policy that provides an oversupply of gas in the market and then the market will fix the price. I have not done economics 101 but if I did, I would learn that if we have an oversupply of a product, we have a low price. I am about having a traded price, not a set price. We all know that the lowest price would be the lifting price of the gas. If we are selling it below our lifting price, we would go broke and that means we would not sell it. That is the flaw—the lifting price. Once upon a time, Woodside used to include the average lifting price of gas in its annual report. It no longer does so. I find that interesting. The next thing is this question about the Economic Regulation Authority’s report. It has a very interesting chapter on the domestic gas reservation price. It has a number of tables, both in the draft report and the final report, showing an econometric analysis of the effect of the domgas reservation policy. It shows that the domgas reservation policy allows investment into industries that would not otherwise survive and therefore it diverts that investment away from higher valued activity elsewhere. The problem with that analysis is that it is at too global a level. There is not a separate Western Australian price close to the Henry Hub price for gas but if there were, the investment would be diverted from elsewhere in the world into Western Australia. Increasing the gas price towards the Japanese crude cocktail price allows the investment to occur elsewhere in the world. As I said, Alcoa would shut its plants in Western Australia. It would not idle them; it would move them. That is what would happen and other facilities would be created elsewhere in the world. The investment will occur. It is true that if we consider a low domestic price of gas a subsidy—I do not—we are asking for investment to move from elsewhere in the world into Western Australia. I personally do not think that is a bad thing. I make the point when I am talking to energy executives that I am a Western Australian shadow minister and I hope to be a Western Australian minister. That is my job. In my view, diverting investment from the United States into Australia is not a bad thing because the current gas price regime on the east coast of Australia, which is just falling to bits, is seeing investment by Australian companies diverted from Australia to the United States. We have already had that problem here because we have already had our gas price spike. The economic analysis is correct but it is just meaningless because it is not looking at Western Australia. I want to turn to the comments made about spending the revenue more flexibly. We are the only country in the world that has no government involvement in the LNG industry. I will come to the United States in a moment— I want to analyse what it is doing—because at this stage, apart from re-gassing, it does not export its own domestic gas. It will in the future but not at this stage. I am not asking for government involvement in the LNG industry. I think I frightened David Byers, the CEO of the Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association, at the Woodside dinner a little while ago because I was halfway through explaining my view about what it would be like if we did have a government oil company and then we were interrupted by a speech. I left the second part of the conversation hanging, so he is probably frightened that that is what I was going to argue for, but I am not arguing for that. Mr F.M. Logan interjected. Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: The member for Cockburn can do it. There are expectations on the industry because there is an absence of government involvement in the facilities. It is the commonwealth’s decision but it is appropriate that it approve developments that maximise its tax revenue. I am not convinced that that will be FLNG; I think it is much more likely to be an expansion of existing facilities. A couple of days ago I read an article in The Australian Financial Review—I think it was KPMG but it may have been Ernst and Young—about a higher level of cooperation in the LNG industry. It is in the interests of not only Western Australians and Australians, but also the companies themselves to have a higher level of cooperation. I wish to make a point about Wheatstone. It is a fabulous onshore project. We love onshore projects. Let us not forget that the pipeline bringing the gas from the field to the LNG facility crosses over the main line for the North West Shelf. Let us not forget that the line taking the gas from Ichthys to Darwin for the Inpex Corporation runs across the surface of the Prelude lease. When Shell says that Prelude is an isolated field and it does not support the high level of capital costs for standalone infrastructure and that is why it is doing it slowly, of course it is right. A floating plant was not the only choice. It could have tolled into the Inpex facility. That would probably have required the construction of a second train in Darwin. A two-train facility would have been much more financially viable for Inpex. It would have been much better for Western Australia because the cost of the pipeline from Ichthys to Darwin could have been amortised over two projects instead of one and Shell could still have got its gas to market. Shell would be saying, “Hang on a second, that’s our project. We’ve got the right to make our own decision. We shouldn’t have to cooperate with our competitors.” That is all true but it should not complain when governments say that they have expectations too. Companies rightly make decisions
7898 [ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] based on their needs. The government is neither an investor in the project nor a partner in companies’ projects but it is a regulator and a facilitator and it does have interests. The government can influence and set out its interests and then the companies will respond to them. I now want to turn to what is happening in the United States. It is interesting to read the literature. When we talk about upstream oil and gas companies in Australia, everybody talks about the LNG facilities but in the United States, they do not. They talk about upstream being the exploration and production companies and the downstream being the users but they describe the LNG facilities—the pipelines and the gas processing—as midstream. Leaving aside the Chevron project in Canada that I mentioned before, which is the same type that we have here with the exploration and production operator also running the LNG facility, these LNG export facilities that are selling gas to Japan are toll facilities. The companies building the LNG facilities do not have a gas field; they have a pipeline. The people exporting the gas to Japan buy the gas at the hub price, pay a fee for using the LNG facility and then export it themselves. The reason the landed price in Japan, even at $4 a gigajoule, is about the JCC price or slightly lower, about which all the Western Australian gas producers go “yay”, is because of the shipping costs—the extra distance of getting it from the Gulf of Mexico and through the Panama Canal. Nobody knows how much they will have to pay to get it through the Panama Canal and across the Pacific Ocean. I think it is about a 22-day steaming distance compared with seven to nine days from Western Australia. However, a project has also been proposed in the United States for a liquefied natural gas export facility in Washington state, which is only seven days steaming from Japan. It is a hub-based project—in other words, it is not based on a specific gas field—so suddenly there would be a revolution in pricing for the Japanese, because they would be able to buy at the hub, pay for the liquefaction and then pay the shipping costs, which would be equivalent to the shipping costs out of the west coast of Australia. That would be a major change to the way that LNG is priced in the Pacific basin, and I imagine that that is keeping the oil and gas executives awake at night, because that would really turn everything on its head. I am not saying that that is a good thing; I am just saying that if it happens, it happens. I note that at a conference late last year or early this year on exports to Japan, a comment was made by a federal minister about the Japanese leaving the pricing model alone. Customers will always look at how they can get a better deal. I just make the point that all the LNG projects up to now have been based on this arrangement. The developers find a large gas resource that will justify a 20 or 25-year project, they find customers with a large balance sheet to justify the risk of a 20 or 25-year contract and then they sign a deal over that long period with some form of indexation, which is where the Japan customs-cleared crude index came from, because there had to be an index that everybody understood. The risk for the developers of the project was relatively small once they had signed the contract with the off-take customer, and they probably could get the project through their board on about 75 per cent of the total capacity of the project. While the project was going along, they would probably find a couple of extra customers and they would have a spare couple of ships a year and they could sell that into the spot market in Europe during winter, as there will always be somewhere to get rid of the extra cargoes. When there was a change in the indexed price of oil, all the capital costs were included in the index. But if the Japanese win and they get more of these projects in the US that are pricing the gas out of the hub price and then they pay a fee for the use of the infrastructure, they will have to index only the commodity price of gas. It is a revolutionary change for the oil and gas companies. It is interesting to look at the Browse project, because there are currently no customers for the Torosa field. If there is one thing that everybody in the world knows, it is that there will not be any development in the Torosa field until there is a customer. I can imagine that there are a lot of tough discussions going on. Why is that relevant? My view has always been that it is in Western Australia’s interests, it is in Australia’s interests and it is in the interests of the field developers to make sure that the five LNG export trains and the two domestic trains on the Burrup have a long supply of gas. I have been reading about the Arun facilities in Sumatra and the Bontang facilities in Kalimantan, which are short of gas, so they are idling facilities. In fact, Arun has LNG trans-shipments to be burnt in the power station because it is such an important part of the energy supply for North Sumatra. It would be a tragedy if the five export trains and the two domestic trains on the Burrup were idled. If they were, governments would have to think about that. Of course, we are not proponents; we do not have our gas. I make the point that it is not their gas either, which is some of the commentary I make about the Grattan Institute report, which refers to the producer’s gas. It is not the producer’s gas; it is the Crown’s gas. One way or another, it is not the Crown’s money paying for the projects. Representatives from Woodside have asked to speak to me, so they will brief Labor people in November when we set a date. Obviously, I talk to Woodside people whenever I can. I am sure that they will have lots of things to tell me about the economics of the proposal, and I look forward to it. I do not have a closed mind, but I do say that the principal issue for Western Australia is those five export trains. If I were a Woodside investor—I am not—I would also be interested to know when it will build the second train for Pluto. When I went up to Pluto during the gas inquiry and got a tour of the construction work, Woodside made the point that it had been entirely designed to have two trains. Clearly, if it had a second train, it would increase its capital utilisation. I am not an investor; it is not my money. I just make the observation that it would be good for the state and the country and, I reckon, for Woodside to have two trains on Pluto. There would be higher capital
[ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] 7899 utilisation. If I had done economics 101—I have not—that is what I would have been taught. The more work that can be put through one piece of capital, the more money that can be made out of it, because the costs can be amortised over a larger volume. It seems pretty straightforward to me. Mr W.R. Marmion: How would you make them do that? How would you make that happen? Mr F.M. Logan: There is a commitment for them to review whether they are going to do it. Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: I am not trying to pick a fight with the Premier, who is not in the chamber. We cannot make companies invest, but we can create the right environment in which to invest. All the oil and gas people are going to ring me when I sit down and say that domestic reservation is antithetical to encouraging that investment. That may be right, but other issues are involved in domestic gas supply. Santos Ltd is the good guy, because it does not export yet. It is just about to do so on the east coast, but it does not export from WA, so that makes it the good guy. Apache Energy currently does not export, so that makes it the good guy. They say that the reservation policy creates an overhang and discourages them from bringing a field into production. When the committee did the inquiry and the industry players appeared, they all said that there are smaller fields that are not economic to support an LNG project but they could be used to support a domestic supply. After the first couple of industry players said that, the five members of the committee made a decision to ask them to name one of those fields, and they would say, “No, I have not given that any consideration.” The problem with floating technology is that it can be located in one location for 10 years and then it can move to another location for 10 years. Look at what happened to Gorgon; between the original approvals and the final project, all these additional fields got chucked in. I think it is BP that does not toll its gas through Gorgon, but it effectively tolls its gas. I think I am right that BP sells it to Shell at the inlet valve and buys it back at the outlet valve. That is tolling in any other language, and maybe getting more free access to infrastructure. If the North West Shelf joint venture does not need both its domestic trains, maybe it could make one of them available as a tolling facility. Who knows? All sorts of people might decide that it is better to toll and get $6 or $7 rather than leave it in the ground in the hope of getting $12 in 15 years’ time. It is currently not my problem, but I am looking forward to having that problem. I want to say to the industry people listening—because they are all sitting in their offices panicking about what I am saying—that I listen to them and take account of what they say. They have genuine interests and I am not trying to ignore their genuine interest. They are investing an enormous amount of money and making a huge contribution to Western Australia. I am not criticising any of those things. But we still need domestic supply of gas at a reasonable price. Debate interrupted, pursuant to standing orders. [Continued on page 7911.] LITTLE MUPPETS CHILDCARE CENTRE — EDGEWATER — CHILDCARE SECTOR Statement by Member for Joondalup MR J. NORBERGER (Joondalup) [12.50 pm]: Today I would like to acknowledge the wonderful staff of Little Muppets Childcare Centre in Edgewater, which is attended by my little Daniel on most days of the week. In acknowledging Little Muppets, I would like to also acknowledge the dedication and professionalism of the childcare sector more broadly, in whom we entrust those most precious to us, our children. Daniel has been attending Little Muppets Childcare Centre since he was 18 months old. All staff are simply wonderful—caring, highly trained and professional and a real asset to the centre. Long gone are the days when childcare centres were just a supervised babysitting service, with our modern centres taking an active role in the early development of our children. With the understandable separation anxiety on some days aside, Daniel loves attending Little Muppets, learning new and exciting things every day. When we pick Daniel up at the end of the day, we see photos on the wall showing the various activities of the day with a detailed description of the day’s activities and highlights. Children are introduced to different cultures, customs and even languages. It does not become any easier dropping off our little man that we love so much but knowing that he is being cared for so lovingly does make a big difference. To all the wonderful staff of Little Muppets, thank you for all that you do. You can be rightly proud of the important job you undertake and the professional way in which you do it. Mira and I are very grateful. PALLIATIVE CARE WA — ANNUAL COMMEMORATION Statement by Member for Girrawheen MS M.M. QUIRK (Girrawheen) [12.51 pm]: Last Thursday I was privileged to attend the Palliative Care WA’s annual commemoration at Winthrop Hall, coinciding with St Luke’s day, the patron saint of physicians. Respectfully emceed by Verity James, the secular service commemorates those who have recently died. This includes loved ones who have died in palliative care and those who have died unexpectedly. Attending were grieving family members, carers, medical and nursing staff, Silver Chain staff and others connected with
