Premier Peter Malinauskas wants to axe hundreds of parklands trees for a MotoGP circuit to demonstrate ambition, promote vibrancy and attract young people to live in South Australia.
Unveiling the $96m racetrack design on Sunday, Mr Malinauskas listed extensive details of the 4.13km circuit, plus a $15m parklands upgrade package designed to soothe controversy about cutting down at least 377 trees.
But the Premier pointedly argued the world-first MotoGP street circuit plan showed SA “has ambition” and “a vision about where we want to be 10, 15 years from now”.
“Here’s the truth of it. South Australia’s population is ageing. We need more young people to not just choose to stay here and live but choose to move here and work,” he said.
“We’ve got more opportunity than we’ve ever had in the past, which means the place should have ambition. We should have vibrancy. We should a sense of youthful enthusiasm for the place, which means doing things that others haven’t done before.”
Mr Malinauskas, in part, explained some of the biggest challenges facing his second-term government – growing private sector jobs and investment to build a more prosperous future.
But soaring state debt and a government-dominated economy remain a major handbrake, creating a considerable burden for the very young people the Premier wants to retain and attract.
There are, as One Nation state leader Cory Bernardi said on Wednesday, “structural problems in this state” related to debt, costs for business and families, plus government red tape strangling aspiration.
These continue despite latest figures showing SA’s unemployment rate was the nation’s lowest, at 4.1 per cent.
As analysis of economic, population and industry growth by The Advertiser in February showed, SA is heading for a long-term economic shock as the population ages, young adults flee, skills shortages intensify and high-wage jobs flatline.
Most employment growth has been government-driven and this is poised to continue, although BHP’s proposed multibillion-dollar Olympic Dam expansion is a bright light on the horizon.
More than $30bn of federal government money will be spent just to build Adelaide’s nuclear-powered submarine yard at Osborne.
Treasurer Tom Koutsantonis insisted the state would not “become Victoria” when his June budget projected $53.654bn debt by mid-2030, with daily interest payments of $9.61m, or $67.46m per week.
But SA’s debt interest burden is poised to become the nation’s most precarious by 2030, with repayments consuming one dollar in every three generated by state taxes, according to an Institute of Public Affairs (IPA) report released in late August.
National accounts figures released on Wednesday showed SA’s economic growth flatlining in the past quarter – equal slowest with New South Wales nationally – to be up 2.8 per cent annually.
According to Westpac analysis, “the weakness is centred on new public demand” – ie government spending – which fell 1.6 per cent in the quarter, the first decline since the third quarter of 2022. New business investment lifted by 6.9 per cent annually, which Westpac said was “still the softest annual read of the mainland states”.
Opposition Leader Ashton Hurn seized on the state final demand figures, saying “the warning signs have been everywhere” about sluggish growth.
“Labor regularly tries to boast about economic growth, but, disappointingly it’s completely flatlined in SA, while states like WA and Queensland power ahead,” Mrs Hurn said.
“It’s time Labor got out of the way of businesses so they – not the government – are the drivers of our economy.”
Mr Malinauskas, though, believes in government driving change to help build economic complexity. Whatever the political approach, the major challenge still lies ahead.
Paul StarickEditor at large
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