Senate hopeful vows to keep 'pet projects' off parkland

Adelaide's unique city parklands must be protected from development through World Heritage listing, according to Jacqui Lambie Network senate candidate Rex Patrick.

Mr Patrick, who served in the Senate from 2017-2022, has pledged to be a "senator for the parklands" and wants to use the chamber as a megaphone directed at both state and federal governments to have the space nominated for heritage listing.

"The Adelaide parklands and the city layout, designed by Colonel William Light some 188 years ago, is in grave jeopardy from state governments past, present and future using what they consider 'free land' for their pet political projects," Mr Patrick said on Friday.

"It's the only city in the world that sits inside a park," he said during a visit to the site where the new Adelaide Aquatic Centre is being built.

The old aquatic centre was demolished to make way for a $135 million complex.

The government has pledged to return more than 1000sq m to the parklands after the centre is built, but Mr Patrick said "significant petitions" had campaigned for it to be moved to a greenfields site or by acquiring land elsewhere.

"Each of the ideas that governments come up with for the parklands are generally good ideas," he said.

"The problem is, over 100 years of good ideas, we're seeing the parklands disappear. We look at a place like New York. The governor of New York would not do to Central Park what we're doing to our parklands."

There have been calls since 2009 for the parklands to be listed as a World Heritage site "but no one's been a political champion of that", Mr Patrick said.

Both the South Australian government and Adelaide City Council nominally support the goal of securing World Heritage listing for the parklands, but Mr Patrick said "neither have done anything for years, and they have conspicuously failed to engage the Australian government in pursuing the cause with UNESCO".

"No one minds temporary events taking place on the parklands. Jackie and I were at the Fringe (festival) last night, a fantastic use of the parklands."

Jacqui Lambie said she was "extremely jealous of Adelaide".

"We don't have this in Hobart, and the only bit of parkland that we have left, we are now fighting for," she said.

"We want a football team ... but we don't want this new stadium, it's the last bit of our parkland left, and that should be left for our kids, and should be a playground for our kids, not for our politicians, they have no social conscience."

"I come to Adelaide and I go, 'well, this is just great'. You can basically walk outside of any house, and here you are in the parklands. Nobody else in the world has that."