7900 [ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] palliative care. I want to acknowledge president Andrew Allsop and the team at Palliative Care WA for their fine work. Singer, the wonderful Kavisha Mazzella, and pianist Ross Bolleter struck the right chord with music and song, which added quiet contemplation and poignant memories. Amanda Bolleter, a long-time social worker in palliative care and David Ladner, pastoral care manager at Bethesda Hospital, reflected on their work and on dying and grief. Stephanie Dowden, clinical nurse consultant in paediatric palliative care, and Stuart McLintock, bereaved brother, contributed by reading poems—touching and hopeful. The hall was three-quarters full and I believe many present had been touched by those who had shared their loved one’s final journey with compassion, understanding and kindness and wanted to show how much that effort was appreciated. It was a deeply affecting ceremony and a fitting tribute and farewell to those whose lives and deaths we were commemorating. 2ND PERTH GIRLS’ BRIGADE — SIXTIETH ANNIVERSARY Statement by Member for Morley MR I.M. BRITZA (Morley) [12.52 pm]: This year marks the 2nd Perth Girls’ Brigade’s sixtieth anniversary and I would like to share with members a little of their history. The 2nd Perth Girl’s Brigade started in 1954 with Joan Rycroft as captain and Rae Semple, Julie Howarth and Glen Stewart as lieutenants. It was based in the Bayswater Methodist Church, where Lloyd Semple was the minister. Activities included drill, folk dancing, gymnastics, marching and badge work of all kinds. Parents helped with many of the activities. Once a year they had a display for parents and the church congregation and anyone else who wished to come, partly to demonstrate what had been done during the year, plus extras such as singing, skits et cetera. A church parade was held once a month. When Captain Rycroft retired, there were some crises of leadership, but always someone stepped in to fill the position of captain. Because of the willingness of these people, the company has functioned without a break for 60 years—far longer than any other company in the state. I was delighted to attend the anniversary service, and it was a pleasure to catch up with people I had not seen for 30 years. Many past leaders were there to help celebrate this wonderful milestone. A history of the company past and present was presented by Mrs Rycroft’s daughter, Barbara; the first Queen’s Badge recipient, Jeanette Hudson, and by one of the present young leaders, Greta Mewhaw. Some of the girls dressed in uniforms from past years and the girls presented a play covering a young girl’s journey from cadets through to pioneers and young leadership. The company now meets at Noranda Uniting Church and has a membership of about 30 girls, and I am thrilled that they are in my electorate. BERLIN WALL DISMANTLING — TWENTY-FIFTH ANNIVERSARY Statement by Member for Southern River MR P. ABETZ (Southern River) [12.54 pm]: I am pleased to inform the house that the twenty-fifth anniversary of the dismantling of the Berlin Wall will not go uncelebrated in Perth, thanks to the energy and initiative of Mr Achim Burmeister, chief executive officer of the West Australian–German Business Association, with sponsorship from Treffpunkt WA Pty Ltd, and Mr Torsten Ketelsen, managing director of GMA Garnet Group. It was just past midnight on 12–13 August 1961 when the East German communist government threw up what became known as the Berlin Wall, because over 2.5 million East Germans had fled the communist utopia and gone into West Berlin. Fearful of having no-one left to govern, anyone who tried to cross over the wall was mercilessly shot. The Berlin Wall wound its way through the centre of Berlin and hugged the entire border of West Berlin, cutting off West Berlin from the rest of East Germany. This resulted in many families and neighbours being separated and some 60 000 East Germans no longer being able to go to their well-paying jobs in West Berlin. To mark the dismantling of the Berlin Wall on 9 November 1989, a public event will be held at the Northbridge piazza on Sunday, 9 November, starting at 12 noon and running through to 5.00 pm. The play Dismantling the Walls, which highlights how individual ethnic communities can separate themselves from each other, will be presented by high school students. They will show how easy it is to dismantle those walls by talking to each other. After the Berlin Wall came down, East and West Germany were reunified into a single German state on 3 October 1990. I hope that many members will take the time to join in this celebration. RAY LEES Statement by Member for Cockburn MR F.M. LOGAN (Cockburn) [12.56 pm]: I rise to acknowledge the life of Mr Ray Lees of Wattleup, a former Mayor of the City of Cockburn, whose funeral was held yesterday in Fremantle. Ray was a staunch Australian Labor Party member and was awarded life membership of the ALP in 2005. Following his wartime service in the merchant marine, Ray was employed as a wharfie in Fremantle for over 30 years. A stalwart of the
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Cockburn Lakes branch of the ALP, Ray could be found at every election, state or federal, in his chair, which was positioned directly outside the door of the Wattleup polling booth, taking no notice of the Liberal complaints about the six-metre rule! Active at all levels of government, Ray was a councillor at the City of Cockburn for 27 years, and deputy mayor and mayor of the city between 1993 and 1997. For his services to council and the community at large, Ray was awarded Freeman of the City of Cockburn in 1995. Ray was virtually integrated into the large Croatian community in Cockburn by his marriage to Rose, and through this connection he became a part-time and then full-time market gardener, producing the best rhubarb in Western Australia. In his legendary contribution to the Cockburn Labor branch fundraisers, Ray was always donating 20-kilo sacks of onions for raffle prizes—that is a lot of onions! Ray was an outspoken and fiery union member and branch member. At every meeting, he made it very clear how much he detested the Liberal Party and always pointed to the latest example of Liberal government outrage. He had a great depth of knowledge about local politics and local history, which always added to debate at branch meetings. Well-liked by all for being a straightforward, honest and always helpful Labor man, Ray is sorely missed by all members of the Cockburn Lakes, Jervoise Bay and Jandakot branches. He is survived by his daughter, Glenda, and his son, Alan. SWAN VALLEY — HUMANE FOOD REGION Statement by Member for Maylands MS L.L. BAKER (Maylands) [12.57 pm]: In August this year, the City of Swan, in conjunction with restaurateurs of the Swan Valley region and the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty of Animals, launched the Swan Valley as Australia’s first humane food region. The Swan Valley is recognised as a leader in fine food and outstanding local produce, as well as premium wines. Now, with the support of the City of Swan and the RSPCA, business owners in the Swan Valley have extended their tourism leadership to include improving the lives of farm animals in Western Australia. The businesses of the Swan Valley recognise that the social ethics concerning food production are changing and that consumers are increasingly asking that the food they purchase be sourced from animals raised in humane conditions, without the cruelty of intensive production processes that deny the sentiency of these animals. A humane food region is a region in which the restaurants and cafes believe in and are committed to serving only eggs, chicken and pork that are produced by farmers who farm humanely. The City of Swan has now proudly changed the entry statements on the roads into the Swan Valley to proclaim, “This is Australia’s First Humane Food Region”. Ambassadors include Taylor’s Art and Coffee House; Kiren Mainwaring, formerly of Dear Friends restaurant; Sandalford Wines; Sittella Winery and Restaurant; Lamont’s Winery and Small Tastes Venue; and Fillaudeau’s Restaurant and Cafe. The sponsors of this project are Mt Barker Free Range Chicken, Linley Valley Pork, MMM Farm Barn Laid, the RSPCA and the City of Swan. Sitting suspended from 1.00 to 2.00 pm QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE ABORIGINAL PRISON POPULATION — PREMIER’S COMMENTS 852. Mr M. McGOWAN to the Premier: I refer to the Premier’s statement today that he would personally take on the role of reducing the number of Aboriginal people in prison. (1) Why has the number of Aboriginal people in prison for fine default over the past five years of this government increased from 101 in 2008 to 590 in 2013? (2) How can the Premier justify a more than 500 per cent increase in the number of Aboriginal people in prison for fine default on his watch? Mr C.J. BARNETT replied: Before I answer that question, I welcome the students from Dudley Park Primary School in the Deputy Premier’s electorate of Dawesville. (1)–(2) A lot of work has been done in our prisons to reduce the number of deaths in custody and to try to reduce the number of young people in detention for what might be seen as relatively minor offences. In some areas the number has been reduced and the Minister for Corrective Services and others have been working on that. Along with the Minister for Corrective Services, I attended a rally on the steps of Parliament House relating primarily to the very sad death of Julieka Dhu while in the care of the state. Investigations into that case, both police and coronial, will take place. I made two commitments to people outside to reassure them that the full truth of what happened in that case would be found and made available to them. That case has pointed to some problems in the complex circumstance of dealing with the family of a deceased. A number of government agencies are involved in that whole issue, including, obviously, WA Police and the WA Country Health Service, and maybe the Department of Corrective Services and the Department of the Attorney General. The family situation is also a little
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different. Two different people were nominated as next of kin at different times, so some agencies talked to some family members; other agencies talked to other family members. Ms M.M. Quirk interjected. Mr C.J. BARNETT: I am trying to treat a serious issue seriously. From that experience, and perhaps others, we have learned that there needs to be better coordination, if nothing else, of what goes on and the way information is communicated to family members, and that is something we will address. I also commented that there are too many deaths in custody of not only Aboriginal people. The reality is that there are more non-Aboriginal deaths in custody than Aboriginal deaths and there are also far too many suicides of young people within our wider community. I said I would work with the relevant ministers and take on a personal responsibility to try to reduce the rate of incarceration of young people, particularly Aboriginal people, and I will do my best to do that. I cannot guarantee that will — Mr P. Papalia interjected. Mr C.J. BARNETT: I hoped members would take a slightly more gracious and even bipartisan approach in trying to deal with a serious social issue in our community. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Warnbro, I call you to order for the third time. Member for Butler, I call you to order for the second time. ABORIGINAL PRISON POPULATION — PREMIER’S COMMENTS 853. Mr M. McGOWAN to the Premier: I have a supplementary question. I refer to my original question and Legislative Assembly answer to question on notice 2746, which details that from 2008 to 2013 the number of Aboriginal people in prison for fine default has increased from 101 to 590; how does the Premier justify that? Mr C.J. BARNETT replied: I do not seek to justify that and nor should I. People are in our prison system — Mr M. McGowan interjected. Mr C.J. BARNETT: Clearly, there will not be a bipartisan approach to this. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Butler, I call you to order for the third time. Member for Cannington, I call you to order for the first time. Member for Warnbro! Mr C.J. BARNETT: People are in our prison system because they are offenders who have been found guilty; that is the reality. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Members! Mr C.J. BARNETT: Anyone who has looked at this issue—whether they are members of Parliament, work in Aboriginal communities or our prison systems, or are academics, journalists and the like—recognises that there is clearly a disproportionately high number of young people, particularly young Aboriginal men, in our justice system. That is one of the great social issues of this state that we are yet to deal with. I made a commitment on behalf of the Liberal–National government that we will do all that we can to try to correct that situation. I cannot claim success, but we will do all that we can. It would have been nice to have some bipartisan, but regardless we will continue. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Right! Member for Cockburn, I call you to order for the first time. Member for Warnbro, that is the last time. PASTORAL LEASES — RENEWAL 854. Mr V.A. CATANIA to the Minister for Lands: I refer to the member for Gosnells’ comments on Country Hour yesterday about the renewal of pastoral leases. Can the minister please outline the Liberal–National government’s pastoral lease renewal program? Mr D.T. REDMAN replied: This house is very much aware that we are working through in the pastoral lease renewal process because, as members know, all the pastoral leases come up for renewal at the end of June 2015. It is an exhaustive process to
[ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] 7903 ensure that we comply with all the issues that need to be complied with to achieve that rollover. I was very, very surprised to hear yesterday the member for Gosnells on Country Hour prosecuting an argument trying to link the viability of pastoral leases to the renewal process. He was absolutely misleading and creating uncertainty and confusion among pastoral lease holders. Mr C.J. Tallentire interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Gosnells, I call you to order for the first time. Mr D.T. REDMAN: He was creating uncertainty and confusion among pastoral lease holders listening to his commentary on the radio. It made them ask whether the government would use viability criteria to determine whether their pastoral lease would roll over. My office and the offices of other members took phone calls about the member for Gosnells’ commentary, which was totally misleading. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Willagee, I call you to order for the first time. Mr D.T. REDMAN: He also went to the point of saying that we will provide freehold homesteads as compensation for losing their pastoral lease. The member not only prosecuted an argument linking viability to the rollover, but also said that we think that the government should give them freehold homesteads for losing their pastoral leases — Mr C.J. Tallentire interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Gosnells, I call you to order for the second time. If you want to ask a question, put your name down. Mr P.B. Watson interjected. The SPEAKER: I do not want to hear from you, member for Albany. Mr D.T. REDMAN: That is small compensation for someone who loses their pastoral lease. I want to make it intimately clear that the rollover of pastoral leases relates to compliance. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Willagee, I call you to order for the second time. Member for Albany, I call you to order for the first time. Mr D.T. REDMAN: I make it very, very clear that the rollover of pastoral leases relates to compliance, pastoral rents, Agriculture Protection Board rates and any outstanding conservation notices. We are working through that process. I am very sure that come rollover time, there will be a high level of compliance to allow it to happen. The Leader of the Opposition needs to rein in the member for Gosnells. He has also asked in this place why we are not weeding out non-viable pastoral leases. The opposition’s position, as stated by its spokesman for the environment, is talking about weeding out pastoral leases. I wonder — Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Members! Member for Bassendean—the wall of noise. Through the Chair please, minister. Mr B.S. Wyatt: It’s not viable for property development. The SPEAKER: Member for Victoria Park! Member for Bassendean, I call you to order for the first time. Minister, bring this to a close and talk through the Chair, please. Mr D.T. REDMAN: I wonder what the view of the member for Kimberley is because she knows full well that about one-third of pastoral leases in the Pilbara and Kimberley are Aboriginal-owned pastoral leases. I wonder what the member for Kimberley thinks about the commentary of the member for Gosnells, who sits in front of her, that we should weed out non-viable pastoral leases. There are viability challenges right across the board in the pastoral industry, which is why the government has embarked on a pastoral reform process. We want to allow diversification and other opportunities to come into the industry so that we can have a long and prosperous future. The member for Gosnells needs to be reined in by the Leader of the Opposition. This is a test for him because the member for Gosnells’ commentary is misleading and confusing. LOCAL GOVERNMENT — AMALGAMATIONS 855. Mr D.A. TEMPLEMAN to the Minister for Local Government: I refer to the minister’s massive failure in the past 24 hours, which has left about 3 000 people without a local authority; his confusing position on Burswood; and, his conflicting position on vote weighting in the proposed new City of Perth. Mr M.J. Cowper interjected.
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The SPEAKER: Member for Murray–Wellington, I call you to order for the first time. Mr D.A. TEMPLEMAN: I will start again. I refer to the minister’s — Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Members! Member for Mandurah! Mr D.A. TEMPLEMAN: Thank you, Mr Speaker. I refer to the minister’s massive failure in the past 24 hours, which has left about — Mr S.K. L’Estrange interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Churchlands, I call you to order for the first time. Mr D.A. TEMPLEMAN: I refer to the minister’s massive failure in the past 24 hours, which has left about 3 000 people without a local authority; his confusing position on Burswood; and, his conflicting position on vote weighting in the new proposed — Point of Order Mr S.K. L’ESTRANGE: Mr Speaker, you have made rules in this chamber about preambles to questions. Mr D.A. Templeman interjected. The SPEAKER: Points of order are to be heard in silence, member for Mandurah. I will allow the member to ask his question. Questions without Notice Resumed Mr D.A. TEMPLEMAN: I refer to the minister’s massive failure in the past 24 hours, which has left about 3 000 people without a local authority; his confusing position on Burswood; and, his conflicting position on vote weighting in the proposed new City of Perth. Will he resign from cabinet; and, if not, why not? Mr A.J. SIMPSON replied: To answer the question: no, I will not resign from cabinet. It is a decision by this government to allow us to get on with the local government reform process, which has been 100 years in the making. It is now time to move on. I will restate what I said this morning about the piece of Subiaco that will not be part of the Subiaco–Cambridge process. We launched it yesterday. We rejected the city of Riversea, which would involve five western suburb authorities coming together. We do not accept that because we are adjusting the boundaries of the City of Perth act. Once we have confirmed that boundary, we can go through the process to assemble those five authorities. I make it very clear that there will be no consequential impact on any ratepayers in those areas. They will continue to be fully serviced by a local government. We are working through the process. We have released a report. We are still working through the final details. We will make sure we get that result before we go to the next level. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Armadale, I call you to order for the first time. Mr A.J. SIMPSON: As I said, there will be no consequences for the ratepayers as we work through this process. Yesterday we released the Local Government Advisory Board’s report. I have had the opportunity to read its 750 pages. Mr W.J. Johnston interjected. Mr A.J. SIMPSON: I even tabled it this morning, so the member for Cannington can have a read. More importantly, this is about the state government making sure that we provide good services for the ratepayers of Western Australia LOCAL GOVERNMENT — AMALGAMATIONS 856. Mr D.A. TEMPLEMAN to the Minister for Local Government: I ask a supplementary question. Does the minister disagree with the Leader of the House, who is one of the most senior ministers of the government, that the people of Kalamunda, Belmont, Mundaring and Swan should be given a chance to have a say about their future? Mr A.J. SIMPSON replied: Yesterday we launched the report. The report contained a proposal — Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Mandurah! That is the question; can the minister address the question?
