Street Corner Interview, Carmen Garcia,
Liberal Candidate for the electorate of Adelaide.
Carmen Garcia is the CEO of the NGO
Multicultural Youth South Australia on Torrens Road.
Garcia: I come from a community services
background, I've advocated for children and young people from a
refugee background, migrant background - I go to them - I'm
probably more articulate advocating for their issues but it's their ideas
I take forward. I'm quite a pragmatist. I will take a practical
approach to a lot of things and it's really about doing homework on
each issue.
Last night I was at St Peters they
called a public street corner meeting themselves because they're not being
consulted. The state government has imposed a 30 year plan. Six
story buildings are going to be put up and the people haven't been
consulted and that's what's frustrated everybody: my catch phrase: I'm here to
advise Adelaide.
I work with everyone in my day job. To
be honest, labor ministers who I have great relationships with, were
quite shocked that I was liberal, when I decided to show my card because
I am professional and I will work with anyone who will get an
outcome.
In my job I've traveled to other states
and I've been really shocked at how much South Australia has not
really progressed even looking at infrastructure which we know will
create jobs, with people coming in. The South road connector, which
is also in my electorate - that contract didn't actually go to a
South Australian company, it went to an interstate consortium so
there may have been a few spill off jobs for South Australians, but
not really...to me, the advocate or the representative of Adelaide
should be saying look, we need to make sure that if it is going to go
to an interstate company, that they win the contract, we need a
guarantee that the jobs are going to go to South Australians.
Jobs has been a really big issue raised
by people. It's not just contract work - the federal government -
obviously their scope is much more infrastructure - even like the
Goodwood junction, a lot of that money, millions and millions of
dollars have come from the federal government. The federal government
have not imposed any kpi's (key performance indicators) on the state
government to consult with the community. I don't want red tape,
we've got enough of that - but what I do think we need : some
accountability to the people who elect us.
Question about the South Road Connector
Garcia: Many of the architects I've
spoken to have said that such an expensive model that they've employed
there - to actually do that all the way down South road will send us
bankrupt - so it's going to be piecemeal and that's the problem. The
South road connector is just another example of how the current
government have approached building our state - everything's
piecemeal it's not connected there's no vision.
Councilor: so just carrying on from
that - the South road plans through here - have you been updated on any
plans that are coming through here?
Garcia: There's lots of talk about it -
I know there are organizations like S.A. freight and the Civil
Construction Federation are strongly advocating putting some budget
bids to the federal government.
I've encouraged them - they should be
getting commitments from both sides of government. That's what I
would do as an advocate but nothing's been committed - there's no
plans.
I don't agree with tolls, the people of
South Australia pay enough in taxes, in registration,and the problem
at the moment is Jay Weatherill is putting all that money to top up
all the deficit he's had.
Olympic Dam
I'm so shocked it hasn't had as much
media coverage of the fallout so that people like Cavpower and big
companies have geared up for that and that is huge black hole that
has been left to businesses and the state and that's why we are
losing front line services. I don't understand why the state
government doesn't have more of a backbone because at the end of
the day all we are doing is selling the license to B.H.P. SA people
own the minerals:- we can encourage joint venture, we could do a lot
more - it's still our minerals in the ground. We're just giving them
a license to mine it - to explore it. We need that investment.
What I'm saying is, there's a lot of
people that have lost because Olympic Dam hasn't proceeded. That's
why we're losing the front line police force - however they say their
cutting that much money, it's going to be jobs. It's because we have
planned a budget for S.A. which included future income - now if we
were business owner we would know the only way to make ends meet is
really you drop your expenditure or you increase your income and
what the state government is doing is dropping their expenditure. We
need to be looking at resourceful ways that we can generate income
from the assets we have, and that's not by selling.
H.I. : Would you support an increase of
the GST rate from say ten percent to twenty percent?
Garcia: No I think we pay enough tax -
H.I.: so definitely no increase in the
GST?
Garcia: I would have to look into it a
lot more in term of the numbers and what the argument was for that.
We pay enough tax, it's just not being managed efficiently. My partner is a fisherman and all this
money that's been gained from all the licenses and registrations of
boats and the fees you pay at the boat ramps but there's still many boat
ramps that haven't been upgraded there's no toilets, there's no
water. So when we pay for
things in tax I assume that money
should go back into the infrastructure or the service that it's been
taken from but that's not what's happening - it's been spread across and that's the
issue - it's about economic
management and I don't think the
government state or federal is doing a very good job.
Question: Where do you live?
Garcia: I live in Blair Athol. I don't
think there's been a liberal politician that's ever come out of
Blair Athol. I really am a local girl I've grown up in Adelaide
electorate my whole life. I went to school at Rosary on Prospect
road and St Dominics in North Adelaide.
My mother was a single parent and
lived in a housing trust house in Blair Athol and the one thing she
tried to do was to give me a really good education. Her
understanding of that was through a private school. We definitely
weren't rich in any way. My grandparents migrated from the
Philippines to help raise me so that's why i have so strong link to
my culture. When I was going to university I was full time carer of
my 86 year old grandfather as well.
I'm a real person and I've had my own
real battles and struggles. A lot of people have had a go at people
for putting their hand up but if I don't put my hand up no one else
is going to. We can't be afraid! I was surprised at how much people
worry about my appearance versus my work ethic or my intelligence
but it goes with the territory. Last week I actually had fifty
volunteers coming down to MYSA where I work on Torrens road folding
and stapling because I don't have a lot of money behind me but I have
people that are committed to get me in. I'm used to putting in a hard
days work - I run a not-for-profit.
HI: congratulations on your gaining
preselection. During that process were you required to submit a
police security check to the party?
Garcia: We had to sign a statutory
declaration. I offered a copy of my nation police clearance as well
as my state because running an organisation that supports children
and young people I have one every twelve months.
I was just required to declare I had
one they didn't actually ask to see it, but I have one every twelve
months. That's an interesting question actually because I've been
working with children and young people as I said- I couldn't hire
anyone that didn't have a police clearance yet members of parliament
are not actually required to have police clearances so you've got
ministers visiting schools that might not have police clearance which
as an organisation we can't visit a school without it.
