Julie Owens (Parramatta, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I will start by congratulating the member for New England for his single-minded advocacy for the people of his electorate. I live in an electorate that is completely different from the member’s. Mine is an inner-city, suburban electorate. I am often heard to say that it contains all of Australia except for rural and regional Australia. All the rest of it is in Parramatta. So, in my electorate, I do not hear the views of rural and regional Australia. I would like to remark that, in this House, I hear more articulate argument for the people in rural and regional Australia from the members for New England and Kennedy than I do from the National Party members combined. I thank you for that, because it well and truly broadens my view of regional Australia. None of us can deny at the moment that a large part of Australia’s prosperity has ridden on the back of rural and regional Australia for decades. If we want rural and regional Australia to continue to prosper, and benefit us all through the next decades, we must all invest in rural and regional Australia at one of the most difficult times, as it seeks to respond to changing environmental issues and the changing economic structures that come with those changes.

This private member’s motion calls on this House to acknowledge the hardship faced by families in rural communities who face withdrawal of water rights. I note that the member does not suggest in this motion that those changes were not necessary, but he does ask that rural communities and individuals be adequately compensated—and not have compensation given with one hand and taken away with the other. The basic principle underlying this motion is that, when you change the ground rules, when you change rules for people who have made family, economic, business and personal decisions based on one set of rules, a government must be very careful about the way it compensates people for their futures. This is true in all areas, and particularly true in rural and regional Australia at this point.

The issue of water resonates in my electorate as well, although on quite a different basis. It is probably the area of the environment that is raised most often. In fact, I hear the word ‘water’ almost on a daily basis in my electorate. For people living in an inner-city area, the changes in our lifestyles as all of us across the country deal with our status as one of the driest continents in the world are largely peripheral. They involve planting native species in our garden, putting in water tanks, washing our car on the grass—doing all the small things that are on the edges of our lives. For people in rural Australia it is a fundamental change, a change in their relationship with the land, the very meaning of ownership of land. These are major changes, which will affect, if we are not careful, the economic viability of rural Australia.

What is the nation’s role in responding to this? We as a nation have benefited incredibly from the prosperity of rural and regional Australia. We have ridden on the back of commodities booms and we have ridden on the back of wheat and wool for decades. We have all benefited and we continue to benefit. We have all reaped the rewards of the work of the people who live in the remote and rural areas of this country, and we all have a responsibility to make sure that rural and regional Australia continues to prosper.

This is one of the many areas affecting our future that this government has failed to respond to in any really serious, coherent way, without a major plan for the future of this country, as we spend and enjoy the prosperity paid for by past generations but refuse to invest seriously in the infrastructure and economic issues that will support future generations. If we want our grandchildren in 50 years time to reap the benefits of rural and regional Australia, we really have to assist our fellow country Australians to find their way through probably the most significant changes to the way that rural and regional Australia operates that we have ever seen. This is one of the biggest issues facing the country—the change in the way we think about our environment, the way we think about water. It is going to affect every single one of us and we all need to get behind one of the major drivers in this country, which is rural Australia.

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