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Mr A.J. SIMPSON: The advisory board released its report and it is now out in the wider sector. Mr D.A. Templeman: Give the people a say in Kalamunda—give them a say! The SPEAKER: Member for Mandurah, I call you to order for the—I have such a long list here—first time. Mr A.J. SIMPSON: The Local Government Advisory Board makes recommendations to me about whether local governments come together via boundary adjustments or amalgamation. It is not my decision to make; rather it is the Local Government Advisory Board’s decision to make. As I have said, I can only accept — Mr D.A. Templeman interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Mandurah, I call you to order for the second time. ILLEGAL DUMPING 857. Mr P.T. MILES to the Minister for the Environment: I note that illegal dumping continues to be an issue in my electorate of Wanneroo and the community as a whole. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Armadale! Mr P.T. MILES: That being the case, can the minister explain what is being done to deal with the issue? Mr A.P. JACOB replied: I thank the member for Wanneroo for not only his question, but also his tireless advocacy in this area on behalf of his electorate and his continual knocking on my door for solutions and responses going forward to tackle this problem. But that is not to say that this government has not done a lot in this space to address littering and illegal dumping. The Liberal–National government has a strong proven track record in this area. I will rehash some of what we have done since 2008. In 2010 this government introduced the offence of dumping waste under the Environmental Protection Act, an offence that attracts a maximum $62 5000 fine for individuals and $125 000 fine for businesses. This government also legislatively increased the maximum penalties under the Litter Act 1979 increasing them from $1 000 to $5 000 for individuals and out to $10 000 for corporations. Indeed, we also increased penalties for spot littering infringements out to $200 where previously they were sitting at only $75. In 2012 we introduced a new category of “litter creating a public risk” which was introduced into the litter regulations. That category of offence attracts a penalty of $500 for individuals and $2 000 for corporations. They are significant increases in penalties—significant increases that are already showing very strong results in this state. The Keep Australia Beautiful National Litter Index for 2013-14 has shown a 38 per cent reduction, since 2008-09, in the number of litter items that we would typically find within 1 000 square metres of this state. They are very strong improvements, but we also acknowledge that there is still work to be done. I have been working on this area with the member for Wanneroo. Although we are tackling litter well, there is some work to be done on illegal dumping, particularly on the Department of Parks and Wildlife’s land, for example, in the Wanneroo electorate, including the Gnangara–Moore River State Forest pine plantation area north of Perth. We recently announced the installation this month of motion-sensing infra-red cameras. We will also have warning signs heading into the pine plantation that we are monitoring and drastically increased fines will apply. We will have covert motion-sensing cameras to catch people in the act so we can prosecute them with the increased powers provided to us under the act. Indeed, that site in the pine plantation is a regular dumping area. Already this year more than 76 tonnes of rubbish has been removed by the Department of Parks and Wildlife. The Department of Parks and Wildlife will continue to work in partnership with the Department of Environment Regulation to ensure that when we catch people through the use of these covert cameras, we prosecute them to the full effect so that we can have a litter-free state. LOCAL GOVERNMENT REFORM — BURSWOOD PENINSULA 858. Mr B.S. WYATT to the Premier: I refer to the Premier’s failed attempt to take the Burswood peninsula from the people of Victoria Park and place it within the local government boundary of the City of Perth, and the Premier’s statement reported today that — We will leave the Burswood peninsula within the town of Victoria Park … and that arrangement will be reviewed in five years time … Why does the Premier continue to create uncertainty for local ratepayers in Victoria Park about their boundary and rate base? Mr C.J. BARNETT replied: At the beginning of this year I had a meeting with the Mayors of Victoria Park and South Perth about the two coming together, and they indicated to me—certainly at that time—that they favoured the two coming together.
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Mr B.S. Wyatt: That is right—with the peninsula. Mr C.J. BARNETT: Yes. They also made a bid for state government funding for the new sports precinct, which amongst other things would include a home for the West Coast Eagles. I said, “Yes, fair enough, we will consider that.” I think members need to recognise that the precinct on which the Crown casino is located and indeed where the sports stadium is being built and there are the remains of what was the golf course all lie under the jurisdiction of the casino act and therefore the Minister for Racing and Gaming. That is a bit of anomaly from the past—I think we all recognise that—but it is the law. Maybe others do not agree with me, but it is my view that in creating a better structured Perth city council as a capital city, the major institutions of the state, sporting facilities and the like, should be in the capital city. That is my view and not everyone necessarily agrees with it. In my discussions with the two mayors I made the point that I would prefer the peninsula to be in the capital city. Their main concern was the rate revenue from the casino. That was their concern, and they were quite open about that. Mr B.S. Wyatt: Are you surprised? Mr C.J. BARNETT: No, not at all. The point I make is that their concern is the rate revenue from the casino. At the moment, although the casino lies within the Victoria Park local government, it has no administrative role at all and I do not think it provides any services. That is all done by the casino. Mr D.J. Kelly: And the car parks, or some of them? Mr C.J. BARNETT: Yes, there is a bit of land there. Yes, there is some land. Mr D.J. Kelly interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Bassendean, I call you to order for the second time. Mr C.J. BARNETT: The member is right in that there are some small parcels of land, but the local government does not have anything to do with the management of that precinct. That has always been within the state government and will remain within the state government. Ultimately, I would like to see it normalised within a local government. Mr B.S. Wyatt: Normalised, what does that even mean? Mr C.J. BARNETT: It is a pretty straightforward word, I would have thought. There is a case for that to be normalised within local government. If that were to happen, I would prefer that to be within the City of Perth, not the city of Victoria Park or South Park or whatever it might be, because it is part of the vision of bringing the major facilities into the capital city. The discussion—I assume it is still the mayors’ view—was about retaining the revenue. I have said that they will retain the rates revenue and that was guaranteed certainly for the next five years and then we will have another look at the situation. I think that is a perfectly reasonable position. LOCAL GOVERNMENT REFORM — BURSWOOD PENINSULA 859. Mr B.S. WYATT to the Premier: I have a supplementary question. One of the arguments the Premier has made along this tortuous course of local government reform is about sustainability. How does the Premier expect the new entity South Park to operate in a sustainable way if he plans to take off a percentage of its revenue base in five years’ time? Mr C.J. BARNETT replied: South Park has been judged by the Local Government Advisory Board to be sustainable. Mr B.S. Wyatt: Yes, on that rate base. Mr C.J. BARNETT: Yes, and one of the options in five years’ time might be for it to retain the rate revenue. I do not particularly care about the rate revenue; I want the capital city to be structured as a capital city. ROE HIGHWAY–BERKSHIRE ROAD INTERSECTION — UPGRADE 860. MR N.W. MORTON to the Minister for Transport: The minister — Mr P.B. Watson interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Albany, I am not interested! Mr N.W. MORTON: The minister recently announced that due to the new level of cooperation between the state and federal governments, an agreement has been reached to construct an interchange — Mr B.S. Wyatt interjected.
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The SPEAKER: Member for Victoria Park, I call you to order for the third time. I want to hear the question in silence. Mr N.W. MORTON: The minister recently announced that due to the new level of cooperation between the state and federal governments, an agreement has been reached to construct an interchange at the intersection of Roe Highway and Berkshire Road, which is a major blackspot in the Forrestfield electorate. Can the minister please advise the house how this project is progressing? Mr D.C. NALDER replied: Certainly. As with the past two days, I take much pleasure to share with the chamber another initiative that this government has undertaken to ensure that we keep people moving in Perth. Mr D.J. Kelly interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Bassendean, I call you to order for the third time. Mr D.C. NALDER: I will touch on this. The member for Bassendean for two days — Mr W.J. Johnston interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Cannington, I call you to order for the second time. Mr D.C. NALDER: For the last two days, the member for Bassendean has poked fun at the pedestrian countdown timers. I can say — Mr W.J. Johnston interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Cannington! Mr D.C. NALDER: I will tell members why we take this very seriously. This is an important way to make it safer for infirm, disabled and elderly people to cross the roads. We take that very seriously, and I think it is a great initiative. However, the initiative that I will now refer to is to do with the member for Forrestfield’s question. There is a great relationship with the federal government and because of that relationship and with the cooperation of the federal government, instead of putting traffic lights at the intersection of Berkshire Road and Roe Highway for $15 million, we can spend $45 million to make it a full grade-separated interchange. This is a fantastic achievement. It is one of the blackspots in our city that has an accident on average every 10 days. It is an important intersection that we need to do. I look forward to continuing to bring these initiatives to this house to prove that this government is taking it seriously and keeping Perth moving. I would like to acknowledge the member for Forrestfield’s hard work in delivering this great outcome for his electorate. GRAIN FREIGHT NETWORK — PROFIT-SHARING AGREEMENT 861. Ms R. SAFFIOTI to the Minister for Transport: I refer to the agreement between the Public Transport Authority and Brookfield Rail that provides for profit sharing between PTA and Brookfield on selected grain freight lines. (1) Was this agreement reached prior to Brookfield’s decision to close 500 kilometres of tier 3 rail line? (2) How much does the government expect to make as a result of this deal? (3) When was the minister first advised of the deal? Mr D.C. NALDER replied: (1)–(3) I will deal with the last part of the question first. The clause in the agreement was brought to my attention yesterday. As a result, I have asked the question and this morning had full briefings with my office. I am very interested to understand the mechanics of this arrangement and to ensure that it is in the best interests of the state. I also want to understand why there is not greater transparency and why there is the need to keep it commercial-in-confidence. I asked those questions and I am waiting for answers. Furthermore, this has resulted from a report recently tabled by the committee. We supplied the copy of this lease document to that committee and we cooperated in that sense. As a response to the report, we will respond in full to Parliament. That is possibly the right and appropriate time for us to respond fully to the issues that have been raised by this report. GRAIN FREIGHT NETWORK — PROFIT-SHARING AGREEMENT 862. Ms R. SAFFIOTI to the Minister for Transport: I have a supplementary question. Given the contentious issue of grain freight rail lines, had the minister ever sought to get a detailed briefing on what his department was doing in relation to this issue before yesterday?
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Mr D.C. NALDER replied: I would really encourage members opposite to take caution in criticising this at this point in time. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for West Swan, I call you to order for the second time. Member for Victoria Park, you are on three calls. Mr D.C. NALDER: The Leader of the Opposition, in this house, claimed that the closure of tier 3 lines would result in tens of thousands of extra vehicles moving through Perth. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Members for West Swan and Willagee, I call you to order for the third time. Mr D.C. NALDER: I have explained to this house that that is totally incorrect. Point of Order Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: The question from the member for West Swan was: when did the minister receive a briefing and did he seek one and when? It was not about any other matter. The minister is ignoring the question. The SPEAKER: Come back to the point, minister. Questions without Notice Resumed Mr D.C. NALDER: I will, Mr Speaker. It is always good to put things into context, I think. That was not the supplementary question. The member for Cannington did not raise the supplementary question in his point of order. The supplementary question had to do with what level of briefing I am receiving from the department. Several members interjected. Point of Order Ms R. SAFFIOTI: The minister did not get the supplementary question right. Why did the minister not seek details of this issue before yesterday? That was the question. Questions without Notice Resumed Mr D.C. NALDER: I will take that as the intent of the question, because that is not how it came out. Mr P.B. Watson interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Albany! Mr D.C. NALDER: I have sought briefings from the department about tier 3 and I was not made aware of the subclause in the agreement. Given the sensitivities of this issue, I want to understand why I had not been made aware of that level of detail. PLANNING — REDEVELOPMENT 863. Mr P. ABETZ to the Minister for Planning: We hear a lot about the revitalisation projects that the Metropolitan Redevelopment Authority is undertaking. Can the minister advise what other planning tools are in place to see redevelopment in areas outside of the MRA’s boundaries? Mr J.H.D. DAY replied: I thank the member for the question. Quite understandably, there is a lot of focus on the major redevelopment projects in the Perth CBD that are transforming Perth as the capital of the state. However, we are also keen to ensure that revitalisation of other parts of the state, whether they be in regional areas or other parts of the Perth metropolitan area, can occur. Use of the Metropolitan Redevelopment Authority is one mechanism by which this can be achieved, but there are other mechanisms within the planning system in Western Australia. An important one of those is the use of improvement plans under the Planning and Development Act. I was pleased to ensure this morning that there was the tabling of an improvement plan that will see the state take control of a parcel of land in the interests of ensuring that the development potential of the area in question is realised. I am referring to the Lissiman Street precinct in the Gosnells locality, within the City of Gosnells, it, of course, being local government authority. Mr C.J. Tallentire interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Gosnells!
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Mr J.H.D. DAY: The City of Gosnells has been very keen for this to occur. Mr C.J. Tallentire: So has the local member. Mr J.H.D. DAY: Of course, the member for Gosnells has taken up the interests of the City of Gosnells. This would have happened anyway, but I appreciate that he has been advocating for his electorate. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Armadale, I call you now to order for the second time; you can congratulate the member for Gosnells outside. Mr J.H.D. DAY: I just make the point that this is an issue that I have discussed with the City of Gosnells on many occasions going back now a number of years. I have been pleased to be able to be in the position of ensuring that the outcome it has been seeking is achieved—that is, the establishment of an improvement plan over the Lissiman Street precinct. It means that the state, through the Western Australian Planning Commission, will have the ability to intervene, and this is generally the case, where the private market has failed to take advantage of development opportunities. In this case, the improvement plan will provide for a planning framework in accordance with the City of Gosnells town planning scheme, namely to consolidate and enhance the Gosnells built form and to encourage new private sector development. A total of about $30 million has been invested in the Gosnells area by state and commonwealth governments since 1999, together with the City of Gosnells itself, of course. Although that occurred, the landowners in this precinct, which is adjacent to the Gosnells station, have not taken advantage of the opportunities available and therefore there has been the necessity to intervene in this way. The process was initiated at the beginning of last year. There was a public advertising consultation period and a public workshop was held in May this year. Only nine submissions were received and all of those supported the proposal. One of the key objectives of improvement plan 39, as it is, is to facilitate the development of the Lissiman Street precinct in a coordinated manner, recognising its significance as a transit-oriented development and facilitating development for the creation of a safe, vibrant mixed-use centre. The plan will enable the purchase of private landholdings via the WA Planning Commission as funded by local government or state government agencies and the private sector, and that will facilitate the development of land in accordance with the City of Gosnells planning scheme. We have now provided the opportunity for this process to be taken further and for land to be acquired. If the private landowners do not take advantage of the development opportunities—the preferable outcome is that they do take advantage of them—there is now the ability to intervene and we have been very keen to work with City of Gosnells to ensure that there will be a substantial improvement in the Lissiman Street precinct. FESA HOUSE SALE 864. Ms M.M. QUIRK to the Acting Minister for Tourism: Some notice of this question has been given. I refer to the sale of FESA House to BGC. (1) Can the acting minister advise the total value of incentives given to BGC and the Starwood Hotel group for the construction of a hotel on the FESA House site? (2) What are the components and amounts of concessions making up that total? Mr J.H.D. DAY replied: (1)–(2) I appreciate that some notice of this question was given. In fact, the question was put on notice yesterday and I have just ascertained it is actually question 3135. It is not possible to provide a detailed response at the moment. Ms M.M. Quirk interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Girrawheen! Mr J.H.D. DAY: As I said, the question was put on notice yesterday and a response will be provided as soon as reasonably possible. STATE TRAINING PROVIDERS — GOLD PLATE AWARDS 865. Mr F.A. ALBAN to the Minister for Training and Workforce Development: Can the minister please update the house on the performance of the state’s — Mr M. McGowan interjected. The SPEAKER: Leader of the Opposition! Start again, please, member. Mr F.A. ALBAN: Can the minister please update the house on the performance of the state’s training providers in the recent Gold Plate Awards for Western Australia, which recognise excellence across the hospitality industry?
