Analysis: SA Premier Peter Malinauskas at sea over algal bloom crisis with Labor’s lack of depth exposed | Paul Starick

The tide is turning on the Malinauskas Government over a flat-footed response to algal bloom carnage as SA revives a bailout state mentality, Paul Starick writes. Have your say.

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A fortnight is a long time in politics, as Peter Malinauskas has found out to his peril.

The tide turned on his government during his July 2-20 leave, as the algal bloom crisis generated a national storm.

All of a sudden, the bereft Liberals have been galvanised, gaining some traction with cut-through lines shaming state and federal governments for flat-footed inaction.

The absence of Mr Malinauskas and key lieutenants Stephen Mullighan and Tom Koutsantonis exposed, yet again, the government’s weak underbelly.

Labor MPs, both state and federal, sat on their hands politically while dead fish washed ashore on Adelaide beaches, desperately hoping the bloom would dissipate, as predicted, in winter storms.

They must have realised Prime Minister Anthony Albanese would take notice and shovel cash if dead fish had washed ashore on Sydney or Gold Coast beaches.

But their ham-fisted excuses for tardiness included that the PM was in China, in a different time zone (by 90 minutes).

Late last week, federal Health Minister and former Labor national president Mark Butler belatedly started elevating the issue nationally, with a three-day salvo of media appearances – including one on Friday on a national morning TV show from a western suburban beach.

By Monday, federal Environment Minister Murray Watt drew upon his previous career as a Maurice Blackburn solicitor to doggedly remain at odds with Mr Malinauskas by refusing to label the marine catastrophe a natural disaster to unlock more cash, instead branding it “a very serious environmental event facing South Australia”.

Premier Peter Malinauskas at an algal bloom press conference on Monday, watched by federal Environment Minister Murray Watt. Picture: Tim Joy

On Tuesday, Mr Malinauskas announced a $28m state/federal package, headlined by $10,000 business grants and expanded early detection and monitoring, delivering a pointed message to the PM that natural disasters did not “fit in a neat box of a human-described criteria … for bureaucratic purposes”.

That night, Mr Albanese effectively rebuffed him, arguing the “ecological event” had “primarily been in state waters” and the federal “response” was “giving support to the South Australian government”.

Asked why Senator Watt had taken so long to get to SA, Mr Albanese said there were “a range of ministers who’ve been on the ground there”, citing “reports of Mark Butler and others”.

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This casts extreme doubt over the supposed influence of SA’s four senior federal cabinet ministers – Mr Butler, Penny Wong, Don Farrell and Amanda Rishworth – along with Mr Malinauskas himself.

Perhaps, as has been the case with previous governments of both persuasions, federal Labor has tired of SA’s repeated pleas for taxpayer-funded handouts.

Perhaps the well has run dry after a $2.4bn Whyalla rescue package – including a $643m state allocation – and the biggest enterprise in Australian history, the taxpayer-funded $368bn AUKUS nuclear-powered submarine project centred on Adelaide.

Premier Peter Malinauskas at Cavan’s Brice Metals on Wednesday. Picture Ben Clark

Mr Malinauskas on Wednesday inadvertently fuelled speculation about difficulties in finding a buyer for the Whyalla steelworks, when he refused to rule out a government ownership stake as a ploughed a further $275m to continue the state-initiated administration.

With Nyrstar Australia in last-ditch talks with state and federal governments to secure a financial lifeline for its embattled lead smelter in Port Pirie, SA is again careering towards an unwanted reputation of the bailout state.

Mr Malinauskas argued the case on Wednesday for government intervention in industries that have a future and sovereign importance.

He responded to my rhetorical point that there was a limit to treasury coffers and taxpayer budgets by declaring the state budget was in surplus, with contingencies for challenges like drought, algal blooms or “saving steel”.

Former UK PM Harold McMillan famously labelled “events, dear boy, events” a leader’s greatest challenge. Labor is starting to falter from events, nine months from the next election.