Commenting on the story: Ex-vice chancellor slams rush to uni merger

Professor Bebbington, who as an ex-Adelaide Uni VC is perfectly placed to make an informed comment on this merger proposal, reinforces essentially all of the expert opinion on this merger;  namely, that the prospect that it will improve on the existing three university system is extremely unlikely.

His point that proceeding with it without due deliberation (let alone a risk management assessment!) before the federal government’s Accord review is published in December, is simply commonsense writ large.

South Australian taxpayers who will fund the $450 million cost deserve more transparency in this process, instead of the secretive “business plans” and lack of realistic consultation that have characterised this proposal for the biggest upheaval in the history of higher education in the state. – Timothy Miles

The aberrant election proposal for this mega-merger is a government policy blunder of substantial proportions; it is the “Transforming Health’ of tertiary education.

The expert and measured opinion of Warren Bebbington must inform a decision to delay the passage of ill-informed and precipitous enabling state legislation until after the recommendations of the Federal Review of Higher Education (The Australian Universities Accord) are codified in 2024.

It is foolhardy to proceed with the largely unsubstantiated plan for the creation of a ‘lumbering dinosaur’, with little evidence of economic and academic benefits, when it is likely to be discordant with the financial and structural requirements of the federal Government.

A realistic and practical future envisages ‘nimble’ institutions of varying  sizes with different aspirations and greater geographic utility.  There will be no place for mammoth ‘one size fits all’ universities created in the belief and hope that they will accrue political and economic capital to state governments.

It will be reprehensible if the Premier throws half a billion dollars at this doubtful enterprise when the Australian Education Union insists that primary and secondary public education needs an additional one billion in annual sustenance, and our hospital system requires substantial ongoing resources to survive. – Warren Jones

Commenting on the story: Offshore wind battle looms over SA coastline

Throughout your article the vaguely defined ‘concerns’ of Mr Carrison and others are referred to, but notably absent is any statement from a qualified expert to support the proposition that offshore windfarms will cause any significant harm to the environment or local businesses.

Also absent is any acknowledgement of the reality of climate change, which poses a far greater threat to regional communities than a dislike of the aesthetic impact of wind turbines.

The fishing industry, like other primary industries, is amongst the groups in Australia most exposed to the consequences of a warming climate and should be pushing for urgent action rather than seeking to prevent it. – Paul Bullock

While it’s fantastic that South East locals are concerned about the impacts of an offshore windfarm on their local environment (if only everyone was so passionate!) there is an urgent greater good to consider that might be worth considering.

Climate change impacts are likely to cause greater damage than wind farms. Of course, any damage that the wind farm proposal might cause must be minimised. However, concerns about rock lobsters (only consumed by the rich) and visual amenity are probably secondary considerations to the imperative of we humans living on this planet without destroying its habitability. We’re all in this together. – Stephen Fuller

Commenting on the story: Kimba’s ‘kick in the guts’ over nuclear waste knockback

Your newspaper has been silent on the implications of the proposed Kimba nuclear waste facility for the debate on the voice. I suppose this is the usual left-wing bias.

However as I make a monthly donation to your newspaper I would expect some informed analysis and comments on this issue.

If a small group of Indigenous people can block a modest nuclear waste repository on land which is not held under native title, the future does appear to be bleak for AUKUS submarines which are to be built in this State.  This would involve SA storing nuclear waste.

The obvious lesson from this legal case is that Indigenous groups appear to be listened to very well by our legal system. This does substantially weaken the argument for the voice to parliament and executive government. – Evonne Moore

Regarding the Kimba nuclear waste dump. I’m very disappointed this will not go ahead. It seems to me the Albanese Government is clearing the deck so there is no trouble ahead of the yes vote referendum.

Another such example is in Western Australia, where the cultural heritage protection rules have been postponed which had been brought in. This was if you wanted to dig deeper than 50 cm or remove more than 4kg of soil on a block of land bigger than 1100 square metres you had to seek approval from an Aboriginal cultural service at $160 an hour.

Farmers and others were preparing to go to court to battle this unfair abuse of power. But for now it has been taken off the table. Interesting. – Phil Herman

Commenting on the story: ‘No Manhattan in Magill’: Minister’s call on uni campus development

I think both political parties should consider that the term NIMBY is insulting. An alternative and fairer acronym for people standing up for themselves and their neighbourhoods is LAMBY – Looking After My Back Yard.

We don’t all want developments in our neighbourhood due to the many negative effects: traffic, parking problems, streets less safe for children and loss of wildlife habitat. – Stephen Morris

Setting aside today’s politicians’ slings and arrows, let’s instead examine what the Chief Executive of Renewal SA, Chris Menz, in July 2023 revealed as a major reason why the Malinauskas government is so hastily pursuing settlement of the merger proposal between the University of Adelaide and the University of South Australia.

The answer is land development for residential housing, and the money Renewal SA anticipates, especially from land rezoning and sales of eastern suburbs allotments for development.

Although Premier Malinauskas recently made it clear that one bonus of his government’s proposed allocation of significant millions to the merger plan was so that land at Uni SA’s Magill campus could be sold for development, he did not make it clear that senior management at Renewal SA have a Magill plan tagged for master planning within six months.

This is probably one reason why the Malinauskas government is pressuring those involved at each university to agree to the merger ASAP, and why state Labor took parliamentary control in the House of Assembly of a parliamentary select committee inquiry in order to write the terms of reference and the setting of an earlier deadline to conclude the inquiry sooner than would have been set by the Legislative Council.

Chief Executive Chris Menz revealed in a 14 July 2023 online Renewal SA publication “A word from the Chief Executive” that there is a tight deadline behind the Magill bid, and an urgency to conduct “site due diligence”.

“The historic merger of University of Adelaide and UniSA will bring about development opportunities for the market, with both the UniSA Magill Campus and land at Mawson Lakes transferring to the Renewal SA landbank as part of the agreement,” he wrote in that 14 July 2023 online Renewal SA publication.

“While the main campus at Magill will be leased back to the university for up to 10 years, land opposite the campus is anticipated to be master-planned within the next six months. Site due diligence will occur in the interim with rezoning to commence over the coming two to five years,” he wrote.

There is, however, nothing in the Planning, Infrastructure and Development Act 2016 to stop the government’s Plan SA from preparing new draft, high-density housing content in a change to the Planning and Design Code relating to Magill land ahead of the final university merger agreement.

The suggestion that the government might wait for “two to five years” is not consistent with the current (and immediate) pressure by South Australian families to buy land to build homes – and Labor’s apparent enthusiasm to assist them. – John Bridgland