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Dr K.D. HAMES replied: The Gold Plate Awards are highly valued in the industry and the Catering Institute of Australia has been presenting them since 1967 in recognition of venues providing very high quality service, and particularly, high-quality meals. Bentley Pines Restaurant is a training restaurant staffed by a chef and people training in that side of the industry. The front-of-house staff serving and looking after people at tables are also trainees. There are also trainee baristas and trainees serve the alcohol as well. I am very pleased to announce that this year it won best restaurant in the training establishment category. This is not only the second year in a row that it has won the award, but it has won it four times in the last seven years—2008, 2009, 2013 and again in 2014. Bentley Pines has occasions on which it has a guest chef. I was lucky enough to go there when the guest chef was from Crown Casino. I am pleased to say that I have been invited to go as the guest chef, and we are raising funds for Youth Focus. Ms M.M. Quirk: Baked beans on toast? Dr K.D. HAMES: No, we are not having that. Our entree will be lobster bisque. I can go through the rest of the menu if the member wants. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! You are making me salivate, minister. Dr K.D. HAMES: The money that is raised from that will go to Youth Focus, which is a fantastic youth group putting a huge amount of work into young people. The public will pay to come and eat. I will be supervising, but the students will be doing the work. Most of the food and alcohol is donated by different organisations throughout the state, all because the outcome is that funds will go to Youth Focus, which is a great cause. TOBACCO PRODUCTS CONTROL ACT — REVIEW 866. Mr R.H. COOK to the Minister for Health: I refer to the minister’s recent comments attacking the board of Healthway, and his failure to defend public health advocates. (1) Can the minister confirm that the 2011 review of the Tobacco Products Control Act presented options for changes to the act and the way health promotion and tobacco control operated in this state? (2) Can the minister also confirm that he has sat on this review for the past three years? (3) Can the minister also confirm that public health stakeholders have repeatedly called for the review options to be implemented to usher in new tobacco controls and health promotion governance, with little response from the minister? Dr K.D. HAMES replied: (1)–(3) There are a few aspects to that answer, because it is clearly a very long question. The review that was done recommended that the board of Healthway be changed to bring more people onto the board who were public health advocates—people who were the subject of the current criticism. The review wanted us to put more people on with that role, but we have formed the view that that is not the direction we want to go with Healthway. We want to have more of a Lotteries Commission style board, which is the modern style of board, which does not include sectional interest groups. That is the key problem that we have had in the past two years, with groups from different areas of interest that are constantly in conflict. We will have a broader representation, like a normal board, of people who can listen to all those interest groups and make decisions. Their prime focus, as is in their recommendations, is to reduce the incidence of smoking in the community and look at other areas of health promotion—just last week I read Hon Keith Wilson’s second reading speech when he introduced the legislation in the first place—to focus on public areas of interest in health, such as obesity, alcohol and tobacco. I am considering changing the board to do those things. TOBACCO PRODUCTS CONTROL ACT — REVIEW 867. Mr R.H. COOK to the Minister for Health: I have a supplementary question. Was that the minister’s view back in 2012, or is the real problem that the minister has simply failed to act on an important public health issue? Dr K.D. HAMES replied: I do not think I have failed. The review made some recommendations — Mr R.H. Cook interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Kwinana, you are on three calls.
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Dr K.D. HAMES: Some of the recommendations have been put in place, and some are in the process of being put in place. The member will recall that I made commitments at the last election to agree to a number of things that were put forward about changes to the tobacco act, and those things are being drafted and will come to me shortly. I cannot act on them until the draft legislation comes to me, and that is what I am waiting for. Mr R.H. Cook interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Kwinana, you are lucky, because the Clerk tells me that he has only two marks down against you. I am now calling you for the third time. PREMIER’S PORTFOLIOS — HOSPITALITY, ACCOMMODATION AND FREE TRAVEL Question on Notice 2076 — Supplementary Information MR C.J. BARNETT (Cottesloe — Premier) [2.44 pm]: In accordance with standing order 82A, I provide some further information in relation to question on notice 2076. [See paper 2327.] PETROLEUM TITLES (BROWSE BASIN) BILL 2014 Second Reading Resumed from an earlier stage of the sitting. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Member for Cannington, just before you start, member for Kwinana and Minister for Health, I do not want to hear anything more about this. MR W.J. JOHNSTON (Cannington) [2.45 pm]: The member for Cockburn is the next person to speak in this debate, and I hope he is ready to speak. I am just here making sure that he is ready. MR F.M. LOGAN (Cockburn) [2.45 pm]: I rise to make a contribution on the Petroleum Titles (Browse Basin) Bill 2014. This piece of legislation comes about directly as a result of the work that was undertaken by the Economics and Industry Standing Committee. Point of Order Mr W.R. MARMION: Mr Speaker, I am having trouble hearing the member. The SPEAKER: If members want to have a private meeting, could they please leave the chamber? Debate Resumed Mr F.M. LOGAN: Thank you, Mr Speaker. This bill comes about as a result of the work undertaken by the Economics and Industry Standing Committee of the Legislative Assembly, investigating the economic impact of floating liquefied natural gas processing on Western Australia—its second report of this Parliament. During the course of our investigations of petroleum titles, the Browse Basin, the geographical location of the floating liquefied natural gas vessel Prelude, which is being put into an area near the Browse Basin, and then the announcement by Woodside of its intent to use similar technology to develop the Brecknock, Caliance and Torosa fields in the Browse Basin, possibly with three liquefied natural gas vessels, the committee took a very close look at the petroleum titles in and around the Browse Basin. As has been presented to this house by way of the committee’s report, and by way of debate from the Labor opposition and from the Premier himself and the Liberal government, the issues of floating liquefied natural gas ships and the development of resources for Western Australia are miles and miles apart. As the committee showed in the report I have referred to, Western Australia gets nothing out of FLNG; it does not get any tax, jobs or domestic gas. These are the largest pieces of maritime equipment ever constructed by humans. They are constructed in the Samsung Heavy Industries shipyard at Geoje Island in South Korea and then they are floated into place—in the case of the Prelude, in the Prelude field, 240 kilometres off the north-west coast of Western Australia—for a period of between 25 and 35 years. It will suck gas out of the ground, turn it into liquefied natural gas offshore and then send it off to Japan. The project on Geoje Island has no Western Australian content. As members heard this morning from the Chairman of the Economics and Industry Standing Committee, the member for Geraldton, in his contribution on the annual report of the committee to the Legislative Assembly, a number of members of the committee went to the Samsung yard on Geoje Island, South Korea, to look at the Prelude floating liquefied natural gas ship and talk to the constructers, Shell and some of the people working on Geoje Island. To say the thing is impressive is an understatement. The ship is 500 metres long, 78 metres wide, and from the handrail down to the dockside is nearly 60 metres. It needs eight electric lifts alongside the ship just to get the workers up and down to work topside, because of the length of time it would otherwise take to walk up the steps. Although anybody would be impressed by the scale of technology involved in floating liquefied natural gas, that has to be put aside and examined through the lens of
7912 [ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] whether it is in the state’s interest. As the committee showed in its FLNG report tabled in this house, it is not in this state’s interest. The only people in Australia who benefit from the introduction of floating liquefied natural gas ships is the commonwealth government. I am sure that the commonwealth government would say that, as a result, we all benefit and that money will come back to Western Australia in some way, shape or form. Perhaps I will let the current Treasurer answer that claim from the commonwealth, given his view about commonwealth– state relations around the goods and services tax and the return of GST to Western Australia, as to whether we get a fair share. Any commonwealth government claim, by either a Labor or a Liberal government, that we will all benefit from FLNG has to be contrasted to Western Australia’s treatment over the GST, and in other areas, and whether we get that money back. What we do not get is jobs. Certain ministers, former ministers and promoters of FLNG—the federal member for Brand, former Minister for Resources and Energy Martin Ferguson, and the current Minister for Industry, Ian Macfarlane—all claim that people might not like the technology but at the end of the day the country will benefit and jobs will be available. Shell put on a barbecue on Geoje Island for the visiting delegation from Western Australia and invited quite a number of the employees of Shell who were going through their introduction to FLNG prior to sailing with the ship and undertaking its installation and who, ultimately, would be the operator maintainers on the ship. Of all the people that I spoke to—I will be criticised by the member for Geraldton if this is not correct—I met only two who came from Western Australia; the rest of them were from overseas or were ex-Clyde Refinery employees from New South Wales and some came from Tasmania. When I asked them whether they would be moving to Western Australia to become Western Australians and to service the ship, their response was that they would continue to live in Tasmania or Sydney and will fly in, fly out through Darwin. I have to ask: where are the jobs? I know that we are not getting any local content, revenue or gas, but the minister said that jobs would be created out of this piece of equipment. Now it appears, apart from maybe maintenance campaigns, there are very few jobs for local Western Australians on the Prelude floating liquefied natural gas ship. When it comes to maintenance campaigns, for which there may well need to be in the region of 300 to 400 people on board the vessel, there is no guarantee they will come from Western Australia. Members may remember that the supply base for the Prelude is in Darwin, so I imagine that the maintenance campaign will be organised out of Darwin. Therefore, any fabrication, equipment or other piece of engineering will be sourced through the supply base in Darwin and could come from anywhere—Brisbane, Melbourne, Sydney and, possibly, Western Australia—but there is no guarantee about that. Even the jobs that were supposedly being created through maintenance campaigns for FLNG Prelude probably will not come about anyway as they will be organised out of Darwin. As part of the examination of FLNG, the committee looked closely at the Torosa gas field because, as is pointed out in this legislation, it has a couple of state titles and we knew there was state interest in exploration in the Seringapatam Reef area to the north of Scott Reef. Whilst we were looking at the maps provided by the department, one of the staff members identified a number of rocks that were on the map just slightly outside the state titles and in the commonwealth titles. We then asked whether those rocks were above the waterline and it turned out they were. Therefore, members of the committee asked: if those rocks are above the waterline, why is that area not part of the state lease and why is it being included in the commonwealth lease? As a result, the department took that matter to Geoscience Australia, which had a closer look at the area and determined what would be state title and commonwealth title and redrew the area to ensure that what the minister refers to as the “golden rocks” — Mr W.R. Marmion: So you found them? Mr F.M. LOGAN: It came out of our committee. We did not find the rocks; we just identified that the rocks were under the commonwealth title and asked whether that was correct. It turned out, from Geoscience Australia, that it was not correct and as a result the boundaries have been redrawn and that area has come into the state and here we are changing the legislation to ensure that those new boundaries form part of the state lease as opposed to the commonwealth lease. I have some questions, but I want the minister to respond as part of his response to the second reading debate rather than by interjection. One question goes to the way in which this bill deals with the existing titles that are likely to run out in December this year. Those two titles, which form part of retention lease TR/5, run out in December this year. The view of the Department of Mines and Petroleum is that this legislation will allow a smooth transition of tenure at the time the titles in Scott Reef and the exploration leases in the Seringapatam Reef come up for renewal. I know that the leases in the Seringapatam Reef come up later, but I am specifically asking the minister about the leases that are likely to come up for replacement. The argument by the Department of Mines and Petroleum is that if this legislation is not passed, those titles will become vacant when the leases run out later this year. If they become vacant, anybody can come along and make a claim against them; I am not 100 per cent sure. I put it to the minister that the legal rights of Woodside, as one of the players in the ownership of the existing retention leases, should be respected in any legislation that will change the title from commonwealth to state waters. I completely agree that that — Mr W.R. Marmion: Do you want me to respond now?
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Mr F.M. LOGAN: No, later. Mr W.R. Marmion: You’re not quite right. It’s actually the commonwealth leases that are the problem. Mr F.M. LOGAN: At the end of the day, the state titles expand into the commonwealth waters. I am pointing out to the minister that I accept the fact that the current owners of the retention leases must be respected and reflected so that they do not lose what they currently have. My question goes to the issue of when those leases come up for renewal in December. Will this piece of legislation automatically give the leaseholders an extension of those retention leases beyond December; and, if so, why? If we go back to the second report of the Economics and Industry Standing Committee, recommendation 2 on page 33 reads — The Minister for Mines and Petroleum and the Minister for State Development urge the Commonwealth Government to specify the criteria for assessing that Retention Leases granted under the Offshore Petroleum and Greenhouse Gas Storage Act 2006 (Cth) are held for a legitimate need to secure gas for long-lived production projects and not to obtain a competitive commercial advantage. As the minister knows, those retention leases are held for a period of up to 15 years on the basis that they are not commercially viable. I put it to the minister that they are now clearly commercially viable because Woodside is already talking about development through floating liquefied natural gas, and prior to that it was talking about development by piping the gas back to James Price Point. Very close by this area we have Shell undertaking the development by FLNG of the Prelude field, which is really part of the Browse field, and not too far away from that is the Santos–GDF Suez project, which was going to be developed by FLNG but will now possibly be developed by platform straight into the Inpex pipeline and then piped back to Darwin. Therefore, the area has now become commercially viable to develop. This was one of the criticisms levelled in the report, raised by ministers who are all talk and no action. I point out that Martin Ferguson, the former federal Minister for Resources and Energy, and the current Minister for Industry, Ian Macfarlane, are both absolute examples of federal ministers who are all talk and no action. When they talk about “use it or lose it”, they have not actually taken anything from anybody. They have gone along to Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association Ltd meetings and made grand statements about “use it or lose it” and a fair number of threats, but they have never done anything. Both the Labor and Liberal parties in Western Australia do not support the development of offshore fields by FLNG, whereas both Labor and Liberal parties federally do support it. There is viable gas in retention leases that will now come under state jurisdiction and are up for renewal, and I put it to the minister that it is a golden opportunity for the Western Australian government to act and to pressure Woodside that there will be no FLNG, or else the lease will go out to the marketplace, because there are plenty of companies that would line up to pipe that gas onshore for domestic consumption. I will not name them, but our committee heard from them when we were preparing our report. MR P.C. TINLEY (Willagee) [3.05 pm]: It is a pleasure to speak to the Petroleum Titles (Browse Basin) Bill 2014. As the member for Cannington—our lead speaker on this bill and shadow spokesperson on all matters relating to energy, mines, minerals, petroleum and many other things—said, the opposition is in furious support of the government to cooperate in the safe and expedited passage of this legislation and we completely concur with the declaration of urgency. We find ourselves with a very responsive piece of legislation to deal with the obvious problem of harmonisation of the way in which these leases are dealt with. Unlike other pieces of government legislation, I find it amazing that something as complex and convoluted—albeit well-trodden—as the path of commonwealth–state relations in these areas can get through a department such as the Department of Mines and Petroleum in the short time it has, while other pieces of legislation, including all those relating to environmental protection or local government in this state, seem to go on and on for about five years. I thank the minister for the offer and delivery of a briefing on this legislation, and I understood from it that there has been a lot of burning of the midnight oil in the development of this bill—hopefully not domestic oil! We heard in the briefing that when tropical cyclone Fay appeared, it created a situation around the Seringapatam Reef. The map provided in the briefing showed that the reef sits inside federal waters, but the cyclone created a change in the mean average high-water mark from which the baseline is derived, and Geoscience Australia made the point clear. We were notified on 27 May that the commonwealth government may have known about those circumstances a lot earlier. I will not talk about a fair playing field, because it seems as though the federal government had its legal advice well in hand, and the commonwealth Solicitor-General made a very fast response post-27 May. The federal government has had time to contemplate the issues involved, and despite the machinations of the federal and state delegates about this matter, I hope they reached common ground very quickly and that there was a degree of trust. It was also interesting to learn in the briefing, as the member for Cannington said, that once the mean high-water mark and the baseline has been worked out and the allocation of jurisdiction over a particular piece of submerged land has been determined, it cannot be taken away. That is a very interesting piece of information. I am also advised that in Torosa field WA-30-R there was a reduction in the lands as a result of cyclonic activity, and that in fact we remain the beneficiary of it and there was no revision of that in the reverse.
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It has been a privilege to sit as a member of the Economics and Industry Standing Committee, as I said earlier today when we tabled the annual report of the committee on the economic impact of floating liquefied natural gas. Given that in this bill Torosa has already been identified and statements have been made by the proponents that the field will more than likely be exploited by FLNG, it is worth dwelling on this—never let a chance go by—to record in this place the implications of FLNG on the small and fragile economy of Western Australia. It is no secret to anybody in this house that the majority of our economy is built and relies heavily on the resources sector. In fact, the resources industry, according to the Department of Mines and Petroleum, is worth about $70 billion in economic output in WA annually. I think that figure is actually on the low side. I think it is well up now towards $100 billion. However, for the purpose of the discussion, it is a lot. The next nearest industry to it is agriculture, closely followed by education as the third, and their contributions are in single digits. Just to get a sense of scale, they are single-digit contributions to the economy of Western Australia alongside the resources sector generally. More specifically, petroleum itself—including crude oil, condensate, LNG and the whole hydrocarbon space—was worth $24.5 billion in 2013. I suspect that in the future years it is going to — Mr W.R. Marmion: Double. Mr P.C. TINLEY: As the minister said, it will easily double. The point is that even though we all know this, we sometimes lose sight of it because we are entrenched in our daily work within the great resource state of Australia. In the past, particularly with bulk commodities such as iron ore and so on, we have been subject to the whiplash of a price cycle and the peaks and troughs that that creates. A small economy such as ours, with a very sparse population spread over such a large land area— although the majority of the population, 70 per cent, is in Perth—comes with unique issues. I will touch on those issues in a moment in relation to this particular operation in Torosa and associated downstream impacts. There are 2.6 million people in Western Australia. The full resources sector is focused entirely on and is subject to a very trade-exposed, internationalised industry. It is therefore really important that we continue to remind ourselves of the fragility of our economy in that space and the legislative policy circumstances that put significant impacts on it if FLNG is the future. In our inquiry, we started off by having a serious look at what the impacts of this would be on the economy in a negative context. It was important to have a clear-eyed understanding of the economic impacts of FLNG on the state. It was also really important to not let that, of itself, create a bias in the committee. The committee very deliberately looked at all sides of the argument. Because there was speculation after that, the committee needed to contemplate further the notion that if FLNG is coming, it will be a reality for the Western Australian economy. Clearly it is coming, as these are commercial decisions over which we have very little control, unless the federal government grows a spine and makes a statement about how we want to exploit our natural endowment. The Torosa gas field alone, on current thinking—I only go from what I read but it is yet to be confirmed by the joint venture partners—may see as many as three or more FLNG facilities on or around it exploiting the resource. There is already one—Prelude. The member for Cockburn said earlier that the committee visited it. However, in Shell’s arrangements alone, which say, “Design one, build many”, there will be potentially as many as 10 of these FLNG facilities off the coast in the future. I do not remember the time scale in which they could come on, but I imagine that if the market allowed for it, they could get a serious run on. The reason for that is a lot of the work on Prelude that people are doing today at the Samsung yard in Geoje is actually a learning exercise. Now they are going at pace. Samsung yard as it stands produces a ship a week— a ship a week! As the member for Cockburn said, the ship is 500 metres long, nearly 100 metres wide and nearly 80 metres high. People cannot understand or appreciate the impact on the psyche of displacement until they stand on it. These figures just roll off the tongue with ease until one actually stands on Prelude. We stood at the highest point at the back of Prelude, turned around and saw the second largest LNG tanker ever made getting ready to be tugged from one dock into another area, and it looked like it was a tinny going past the back of Prelude! It really did. We looked down over the top of it; it was an unbelievable sight. I believe that from casual conversations with the engineers there—they are not purported to be accurate—vessels similar to Prelude will be built at least one-third of the time sooner than the time taken to build them now. That is the estimated and intuitive view of the engineers, and they are very experienced people in this type of manufacturing facility. They believe that eventually they will be turning them out in half the time. The prospect of seeing these mammoth facilities—the largest floating thing ever built by humans—off the coast of Western Australia really needs to be put in the context of where the opportunity is for us. What can we control? What can we derive as a benefit for the people of Western Australia? More importantly, what do we need to do now to expedite the best possible outcome for businesses and for the people of Western Australia? A good example, but which is perhaps open to debate, is the way the entire process went with the Browse onshore facility. Commentary from not one, but both sides of the chamber is that we should think with more far-sighted vision about another environment in which we might unlock the natural resource off the coast of Western Australia and how a government could facilitate the easiest possible option. The committee went to
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Darwin and talked to the people in the Northern Territory government about how they had worked with Inpex to ensure that that facility had the smoothest possible insertion into the economy of the Northern Territory. Mr W.J. Johnston interjected. Mr P.C. TINLEY: The first issue, of course—the member for Cannington cannot help himself today—is that it does not do gas reservation. I wonder how long that will last as its economy grows. We will see. The principal operational issue was — Mr W.J. Johnston: Can I make a point? Mr P.C. TINLEY: Please do. Mr W.J. Johnston: They’re talking about building this pipeline from Darwin to connect to Moomba but, of course, no gas is available in Darwin, so it’s irrelevant. Unless they have a domestic train for Inpex, which isn’t going happen, why would they build the pipeline? Mr P.C. TINLEY: The member for Cannington is talking about the total national network of gas, which is something short of mythical. Mr B.S. Wyatt: Perhaps they could join it up to the Ord! Mr P.C. TINLEY: Yes, it could power the Ord filters—or canal! The point is that the Northern Territory government is smaller with a lot less going on. I would not suggest for a moment that the Department of Mines and Petroleum or anybody else could have done this as a whole-of-government approach, but it had all the approvals sorted and the area had been set aside. A minimal amount of approval effort was required for Inpex. It is a micro insight into what is possible. In retrospect one wonders whether, if we had James Price Point shovel-ready for all intents and purposes, from the government’s point of view, what outcome would have been achieved. Mr W.J. Johnston: Inpex never wanted to go to the coast. It wanted to go to the Maret Islands. Mr P.C. TINLEY: It wanted to level a class-A reserve. Mr W.J. Johnston: In its evidence to our committee, we asked whether it preferred one side over the other in terms of the Northern Development Taskforce. It said it submitted its comments to the Northern Development Taskforce, but never considered any other site in Western Australia apart from the Maret Islands. Mr W.R. Marmion: I am with the member; it is a good question to put! Mr P.C. TINLEY: It is a hypothetical now. It is salutatory, I suppose, insomuch that it is gone. Floating liquefied natural gas is coming—it is what it is. I know that 10, 20 or 30-year outlooks are politically scary time frames, but at some point we, as a total political effort, need to consider the longer-term future of our kids and their kids. What I mean is that in the short near-term—in the next five to 10 years—10 of these things are potentially growing, although I do not imagine that there will be 10 over that time. What will the servicing requirements be? We kept asking: Where will the maintenance crews come from? Where will the technical support come from? Where will the in extremis responses come from? No-one looked us in the eye and told us the lay-down misère that they would come from Western Australia. They are currently serviced from an inadequate facility in Broome and I understand that there is some provision for it. But right now, at pace, the Northern Territory is gearing up its wharfing arrangements to provide that support. Mr W.R. Marmion: It is our competition. Mr P.C. TINLEY: It is our competition, and we should be rising to the challenge of that competition. We are a small business in global terms. I have always maintained that it is incumbent for Western Australia, with its 2.6-odd million people who live over such a dispersed area and its prehensile insertion for Australia into the Indian Ocean, to take a wider regional view. I will not go into our role in the Indian Ocean, because it is completely distracting. The point is: where is the land-back wharf in phases 1, 2 and 3 that will position the far north coast of Western Australia to service them? Is that the best position? For the positioning strategy for all those sorts of things and all the attendant supplying and enabling infrastructure around it—such as the roadways and the long, wide loads—we can look at the Australian Marine Complex, for example, and its common-user facility, which is a massive project that was delivered over many years. The testament of a good policy is one that survives changes in administration, which the CUF did. AMC has and it has paid off. There is debate about its efficiency or effectiveness and the use of capital—but it is there. It is like the Melbourne trams! They have been paid for time and again and are now the beneficiaries of leveraged capital. [Member’s time extended.] Mr P.C. TINLEY: The issue is not only the infrastructure bottlenecks such as land-back wharfs, but also the opportunity with the Torosa field and the so-called golden rocks. The government—not only the Premier and executive government, but also the departments of the government—must put a full-court press on the
7916 [ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] proponents to ensure that we leverage the best possible opportunities well into the future. I am talking about not only 35 years of through-life maintenance support or a potential this or a potential that, but getting down to skilled local jobs and the continuity and sustainability of those skilled local jobs over time. Let us not put this in the basket of being a global business that is open for business and therefore at the whims of global change. That is just bunkum. The capacity for the state of Western Australia to participate is this golden era of LNG extraction is, I believe, really possible and requires a significant amount of leadership and a certain amount of vision. A good example that I will highlight for members are two companies in the United Kingdom that are providing subsea support to Gorgon. MSCM and Viper Subsea have been working on subsea technology—as extracted from their various experiences in the North Sea, no doubt—and manufacturing products in Britain. MSCM has opened an office on St Georges Terrace—that is how much it thinks WA will grow. Its global positioning strategy is set, but where will it manufacture its equipment? MSCM will continue to manufacture its equipment—it has made public statements about this and Viper Subsea has said the same—in the United Kingdom. If it is within the capacity for both MSCM and Viper Subsea to manufacture in a similarly costly country—the United Kingdom—notwithstanding the exchange rate and the terms of trade, why is it not possible for an isolated market with the capacity to do so to get on and pick off the bits of this behemoth flow of projects that would be beneficial to us? Why do we not make it clear to the companies that want to exploit the natural resource off the coast of Western Australia, regardless of whether it is federal or state waters, that we have things of particular interest? We should own the design, construction and maintenance of everything subsea. There is nothing about scale that shows it needs to be made in a yard in Korea. There is nothing about it that says that the technology that is resident in the corporate knowledge of Western Australia cannot undertake the task. In fact, if we look at what happens at the University of Western Australia’s destructive testing laboratory for subsea movements, we see that it is innovative technology. A range of constituent parts of our economy can either be directly used or adapted to assist. I am talking about the whole system, including research and development as well as pure research on these issues. Government policy also needs to seriously refer to local content and how we measure it. If members have read the local content report from the Department of State Development, they would have found that there is very little to give them confidence that we are doing anything more than defining the problem. The last one identified a nice jump in local content, but it did not differentiate between what I call “grudge buys”—that is, those buys that have to be made because companies are here, such as airfares, accommodation and catering—and the skilled work that applies to these sorts of opportunities, which requires a long lead-time to train our youth and to retrain those who are restructuring in different industries. So much of what we do as a government and as a state defines the status quo and the problem as it stands, with very little attempt to identify where we want to take it. When it comes to public policy, particularly in R&D, there is an old saying that we should not pick winners. But I would add to that: certainly we should not pick winners, but we should back winners. There is nothing wrong when a government backs winners—and the winning sector in this state is the resource sector. It has been winning globally for years. Why do we not harness that and say that these are the sorts of things we value, and not just say that in a policy sense? If we talked to anybody on the Terrace and anybody who gave evidence to the Economics and Industry Standing Committee when it discussed this matter, they would say that they do not like commentary around government policy. Government policy changes within the same government during a term of government and also changes as governments change. Business wants certainty. We all know that mantra. Let us give it certainty. Let us legislate. There is nothing more certain than a piece of legislation that identifies and holds to account those who exploit the natural resources of the people of Western Australia and Australia. It does not have to be a case of everybody running to their fundamentalist economic corners, saying that that is against free trade, internationalised economies or a global view. It is not. There are many examples of governments that participate in the market. Governments have always regulated markets and always had a say in what goes on. Mr F.M. Logan: You only have to look at our number one trading partner. Mr P.C. TINLEY: Yes. It really happens. Some substantive things can be done. It is a retrograde step to defund such things as Industry Capability Network WA and ProjectConnect rather than look at their effectiveness or ineffectiveness. We need to take on the system of systems—that is, everything that supports the business. What is being done about businesses and enterprises at the enterprise level in Western Australia that is not fit for purpose? When I introduced the Skilled Jobs (Benefits from the Book) Bill 2012, which dealt with local content and was defeated twice along party lines, the debate identified that some high-level Western Australian companies are not good at collaborating. They are not good at joint ventures. They cannot get past sometimes that they are competitors one day and collaborators the next day. A sophisticated industry sector that would support that sort of growth and arrangement would have that. Defunding organisations that support Western Australian businesses and help them grow is fundamentally woeful. I would make a special case for Western Australia to have a muscular approach to local content, because unlike the rest of Australia, we are a stand-alone, isolated economy. The strategic threshold below which we would allow our industry capacity to fall is different from that in a network state on the eastern seaboard. Those states
[ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] 7917 have network power, growing network gas and network manufacturing capacities. Western Australia does not have those features. The network for Western Australia starts in Vietnam and moves north and west. That is not in the interests of Western Australians and future jobs. We need to attend to the matters that relate to this particular opportunity. I wanted to make those comments as loud and as clearly as I could: it is not one department’s responsibility to ensure the economic future of Western Australia and the skilled jobs as we transition to a knowledge economy and a skilled services sector and grow those sectors; it is the job of every department of the government and the ministerial group leading those departments to bring together the necessary vision that will deliver a sustainable future. MR B.S. WYATT (Victoria Park) [3.34 pm]: I, too, rise to speak to the Petroleum Titles (Browse Basin) Bill 2014. I thank the members for Cannington, Willagee and Cockburn, who have spent a lot of time in the space around energy. Inevitably, in a state such as Western Australia, that is a conversation around Western Australian economic development and, as the member for Willagee thoroughly pointed out, how we extract the maximum benefit from our finite resources for our population, not only now but also, as the member for Willagee pointed out, 30 or 40 years from now when this place will be full of very different people—a perpetual issue for our Parliament and government. I also want to comment generally on something that has already been alluded to by the member for Willagee concerning the conversation around floating liquefied natural gas and Western Australia and that is linked very much to the broader conversation taking place in countries around the Indian Ocean. In doing so, I acknowledge and wish all members of the Australian subcontinental community a very happy Diwali. On Saturday a lot of us will be going to the Diwali Mela Festival at the Claremont Showground. On Sunday I will have the very good fortune of travelling to India for a week to visit Mumbai and Delhi, a trip that I have wanted to do for a long time because I think the relationship between Western Australia and India is very underdone, something on which I have disagreed with the Premier before. The Department of State Development website shows the trade relationship between Western Australia and India, that giant upon which the Indian Ocean–rim countries look to and the only country from which an ocean has adopted its name. The website shows that Western Australian exports to India in 2009 were worth $7.5 billion. The Department of State Development website is very good and contains lots of information. In 2009 Western Australia exported $7.5 billion worth of exports to India, but by 2013 that had declined to $2.5 billion. That is an incredibly rapid drop in exports to India. India is a country that I think now, with a change of government to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, whose party has just last weekend had two very successful elections in two significant states, will emerge with even greater effort and determination over the coming decades. I do not think Western Australia is placed as well as it could and should be to maximise that potential. Mr W.J. Johnston: You know that the Prime Minister of India is not visiting Perth when he comes to Australia. Mr B.S. WYATT: Member for Cannington, at one level I am not surprised by that, because, of that $7.5 million in Western Australian exports—minister, I appreciate that I am not directly addressing the bill, but I will not be long on this — The ACTING SPEAKER: I will give you leniency, member for Victoria Park. Mr B.S. WYATT: The most significant Western Australian export to India is non-currency gold for jewellery. That has declined a lot simply because tariffs on gold have been imposed by the Indian government and no doubt due to the strong Australian dollar. A range of different things have influenced that decline. Mr W.R. Marmion: China has a strong demand for gold, too. Mr B.S. WYATT: Yes, that is right. But the Department of State Development’s factsheet refers to the top five Western Australian exports to India. Mr P.C. Tinley interjected. Mr B.S. WYATT: That is a good point. There will not be any gold left. Among the top five Western Australian exports to India are, from memory, gold; confidential resources, which, although I am not sure why it is called that, are basically mineral sands and a range of other commodities; and petroleum products. I was surprised to not see services among the top five things Western Australia exports to India. There are no education or professional services. I cannot remember what the fifth export on that list was, but it was valued at around $50 million, so we are getting into a very low amount. Mr W.J. Johnston: I’d have thought there were more students than that. Mr B.S. WYATT: That is what I would have thought, member for Cannington. I was very surprised to see that. I had been told, as we all know, that the Victorian government has been very aggressive to ensure that it captures its market of Indian students, but I was very surprised by that Department of State Development statistic. It highlights a point — Mr W.R. Marmion: Now LNG is going to take off.
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Mr B.S. WYATT: Absolutely; I will come to that. Again, this is a point that the member for Willagee made very effectively. We all talk about where we sit on the Indian Ocean rim. The Indian Ocean Rim Association Council of Ministers recently met in Perth. Foreign Minister Julie Bishop chaired that meeting, and I recall seeing media commentary about her at the time. Mr W.J. Johnston: Indonesia was the deputy chair. Mr B.S. WYATT: Indonesia was the deputy chair. Western Australia was the first state in Australia to open a trade office in India, so we have a comparatively long history with India. Mr P.C. Tinley: We have a responsibility. Mr B.S. WYATT: That is right, member for Willagee. But I do not think we are doing enough. I am looking forward to my trip next week because it will increase my knowledge base about what we can obtain from and provide to India. There was at the federal level under the previous Rudd and Gillard governments, and this seems to be continuing under the current Abbott government, a very determined focus on improving that relationship and increasing trade with India, but there is some work to be done at the state level. I hope—in fact, I am determined—to have conversations in that regard. I know that some of my colleagues, particularly the members for Willagee, Cannington, Cockburn and West Swan, have had conversations about Western Australia’s role on the Indian Ocean rim and the opportunities it brings, and also the responsibilities we have as a result thereof. Therefore, we do not need to have the conversations we have now about what is just off our coastline, what is within our waters and what is in commonwealth waters. We must lift our eyes and have a much broader conversation about our role in the Indian Ocean region and find what we have in common. Looking around the region, we can see things like Ebola, the rise of the Indian defence forces and the interests and inevitable tensions around the Malacca Straits. These are conversations that we have to be a part of. I acknowledge that we are not a nation state, we are a state, but inevitably we will be involved because of our sheer size and the influence in Western Australia of the growing Indian community and communities from countries that border the Indian Ocean rim. Coming back to my comments specifically about the bill, the member for Cannington outlined in great detail why we are here. Of course, we support this legislation. I am glad the member for Cannington made the point that we are happy to have this bill declared urgent at the beginning, because this is exactly the reason standing orders provide urgency for debates. It is not because of the organisational incompetence of a minister—I am not referring to you, Minister for Mines and Petroleum, of course; I am using the royal minister. Certainly, it is not for what we saw last year after the election when bill after bill was declared urgent, which was clearly a misuse of process. Mr W.J. Johnston: Shame, shame. Mr B.S. WYATT: Shame, shame. We support the retention and exploration leases that the member for Cannington outlined, because we do not want to have uncertainty surrounding those leases. I think all members look on the loss of an onshore LNG facility in the Kimberley as a lost opportunity. The words from the member for Willagee are echoing in my ears about whether had it been shovel-ready, there would have been a different outcome. Who knows? But that is quite likely, I would have thought. I say this without advocacy, and without ever having had a conversation about this with the Kimberley Land Council, but the divisive nature of not just the green movement but also the Aboriginal movement makes me curious. If Woodside entered into an arrangement with the local traditional owners and considered an equity stake in what was to be built, which can be done quite easily, rather than a payment system—recall the deal that was done; it involved the state—there would have been real ownership of the development of that plant by the traditional owner in the Kimberley. As they say, it is skin in the game. We are playing with a hypothetical here, but I am curious whether that may have eased some of those tensions or at least allowed the debate or those ructions to take place in a different environment at the time. I wonder, because I think that was a lost opportunity for the state and the Aboriginal community. Mr W.R. Marmion: Parallel to that was the environmental issues—the environmental movement. Mr B.S. WYATT: That aside, I am talking about the Aboriginal community, because I think that may have posed a different environment for the discussion. It may not have—who knows?—but we are talking about what might have been. The rise of floating liquefied natural gas has startled me, because when I was first elected to this place not that long ago in 2006, FLNG was a pipedream. It was something that may happen. With the rapid changes in technology, FLNG has become not only viable but effectively changed the entire concept of exploiting the Browse Basin. It is not yet being exploited by FLNG, but no doubt at some point it will. We have heard and
[ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] 7919 members have spoken to me previously about the size of the FLNG platforms and that the South Korean manufacturers are producing a ship a week; that is just an extraordinary statistic. Mr P.C. Tinley: It is only the third largest; there are two more that are bigger. Mr B.S. WYATT: I have not been to South Korea, but I am desperate to go. To see that would be mind-blowing. Of course, FLNG provides other challenges that have been raised by many members of Parliament. The member for Willagee hit it on the head when he said that we are a relatively small population in a large state. We are generally highly educated and have high wages compared to those of most of the world. Subsea infrastructure is an extraordinary opportunity for us. The member for Willagee worked during the first term of the Barnett government to bring to the attention of not only the government, but also the corporations the importance of local content beyond grudge buys—that is, the things they have to buy because they here with airfares, hotel rooms et cetera. As the member for Willagee pointed out, that is something that we have to be alert to. We have to be willing and able to protect, defend and exploit our resources to the maximum capacity to benefit ourselves. That is what a royalty regime does. That is what the local content debate does, whatever form it may work out to be. Due to the nature of the WA economy and the nature of our population, that benefit has to be in the training of our people. That is where it has to be and where we get the greatest long-term advantages from the exploitation of our natural resources. It terrifies and worries me, moving back a bit, making a broad sweeping comment about the energy and resources sector, that when iron ore production comes off—I refer not in terms of value, as at the moment we are still seeing the ramp up and tonnages increase—places such as Jigalong will be the same when I travel there in the future. This is something my dad, God bless him, was worried about. He went to Jigalong on and off for his entire life, right up until not long before he died. He was always angry and upset that really not much had changed at Jigalong during his lifetime in issues around poverty. That is despite the fact that Jigalong is very, very close to one of the largest iron ore deposits in the world that has been exploited for decades. We have to have this debate. That wave for liquefied natural gas, as the minister has pointed out, particularly with respect to India, has not yet hit, but it will, and we have to be very careful that we do not miss it or fail to maximise the ride we can take on that wave. I do not want to be an old man looking at some of the communities in Western Australia and thinking that they did not change during my dad’s lifetime and they have not changed during mine. That would be a great tragedy. I do not intend to seek an extension; I simply make those points. As the shadow minister, the member for Cannington, has pointed out, we will support the passage of this bill, which is a very important bill in light of the discovery of the golden rocks. May we continue to find offshore rocks!—not just those rocks that happened to sit above massive deposits of gas — Mr W.J. Johnston: But that helps! Mr B.S. WYATT: That helps! And I find it certainly helps focus the mind of the Parliament. It is amazing how quickly we can get a piece of legislation drafted, onto the floor of Parliament and through the lower house when there is a big — Mr F.M. Logan: Pile of gas. Mr B.S. WYATT: — pile of gas sitting below those rocks. I hope cyclones will come and go and we find more rocks that will conveniently even up that balance with our friends in Canberra. I think our friends in Canberra get used to that surge of revenue without really quite understanding how it has all come about. Mr P.C. Tinley: It’s a sugar hit! Mr B.S. WYATT: It is a sugar hit; that is right. I think we have seen that with federal governments cutting taxes, doing this and doing that, and when the sugar hit subsides, as it does with my four-year-old, we are left with a cranky outcome, and that is something we do not want to see again. I think those revenues flowing to Perth, Western Australia are much better utilised than those flowing to Canberra, and I look forward to finding many more golden rocks. MR I.C. BLAYNEY (Geraldton) [3.52 pm]: I rise to speak on the Petroleum Titles (Browse Basin) Bill 2014. I am a very patient person. I have been sitting here patiently listening. I had not really intended to mention anything about India; I have not really got anything against the place. I was going to point out that I do not know what the Indonesians, our nearest neighbours, call what to us is the Indian Ocean rim, because, of course, they call the Indian Ocean the Indonesian Ocean. I will briefly mention South Korea, of course, the land of miracles—our third-biggest trading partner. Browse and the commercialisation of its gas has been an issue for me since I was elected again in 2013. Being the Chairman of the Economics and Industry Standing Committee looking into the emergence of floating liquefied natural gas, it has been the main issue for me. Looking back, the Browse field was discovered in 1971 and is still sitting there unexploited. Well done to Geoscience Australia. It is quite amazing that a cyclone can push a few rocks onto a reef that then get colonised. We thought Western
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Australia would have five per cent of the overall Browse field, which is what Woodside claimed at the time, but now with 63 per cent of the Torosa field, we have in excess of 30 per cent of the overall Browse field. During the time our committee has been working on FLNG, Shell has been a regular visitor, as has Prelude. I was one of the members who went to look at the vessel being built in Geoje, South Korea. There is no doubt that it is a big beast. It is the biggest floating vessel that has ever been made. When Shell or anyone else in the industry is asked to define whether it is new technology or just a derivation of existing technology, the answer is that it is both, which is a delightfully ambiguous answer. It weighs 600 000 tonnes and is the same height as a 17-storey building. It is actually smaller than what is proposed for Scarborough, which I think will be about 1 million tonnes. There is no doubt that this technology and system will have a large impact on domestic employment, with a substantial loss of construction jobs at James Price Point. Of course, we can see the attraction of it for Woodside in that it is committing its capital in blocks rather than the whole lot upfront. With the figure that Woodside has used for James Price Point, being $80 billion, it is obviously attractive for Woodside to buy these things in blocks at about $12 billion each. The committee has already taken a strong interest in the safety of the offshore vessels, in particular because the crew will stay on the vessel during cyclones and the fact that the vessel cannot move—it is anchored. As part of our recent trip to Europe we visited the Maritime Research Institute Netherlands tank testing facility and watched the video of the Prelude vessel encountering a once-in-10 000-years cyclone. I came away thinking that the vessel would probably survive that, but to see something of the scale of the Prelude vessel, which is an enormous vessel, have waves nearly going over the top of it gives the idea that we are taking quite a big step with this vessel. To be able to get it onto the vessel, the area that would normally be taken up by a gas processing plant is reduced by one quarter. Once again, there is quite a substantial change in using existing technology. The other concern we had was how the people at the bow would get off if there was an explosion midway along the vessel. Shell was good enough to walk us right through the whole area of the vessel and show us how that would work. When it comes to opportunities, we really have to look deeply to see how Western Australia could get a lot of jobs and opportunities out of the advent of FLNG. There are some there. I expect there will be some design work and some high-value construction work, but we will have to be very keen and focused and have the government behind us to get a lot of that. There will be some domestic employment spin-offs from the gas industry in the Kimberley. Broome is already the centre of the aviation requirements for Prelude, and it will be home for the emergency and tug support services. It has to be remembered that a number of tugs have to be out there accompanying these vessels because they have to bring the tankers in to load. It would be hoped that we can build a supply base and engineering services with that as well. The government has already put funds into expanding Challenger Institute of Technology, with 200 people being trained there to operate Prelude, which is a positive move. Offshore maintenance is a big issue and, once again, it is very important that we have a focused approach to making sure we can get as many of those jobs as we can. The difference with Prelude and the FLNG barges is that they will require continuous maintenance and up to 350 people will work on these vessels, with about 650 other jobs associated with the vessel. The rough rule of thumb, if one had to be given, would be that there are probably about 1 000 jobs per vessel. Of course, looking back through the history of Western Australia, our first gas plant, the North West Shelf, was built here. We then went to modular construction, and I think Pluto was a modular construction site. Now, of course, the whole thing is built overseas. It is just dragged here, set up and it starts producing. Our committee is continuing its work on safety and opportunities. That said, there is no doubt that it is harder to get opportunities and benefits out of FLNG, apart from tax. One of the conclusions my committee came to was that one of the main interests the commonwealth had in this was tax. Fortunately, now that the Western Australian government has a much bigger proportion of the Torosa field, we start to hold a few cards, and I am hoping that we will get more gas from other places as domestic gas, as a trade-off for Prelude not putting any gas directly into the domestic system. It is worth keeping hold of the James Price Point site, because the Canning Basin is one of the great yet-to-be-exploited gas fields in the world, and we may well need James Price Point to process and export the gas. A couple of members have mentioned the Samsung yard in Geoje, which we visited. After the rest of the committee had left and come back to Australia, the member for Moore and I visited the Hyundai yard, which is just up the road a bit. It is the biggest shipyard in the world, and turns out a ship every four days. When we were there the yard was building a container ship that would carry 19 000 containers. Some 60 000 people work there every normal working day and, with subcontractors added into that, up to 80 000 people work at that shipyard. Just down the road, Hyundai has a car factory that turns out 1.5 million cars a year. Australia, sadly, is about to lose its car industry, and that one Hyundai plant turns out more cars than the entire Australian market. There are not the opportunities in FLNG that there would be if the development had taken place onshore. At the same time, I do not think that there are no opportunities, but we will have to be very focused to do well out of it.
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MR W.R. MARMION (Nedlands — Minister for Mines and Petroleum) [4.02 pm] — in reply: I begin by thanking members for their contributions to the debate on the Petroleum Titles (Browse Basin) Bill 2014—the members for Cannington, Cockburn, Willagee, Victoria Park and Geraldton. The member for Cannington summed up the legislation quite well. His contribution could almost have been my concluding second reading speech. It is quite a simple bill. As the member for Cannington quite eloquently mentioned, all it is doing — Mr W.J. Johnston: We are being very nice to each other! Mr W.R. MARMION: This is the only good bit! It is a simple bill that makes sure that the skin in the game by the proponents of the Torosa field remains when the commonwealth retention leases shrink. As the member pointed out, if we do not do this, under the current arrangements, the bit that the commonwealth loses would still become Western Australian, but we would have to put it out for anyone to bid for. Mr P.C. Tinley: Were you tempted, minister? Mr W.R. MARMION: It does go through one’s mind! At the end of the day, sovereign risk is paramount, and we value our sovereign risk in Western Australia, so the investment that the proponents have put into this field needs to be protected. That is what this bill is about. Some of the other points mentioned by the member were quite interesting, although not relevant to the bill, such as the different ways in which gas is priced around the world, and whether it is tied to oil as an energy unit—there are lots of ways in which this can be done—or tied to another commodity. The way gas is priced is quite interesting, and makes us think. The member mentioned the Singapore trading hub, which was quite interesting. The main point, I guess, that the member wanted to make was about domestic gas policy, and how we are a bit different in Western Australia compared with other states, and probably the rest of the world. The member then talked about the greater utility of assets such as Pluto. He also mentioned the Economic Regulation Authority report. I would probably agree with the member on that point. There is very global commentary on that. It was an opportunity for the member to make some very good points on a bigger picture than the bill we are talking about today. The member for Cockburn left me with a couple of questions. Most members spoke about the Economics and Industry Standing Committee’s report on floating liquefied natural gas, which then became a topic of conversation and has been discussed in this house before. To respond to the member’s specific question, passing this bill will not pre-empt any other decisions to be made on those leases. All this does is put in place the provision that if we renew the retention leases, which is a separate decision, the proponents will not be worse off. They will not lose that bit of land that was commonwealth land under WA-30-R, which is the commonwealth retention lease. That lease will shrink, and the gap will be taken up by state leases. I have probably answered the member’s other question as well. The retention lease, as the member said, is in place for 15 years, if the field is not currently viable. The member suggested that it appears that the field could now be viable. That is a decision that will be made when I have a look at the retention leases, and if I renew them and if they are viable, the proponents have to move. If they are not viable, I have 12 months to do something about it. Mr F.M. Logan: If you were the commonwealth minister, I would expect the proponents to be arguing for the leases to be rolled over for another 15 years. That is what they would be arguing. We are not in that situation anymore, but it needs to be clearly brought to their attention. Mr W.R. MARMION: The advice that I have is that Woodside is looking at going to a front-end engineering design decision early next year. At the moment, there is uncertainty about how it can do its economics on it. That is one of the other reasons for fast-tracking this bill. Mr F.M. Logan: The point I am making to you, minister, is that as the resources minister for Western Australia, not the commonwealth minister, it will need to be made very clear that, as the member for Cannington indicated, the dollar has dropped, so the cost of doing that work offshore has dropped, and the state does not support FLNG. Mr W.R. MARMION: When I get the advice on whether to renew from my department, the economics will be presented. I realise that. The member for Willagee said what a bonus it was that we have these rocks, and everyone in Western Australia obviously agrees with that. He then talked about the importance of the resources industry in total. The actual value figure for the industry is now $122 billion, just to put that on the record. Petroleum products is the number two earner, and it will grow when we get Gorgon and Wheatstone on train soon—it will probably double. The member posed an interesting hypothetical that, if we already had a supply base at James Price Point, would the decision have been better? Although it is not related to this bill, it raises the question that the next time that happens we will need to have something in train so that the decision can perhaps be more in our favour. The member for Victoria Park raised the importance of India for the future. As I mentioned by way of interjection, it is relevant to some extent that we have signed up for liquefied natural gas sales to India already. I agree with the
7922 [ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] member that in the general picture, even though it is a broader thing and comes under other departments, India is a focus for this government for the near future. The member for Geraldton, who is Chairman of the Economics and Industry Standing Committee, raised some good points about floating liquefied natural gas and the concerns the committee had about explosions and stability, and asked how many people will be working on the facility, how many will be Western Australians, and about the local content. Just to get back to the bill, it is fairly simple. It is in three parts. Part 1 refers to the title and the definitions. Part 2 concentrates on the Scott Reef area and explains how the current Western Australian lease R2 will be expanded to be a shore-based lease and also that the TR/5 territorial waters lease will be expanded to take into WA water those areas currently included in commonwealth WA-30-R. Part 3 picks up a piece of WA-315, a commonwealth exploration lease, where we previously had no land but where we now have land. Part 3 provides the opportunity to create two more leases, one under the Petroleum (Submerged Lands) Act and one under the Petroleum and Geothermal Energy Resources Act to cover that area. Part 4 covers administrative matters to make sure that certain locations that are deemed commonwealth locations are now deemed state locations, so that administrative details in the WA registers can be adjusted to take into account the changes and the increased land we now have. I commend the bill to the house and look forward to the future royalty streams that Western Australia may enjoy when we are able to define how much of the Torosa gas field will deliver a net revenue to Western Australia through royalties. At the moment, the next phase is to determine what percentage of that field will go to the commonwealth and what percentage will go to the state. As a result of Geoscience Australia coming up with these extra “golden rocks”, our percentage will be much greater. I thank everyone for their support of the bill. Question put and passed. Bill read a second time. Consideration in Detail Clauses 1 to 3 put and passed. Clause 4: Expansion of lease R2 — Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: My question is similar to the question that the member for Cockburn asked the minister. At the moment there is a commonwealth and a state retention lease that have identical terms—actually, they might be slightly different now because the commonwealth deleted the need to go back to James Price Point, but the state lease still refers to James Price Point. When we expand R2 to take up the area that is no longer covered by commonwealth law, is there an expectation of what will be in that retention lease? Will there be a continued obligation on the proponents to go to James Price Point, or what will be the expectation of that expanded state lease? Mr W.R. MARMION: We have not made any decision on that. Currently, all we are doing is making sure that if the decision is made down the track, on 23 December, 24 December or thereafter when a decision is made, passing this bill does not open up the possibility of the current proponents losing the previously commonwealth part of the retention lease that now will be part of the Western Australian lease. Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: Let us assume that this had never happened, we would still be getting very close to the date of renewal of this retention lease, so the minister must have been receiving advice from his agency and other agencies about the impact of renewing R2. I would expect that the minister would have been in conversation with the proponents in any case to give them a heads up about the government’s plans and he would have an idea whether the government would continue to have an onshore obligation. What is the likely position of the government? In my contribution to the second reading debate, I made the point that we could have a floating facility with a tieback for pipeline gas to shore to ensure there was a domestic supply available that was not an LNG supply, which would not be acceptable. There might be all these different options and I would have expected, given the lease was almost at an end, that the minister would be talking to his agency and other agencies about those decisions. Mr W.R. MARMION: This cuts across two portfolios—the Department of State Development and the Department of Mines and Petroleum. In relation to my portfolio of mines, the first thing that will happen is that I will get a report from my department, because part of the condition of the lease is about commerciality, which the member mentioned. The commonwealth, in some incredibly short space of time, from the information it got, managed to determine that floating LNG was commercial and putting the facility on land was not. I have not received that advice from my department and I do not think I will be making that decision in such a short space of time because I will be looking at the analysis and the assumptions made. I do not yet have that advice, but I certainly expect to have it by December. That will be a separate decision from the Petroleum Titles (Browse
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Basin) Bill 2014 but will obviously be related to it to make sure that the proponents are not in the position of losing a little chunk of the Torosa field to someone else who might bid if we had to put it out to bidding. Mr F.M. LOGAN: It is not exactly a “little chunk” by any stretch of the imagination; in total, it would be one-third of the whole field, and I think there is 16 trillion cubic feet in the entire field. That is an enormous amount of gas. To return to the point I was talking about earlier, the tenement had a 15-year life span under which it could be argued that the lease was not being developed on the basis of the commercial unviability of the location; it is remote and therefore unviable to develop. As I pointed out to the minister, companies are developing all around that area: Inpex, Shell, GDF Suez and Santos. They are developing all around there, so the time has clearly come for the field to become commercially viable. The minister’s federal counterparts talked publicly about this particular area in terms of the use it or lose it principle. Surely the minister must take that into account, given that the lease is coming up for renewal. Surely he should take into account what his federal counterparts have said about this area. Has he taken this to the Premier, who is the Minister for State Development? It will be interesting to know what the Department of State Development has advised. Our experience with the Department of State Development is a particularly poor one; it does nothing until the companies have made a decision. It would be interesting to know whether the minister has taken this issue to the Premier and put to him the proposition that this is the key point in time when Western Australian can take advantage of the renewal of this lease for the purposes of state development, the monetisation of that gas and the delivery of domestic gas to Western Australia. Mr W.R. MARMION: My department is working through the renewal process with the proponent. I have not been involved in that, and it is quite complicated because there are a whole lot of issues involved, including even the actual three-dimensional composition of the field itself and the allocation of the gas and which bits are going to be state royalty and which will be commonwealth. It is quite a complex exercise to determine the viability and the ongoing obligations in terms of domestic gas. Obviously, another issue that I understand the Department of State Development is talking about is the supply base. That has nothing to do with this bill at all, but it is obviously of interest to everyone in this room and down the track. I have an open mind, so on 23 or 24 December, if I choose to make a decision regarding these leases, I will take everything into account at that time. Mr F.M. LOGAN: I thank the minister for that response, but it has not really elaborated anything. I understand that the minister is receiving advice and that it is complex, but this goes to who holds the lease and what benefits the state as a whole can get from negotiations around either the renewal or non-renewal of that lease. It is not an automatic rollover, and that was made very clear by both the former federal minister and the current federal minister. We will be watching very closely to see what the minister’s decision will be, because this is a multi-multibillion-dollar decision, with the potential for either the creation or loss of tens of thousands of jobs for Western Australia.
Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: I will make an observation on this clause before we move on to another one and ask another question. As the federal minister at the time pointed out to me, it is not that the commonwealth retention lease prevents the use of James Price Point; it is that it allows the consideration of other locations and floating liquefied natural gas. It is not because the commonwealth was able to make a decision in short order that one was not financially viable; it simply allowed the proponents to look at things other than James Price Point. Three years ago, three of the five joint venture partners actually thought that backfilling the Burrup Peninsula was the best and most cost-effective way. It was not Woodside, but the media reports—these are not from the companies; I am referring to media reports—were that Chevron and Shell wanted to backfill the North West Shelf and that BHP was not averse to backfilling the North West Shelf. Indeed, my comments during the second reading debate would not give any indication that the Labor Party would oppose backfilling the North West Shelf either, because that could be in everybody’s interest; it would certainly keep the capital costs down and the delays would not be as great as some people might think.
Leaving all that aside, it was explained to us in our briefing that this is stand-alone legislation and it sits alongside the Petroleum and Geothermal Energy Resources Act and the Petroleum (Submerged Lands) Act, which is obviously covered under clause 5. The state government’s policy remains that there is an obligation for domestic reserves on export projects. I am effectively asking the minister to confirm that that policy obligation remains and that the state government will not change that. The minister might on 24 December say, “Bugger you all, you’re all off and we will put it out that the retention lease isn’t renewed.” It is not my expectation that the minister will not renew the retention lease, but I do expect the government of Western Australia to continue to pursue its stated policy objective of domestic gas reservation. That is really what I am driving at. The minister can answer the question any way he wants. Is he saying to us that the government’s domestic gas reservation policy is being reviewed? If he is not, he should just say that when the government considers the renewal of R2, it is going to look at it in terms of domestic obligations.
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Mr W.R. MARMION: That is true. We have a domestic gas policy, but the implementation of that policy is not part of my role as Minister for Mines and Petroleum. I cannot tell the member what will eventuate in that respect, because I will not be involved in it. Clause put and passed. Clause 5 put and passed. Clause 6: New exploration permit under Petroleum (Submerged Lands) Act 1982 — Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: I note for the record in the future that issues regarding clause 5 are the same as for clause 4, so there is no reason to ask the same set of questions again. This clause refers to the exploration permit. Am I right that this is the one where there is — Mr W.R. Marmion: It is the little tiny bit at the top of Scott Reef. Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: So this is the bit about which there is an expectation that the proponents will give up their right because it is just that tiny little bit at the very bottom of WA-315-P. Mr W.R. Marmion: Correct. Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: It is so small that it is not really relevant. Mr W.R. Marmion: But you have to cover it. Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: I accept that it has to be covered and the law has to comply. I am just confirming that that is what this clause is about. Mr W.R. MARMION: The member is dead right. Because the boundary for the Scott Reef area moves a little into WA-315-P—the other commonwealth exploration one that is really the Seringapatam Reef area—clause 6 covers a new exploration permit under WA legislation that is currently under commonwealth legislation. Clause put and passed. Clause 7: New exploration permit under Petroleum and Geothermal Energy Resources Act 1967 — Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: By way of comment, clause 8 will deal with the little bit that is in WA-398-P, and this one is WA-315-P; is that right? Mr W.R. Marmion: Correct. Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: At the moment we are not aware of any gas resources. This is still an exploration permit and nobody has told us that there is any gas underneath this. Mr W.R. Marmion: Not yet. Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: But there have been discoveries elsewhere in the — Mr W.R. Marmion: Kronos is the little bit at the bottom, yes—ConocoPhillips. Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: Yes. Conoco found gas in this permit but not in this location; is that the story? Mr W.R. Marmion: Correct. Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: Again we are just expecting Conoco to come back and ask, and there is an alignment of the dates here as well. There are two separate permits and we are going to give it a single date; is that it? Mr W.R. MARMION: Clause 7 covers a new exploration permit under the Petroleum and Geothermal Energy Resources Act, which is the pink centre in the middle of the map. Mr W.J. Johnston: Right. Mr W.R. MARMION: That is what clause 7 is about and what we are dealing with there. Mr W.J. Johnston: And clause 8 is then for the rest of that; clause 8 is the ring around it. Mr W.R. MARMION: Yes, that is correct. Mr F.M. LOGAN: I thank the minister for explaining that. Can the minister remind the house of the time frames for the exploration permit and the advice that he or the department has received from ConocoPhillips about the potential resource under these new exploration permits? Mr W.R. MARMION: Has the member got the map in front of him? It might help to explain it. Mr F.M. Logan: I think I know. Mr W.R. MARMION: Permit WA-315-P is the big bit that I am pointing to on the map. That is due for renewal in August 2015. When that happens, WA will end up with the pink bit in the middle and the yellow bit on the outside that is in that permit. Then the other commonwealth permit, WA-398-P, comes up in October 2016. So
[ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] 7925 when that comes in vogue, we will pick up that other extra yellow bit just in that top corner there. That is the time frame, so by October 2016 we will have completed the doughnut. Mr F.M. Logan: Picking up both sides of the doughnut. Mr W.R. MARMION: Yes, the whole lot. Clause put and passed. Clauses 8 to 10 put and passed. Title put and passed. Leave granted to proceed forthwith to third reading. Third Reading MR W.R. MARMION (Nedlands — Minister for Mines and Petroleum) [4.35 pm]: I move — That the bill be now read a third time. MR W.J. JOHNSTON (Cannington) [4.36 pm]: I want to quickly talk about a couple of things that came out of the consideration in detail stage of the Petroleum Titles (Browse Basin) Bill 2014. The Leader of the House will be happy to know that we will be done before five o’clock. Mr P.C. Tinley: As promised. Mr W.J. JOHNSTON: As promised! I want to comment on the position on the renewal of the retention lease for the Torosa field in respect of the obligations for domestic gas. We would be outraged if there was not a continuation of the obligations on the proponents to come up with a plan to provide domestic gas. This is a complex financial project for these proponents. If it was easy, they would have done it in the past. Of course, the idea of retention leases, the issue the member for Cockburn was driving at, is to get them to exploit the resource. Thirty-five years ago there was no expectation of floating liquefied natural gas. There was no expectation of anything other than a stick-build. We can go back and have a look at the way the construction methods for LNG facilities have changed over time. People say, “You can’t have sovereign risk.” I agree that sovereign risk should be held to a minimum. It is not a sovereign risk on the proponents for there to be an expectation that work will be done onshore, because when they found the resource, they had an expectation that 100 per cent of the work would be done onshore with much less subsea facilities and all these things that did not exist 35 years ago. Technology has come along and now the opportunities for the exploitation of these fields are very different from the obligations that existed 35 years ago. I am not a Luddite. Equally, I am not a technological determinist, which is the opposite of a Luddite—that is, a person who believes that because a technology exists, it must be used. An argument on behalf of the proponents that because they have a new technology it must be used is not a valid argument. They have legitimate, valid arguments about their financial interests; and the state, the commonwealth and the people of Western Australia and Australia have valid and fair arguments. We therefore drove in on only one issue in consideration in detail—that is, the obligations that the minister might be minded to give. The minister did his level best to not tell us what his views will be. I suppose if I were the minister, I would have done exactly the same thing because, apart from anything else, at least he can say that he did not come with apprehended bias. Equally, we need and expect a commitment from the state government that it still has in mind the question of domestic gas reservation. Some time ago, before the election, the Leader of the Opposition, Mark McGowan, asked the Premier some questions about a domgas pipeline from Broome to Port Hedland because at that time we still thought the gas would come onshore at James Price Point. It is still a live issue. I am not at the table with companies and the government, but as the opposition looking in on those conversations, for us that is a very, very live issue. I look forward to getting the PowerPoint presentation from Woodside and from the joint venture overall. I mean that quite genuinely because I am interested in what they say. However, having made those comments, I am yet to be convinced. I finish by commenting on the discussion of some members, particularly the member for Willagee, about the potential for getting something more out of the technologies being applied in the sector. A briefing paper was presented by the Economics and Industry Standing Committee—Dr Loraine Abernethie was the secretary of the committee at the time—on the potential for an LNG centre of excellence in Perth. It was an interesting briefing paper and I think people should read it, because we need to think about how we bring all that together. I made a comment about the Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association, and I will finish on this point. I find APPEA to be one of the best lobby groups in the country. It is great because it does research and presents it to us. Of course, it presents it to us for its preferred outcome, which is fair enough because that is what it is paid to do. I have known Sted Ellis since he was at BHP. I first met him there and he is now at APPEA.
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I think he is a great guy; he is probably listening. Kieran Murphy is now the Western Australian outfit’s public relations guy in Perth. He is a great bloke; I worked with him for the 2001, 2005 and 2008 elections. They are a great team. That does not mean I agree with everything they say, but I know that when I talk to them, I get the real story. I look forward to continuing the conversation with the petroleum industry. It is a major part of our state and our future, but it has to include competitively privatised energy for Western Australian industry. MR F.M. LOGAN (Cockburn) [4.42 pm]: I also rise to say a few words at the third reading stage of the Petroleum Titles (Browse Basin) Bill 2014. I support the statements made by the member for Cannington, but my views go a bit beyond how the member for Cannington has outlined the situation. It is not a question of not telegraphing our punches to the upstream proponents in negotiations; it is about making the state’s view and policy very clear. In some cases, we are dealing with companies that are larger than countries in financial clout. Shell is virtually Holland. It is the biggest oil company in Europe and one of the biggest oil companies on the planet. Its financial clout is bigger than many, many nations on earth. When the state minister deals with them, he has to be tough because they are tough. That is why they are a big, big company; they do not take prisoners in their negotiations to secure outcomes for their shareholders. That is their objective and that is fine. That is why they are in business. The business of ministers is to protect the national and state interests, and the minister has to be as tough as they are and make it very, very clear that if they want to operate in this state and this country, here are the rules. Just recently, Tanzania, which is not known as one of the toughest countries on the planet in dealing with multinational companies, told various multinational oil companies that it will not have floating liquefied natural gas in their waters. Tanzania told them very clearly that that technology will not be applied in Tanzania and companies must do gas production and LNG development onshore. Tanzania said that otherwise those companies should go away and it will talk to another oil company. Tanzania will get an outcome that is for the benefit of the Tanzanian economy and the people of Tanzania. It will have jobs, and I guarantee members that the Tanzanian government will push very hard for local content so that Tanzania will have a diversified industry. Good on them. That is exactly what Angola has done with multinational companies. That is exactly what Nigeria has done with the massive manufacturing base that has just been constructed at Port Harcourt in Nigeria. Who is one of the major proponents in Nigeria? Shell is. Nigeria’s government has been able to negotiate out of Shell not only benefits for the country, but also a diversified range of jobs for the exploitation of oil and gas within Nigeria. If it is not that difficult for what we see as Third World countries to do this, surely Australia as a supposed First World country could do the same. If it cannot do the same, it is no better than the series of colonies it was prior to 1900 when large European countries came to Australia, exploited the resources and took them away and then Australia bought the manufactured goods. We have not moved on from pre-1900; we are simply a colonial place for exploitation. It is for those key reasons that the minister has an opportunity at this point in time when the map has been redrawn. It is always great when maps are redrawn because the whole economic climate changes when lines on a map are moved. It does not matter whether it is local government lines on a map or whether it is the Berlin conference of 1890 — Ms M.M. Quirk: The Balfour agreement in 1954. Mr F.M. LOGAN: The Balfour Declaration of 1924, I think it was. When lines on a map change, so do cultures, environments and the economy. In this case the lines on the map have been redrawn and those golden rocks have gone into state territory waters, which we hope are massive deposits of gas. How will those massive deposits of gas be developed? We would argue to the minister that they should be developed in the most financially beneficial way for Western Australians—not for Shell, not for Woodside, but for Western Australians. Shell and Woodside operate in their own interests for their shareholders, as they should. We have to operate for the benefit of all Western Australians. We will watch the decision the minister makes very closely come Christmas time. If the minister provides a rollover to the existing holders of those tenement leases without recognition, as the member for Cannington has referred to, that the holders of the new lease under this legislation have an obligation to deliver domestic gas onshore, we will have killed the domestic gas policy in Western Australia. We will have nailed the energy industry in Western Australia in a big way and set back the potential benefits for Western Australia by billions and billions of dollars, particularly regarding downstream development. Earlier the member for Cannington referred to the need for Alcoa and various resource companies to supply large volumes of gas, and this field will deliver it. We will be watching that decision very closely. It is not an automatic right that this lease should be rolled over. I recognise the rights of the current holder of the commonwealth lease, but that does not necessarily guarantee—this is where, again, I differ from my colleague the member for Cannington—that they have an automatic right to the new lease. They certainly have greater dibs on it than others, but not an automatic right. It is not just me saying that; previous federal ministers have said the same thing. The area out there is now commercially viable. Woodside and all the other players need to have made it very, very clear to them that there are myriad ways in which that gas can be commercially monetised. As the member for Cannington said, it could be through floating technology with a tieback to the coast, or it could be simply from a tieback of a small series of subsea-based wellheads with tiebacks straight to the coast, delivering just domestic
[ASSEMBLY — Thursday, 23 October 2014] 7927 gas—not processed gas, but just gas—that can then be cleaned and processed onshore. The benefits of doing anything like that are multiple. It means there would be onshore processing of gas, local content, and, most importantly for the people of the Kimberley, the agreement the state government struck with the Indigenous groups could be properly fulfilled. Jobs would be available for Indigenous people, transforming their lives, which is what James Price Point was going to do. It would mean there would be a secure supply of domestic gas for the future transformation of the Kimberley, whether it be mineral processing or the delivery of that gas further south. The minister knows exactly the resource riches the Kimberley has anyway, and they would require massive amounts of energy for development. The state will achieve critically important benefits from this very simple piece of legislation. The rights of the jurisdiction of Western Australia will extend into what was previously commonwealth waters, and new exploration leases will be created for the possible exploitation of the gas underneath the Seringapatam Reef. The benefits of these changes will flow to the people and economy of Western Australia, and it is critically important that the minister delivers on that. MR P.C. TINLEY (Willagee) [4.52 pm]: I hope that the minister is enjoying his ministerial pep talk as we suit him up to go into the round of negotiations that inevitably he is in the middle of now; I hope he will continue to fight on behalf of Western Australians. The opposition performs a very important function, although I am sure that at times the inner voice between the minister’s ears is screaming with the tedium that is getting a piece of legislation through this chamber. We on this side take very seriously our responsibility to carry out the accountability function on behalf of the people of Western Australia for the natural enrichment of our great state. That, by extension, is very important because on other side of the table from the minister during these particular negotiations sit some companies and enterprises that are entirely motivated by very activist shareholders and stockholders. They would take a very dim view at any erosion of their potential returns via dividend yields or capital growth. We are acutely aware of the pressure the government is under, particularly at a time when we are seeing the utility of the Burrup in decline and a diminution—potentially an exhaustion—of the domestic gas supply to this state. I really do urge, encourage and support the minister wholeheartedly in extracting the best value, because if he comes up short, he will have to answer to the chamber. Ultimately, he will have to answer, of course, to the people of Western Australia. The opposition’s secondary function of accountability is to ensure that all Western Australians are fully aware of the government’s fault on a particular decision. The government has stated only one thing about its needs, and that bit is legislated for. Everything else is policy, intention and ambition; the only thing stated in legislative terms is the domestic gas preservation policy, and we need to find ways to fulfil that requirement. Tieback is, I think, fundamental, and I would also extend that by saying tieback does not necessarily have to be tied directly to one particular field; it is just an overall extraction. On that basis, sail well! Question put and passed. Bill read a third time and transmitted to the Council. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION — ANNUAL REPORT 2013–14 POTATO MARKETING CORPORATION — ANNUAL REPORT 2013–14 Corrections —Statement by Acting Speaker THE ACTING SPEAKER (Ian Britza): I received a letter from the Minister for Education dated 22 October 2014, requesting that corrections be made to the Department of Education “Annual Report 2013–14”, which was tabled on 25 September 2014. Amendments are requested at pages 3, 18, 24 and 39 of the report to provide corrected figures. Under the provisions of standing order 156, I advise the Assembly that I have authorised that the necessary corrections be attached to the tabled paper. I received advice today from the Minister for Agriculture and Food indicating a minor transposition error in the Potato Marketing Corporation “Annual Report 2013–14”, which was tabled on 24 September 2014. The error relates to the content appearing on page 95 of the annual report, which is not as per the final audited financial statements. The appropriate supporting documentation, including an erratum summary, replacement page 95 for insertion and a copy of the original page 95 for comparison are attached to the letter. I advise the Assembly that I have dealt with this advice as a request under standing order 156, and have accordingly authorised that the necessary correction be attached to the tabled paper. [See papers 2328 and 2329.] MANDATORY TESTING (INFECTIOUS DISEASES) BILL 2014 Returned Bill returned from the Council without amendment.
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ADJOURNMENT OF THE HOUSE Special On motion by Mr J.H.D. Day (Leader of the House), resolved — That the house at its rising adjourn until Tuesday, 11 November 2014 at 2.00 pm. House adjourned at 4.58 pm ______
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QUESTIONS ON NOTICE
Questions and answers are as supplied to Hansard.
PREMIER’S PORTFOLIOS — SENIOR OFFICERS 2683. Mr M. McGowan to the Premier; Minister for State Development; Science: For each department, agency or government trading enterprise within the Premier’s portfolio of responsibilities, I ask, has any officer above level 7.1 or equivalent accepted any gift, hospitality, invitation to an event, free accommodation or free travel from a private company or individual, since 1 July 2013, and if so: (a) how many officers have accepted any hospitality, invitation to an event, free accommodation or free travel from a private company or individual; (b) what was the nature of the hospitality, event, free accommodation or free travel, and what is the name of the individual or private company that offered them; (c) what is the estimated individual value of the hospitality, event, free accommodation or free travel; and (d) does the agency have any commercial or financial relationship with the private company or individual, and if so, what is the nature of that commercial or financial relationship? Mr C.J. Barnett replied: Salaries and Allowances Tribunal No (a)–(d) Not applicable ChemCentre (a) Three (b) Gift vouchers received from NATA for Service provided as NATA assessor; An Agilent Diary received from Agilent Technologies Ltd; A lunch invitation from AIM for presentation by John Worsfold on ‘building a high performance team’. (c) $60; $20; $120. (d) Yes. NATA conducts NATA accreditation, some ChemCentre scientific equipment is procured from Agilent and it also provides equipment maintenance service for ChemCentre. AIM provides business courses for ChemCentre employees. Public Sector Commission (a) One (b) Invitation to attend an Australia Day Lunch (Australia Day Council) (c) $130 (d) No Lotterywest (a) One (b) Lester Blades — Diabetes WA Corporate Luncheon; Hay Group — Roundtable discussion on Not for Profit Sector; Jack Bendat — Wildcats Game (2 tickets); Seven West — Business Lunch jointly hosted by The West Fashion Agenda and Hawaiian (c) $165; $150; $160; $120 (d) No client relationship; No client relationship; No client relationship; Commercial — Lotterywest purchases media from Seven West Media and Seven West broadcast Lotto results. Department of State Development (a) 23 (b)–(d) [See tabled paper no 2326.] Department of the Premier and Cabinet The Department of the Premier and Cabinet, excluding Ministerial Offices, advises, according to its records:
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(a) 18 (b)–(d) [See tabled paper no 2326.] Gold Corporation Gold Corporation has advised that on 16 September 2014 it amended its Code of Conduct so that all gifts and benefits are recorded. Gold Corporation advises, based on recollection: (a) 18 (b)–(d) [See tabled paper no 2326.] BUS STOPS — DISABILITY ACCESS UPGRADE 2942. Ms J.M. Freeman to the Minister for Transport: (1) How much is allocated in the state budget to the upgrade bus-stops to meet current disability access standards in: (a) 2014–2015; (b) 2015–2016; (c) 2016–2017; and (d) 2017–2018? (2) What bus stops have already been selected for upgrading in 2013–2014? (3) How much is allocated for each bus stop in (2)? (4) What bus-stops were upgraded in: (a) 2012–2013; and (b) 2013–2014? (5) What was the final cost to upgrade each bus stop in 4(a) and (b)? (6) What is the funding ratio between state and local governments to upgrade bus stops? (7) How are bus stops to be upgraded, identified and selected? (8) What criteria are used to identify priority locations? (9) Does the criteria require that the full length of the bus route be upgraded at the same time? (10) Is it a requirement that upgraded bus stops have footpath access to them? (11) If no, how are people with disabilities expected to access the upgraded bus stop? Mr D.C. Nalder replied: (1) State budget allocations for the Public Transport Authority’s (PTA) Bus Stop Accessibility Works Program include: (a) $3 924 000 (b) $4 052 000 (c) $4 183 000 (d) $4 319 000 (2) Approximately 633 bus stops have been identified for upgrade in 2014–15. (3) Approximately $6 200 per bus stop. (4) (a) 650 stops were upgraded. (b) 610 stops were upgraded. (5) The final cost to upgrade the bus stops for (4)(a) was for the amount of $4 764 000 and (4)(b) was for the amount of $5 458 000. It should be noted that for the PTA to provide this information for each individual bus stop would require the agency to expend an unreasonable amount of resources to collate the information. (6) Upgrades under the PTA’s Bus Stop Accessibility Works Program are 100 per cent funded by the State Government. Some Local Governments also elect to undertake a limited number of bus stop upgrades as part of their road and footpath upgrade projects.
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(7) Current practice is to select bus stops along high patronage routes. Bus routes known to be the subject of future route changes are specifically avoided. Approximately 50 stops per annum are allocated to specific requests received from people with disabilities or representatives groups. (8) Priority locations are identified from specific upgrade requests received from people with disabilities or representative groups that use nominated bus stops. (9) Upgrading all bus stops along an entire bus route is PTA’s preferred approach. (10) Yes, if a local footpath is nearby. There are some areas of Perth where the existing footpath network is extremely inadequate and it is not the responsibility of the PTA to undertake Local Government functions. (11) Not applicable MINISTER FOR WATER’S PORTFOLIOS — 2013 ABORIGINAL BUSINESS CONTRACTS 2965. Mr B.S. Wyatt to the Minister for Water; Forestry: I refer to the announced changes to the Government’s procurement policies which exempt Aboriginal Enterprises from the Open and Effective Competition policy, announced by the Minister for Aboriginal Affairs and Minister for Finance on 9 November 2012 and in relation to these changes, for every agency under the jurisdiction of the Minister and for the period 9 November 2012 to 8 November 2013, I ask: (a) what was the name of each Aboriginal business contracted; (b) what services did the business provide to the agency; (c) what was the term of the contract; and (d) what was the total value of the contract to the Aboriginal business? Ms M.J. Davies replied: (a)–(d) Please refer to Legislative Assembly Question on Notice 2949. MINISTER FOR WATER’S PORTFOLIOS — 2014 ABORIGINAL BUSINESS CONTRACTS 2982. Mr B.S. Wyatt to the Minister for Water; Forestry: I refer to the announced changes to the Government’s procurement policies which exempt Aboriginal Enterprises from the Open and Effective Competition policy, announced by the Minister for Aboriginal Affairs and Minister for Finance on 9 November 2012 and in relation to these changes, for every agency under the jurisdiction of the Minister and from 9 November 2013 up to 8 November 2014, I ask: (a) what was the name of each Aboriginal business contracted; (b) what services did the business provide to the agency; (c) what was the term of the contract; and (d) what was the total value of the contract to the Aboriginal Business? Ms M.J. Davies replied: (a)–(d) Please refer to Legislative Assembly Question on Notice 2966.
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