Tony Windsor (New England, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

The member for Maranoa says that there is going to be consultation. Thank you very much. The Deputy Prime Minister says a similar thing. He has gone back on his commitment to growers that he would poll them about significant changes. He is saying that he will consult with the industry. Let us have a look at who that is. I used to be a member of the Grains Council of Australia. I do not know whether the system has changed, but when I was a member, I represented the New South Wales Farmers Association and I was a coarse grains member on the committee. A coarse grains member does not necessarily grow wheat. In my case, I did grow wheat, but I had a say on the wheat industry. What you could have are people who do not grow wheat having a say through the Grains Council of Australia about the future marketing arrangements of the wheat industry, which could have implications for other grains that may or may not be exported.

If you look at the recent history of the Grains Council of Australia in advocating for grain growers—they are not there for the wheat industry; they are there for grain growers—you will see that they have been more interested in the future of the feedlot industry. When the ethanol and biofuels debate was taking place, the Grains Council of Australia, which is supposed to be there representing grain growers, came out and condemned a mandate of ethanol on the basis that it believed that the motorists of Australia should have choice and that it could have an impact on feedlotters. If that is the group that the wheat growers of Australia are going to put their faith in, God help us. If people took the time to look at the recent history on the various visions of wheat marketing, they would see there are a number of other things. Some work has been done—some by American related consultants—that I will not go into at the moment, but I urge others to.

The other peak body that the Deputy Prime Minister and, I presume, the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry would put their trust in would be the National Farmers Federation, which is supposedly a peak body representing farmers. The people on the National Farmers Federation come from constituent bodies, but they do not necessarily come from grain growing areas. I regard the President of the New South Wales Farmers Association, Jock Laurie, as a friend. He does not grow wheat—he is a wool grower—but he is on the National Farmers Federation. He may well have a critical part in the decision-making process on the future of our export arrangements.

If we look closely at the performance of the National Farmers Federation in recent years, do we see an organisation that has represented farmers? I think not. Look at the issue of Telstra. All the polls that were taken, including some that were done by farm organisations—constituent members of the National Farmers Federation—did not want Telstra to be sold, but they voted to sell it. They endorsed the government arrangement by saying that they had been promised a letter that would deliver equity of access for country people to broadband and basic telephone services. No-one has ever seen the letter, but Barnaby Joyce voted for the sale in the Senate on the basis of that commitment. The commitment is absolutely gone. These are the people that the government is going to put their faith in to make a major decision about the future of one of our greatest industries. We are all well aware of the corrupt activity in world markets. The point that I make is that a lot of these people are not particularly interested in the wheat industry and a lot of these people have other agendas behind the scenes—political agendas or a whole range of other agendas. The only way, Minister, that you can find out what the growers want—and it does not circumvent the course of government—is to ask them. Ask these constituent bodies, but do not let them be the final arbiters.

I suggest—and what the amendment does this—the industry groups, the Wilson Tuckeys of this world and others put up options. Given the discredited nature of the Wheat Board, we should be looking at options. My particular view is very similar to that of the member for Mallee: that is, we should end up with something that is not all that dissimilar to what we have now—that is what I think growers are saying, but I have not spoken to them all; there are 20-odd thousand of them. But there may be a slight modification. There may be other options and this is a time when those options should at least be aired.

The various media reports I have seen today suggest that there will be some options prepared by various people within industry. All I am suggesting is that when they are prepared, those options—with the arguments for and against—be mailed out to the people whose livelihoods are going to depend on the decision that the government makes so that they at least have a say. They can sit around their own kitchen table—away from the political view, away from the agripolitical view and away from this parliament—and come together with their own communities and ask, ‘What do you think of this?’ and take advice, but let them have a vote.

That vote does not have to bind anybody. In fact, it would actually give government and the minister some guidance in terms of what the growers actually think. The cabinet is quite at liberty, given our parliamentary process, to make a decision that is completely different. But, if we do not really consult the growers on an issue of this magnitude, when we all go through this palaver about how we are so concerned about the wheat growers—the blokes on the tractors—I think we are doing them a great disservice.

So I would suggest again: produce the option, take the time to mail out the option and ask for the wheat growers’ personal opinions. I do not just mean shareholders of AWB. A lot of them are not wheat growers. A lot of them have other interests. I would suggest that the poll actually reinforces the argument of the member for Mallee, if in fact he is representing the people in his electorate—and I have no doubt that he is.

The other issue that I would like to raise in relation to the poll is that, if this amendment is voted down today, I intend to poll the growers. It is possible to do. I intend to do it, because I feel very strongly about this. Those people deserve a say. You cannot go out into the countryside, as the Deputy Prime Minister did, and say to people, ‘If there’s any change, trust in us’—with placards up in the background saying how great you are—‘and, if there’s any significant change, we’ll come back to you.’ He did not say, ‘We’ll come back to David Crombie or Peter Corish or Jock Laurie.’ He said to the people of Victoria, I think in the member for Mallee’s electorate, ‘We’ll come back to you on this’—not to the industry leadership group but to the farm community.

If anybody suggests that those people who drive those tractors are not capable of making rational decisions about their own future, I think that is an extraordinary insult. If this amendment is not supported today, that is essentially what this parliament is doing. It is saying: ‘We feel for you; we understand about the $300 million that has gone berserk in Iraq and the $30 or $40 that the Western Australian grain growers are going to suffer this year. We recognise the problem. We have put in place a commission to look at the administrative problems. But we don’t trust you to be part of the decision-making process.’ What if the ones that we do trust are the traditional lackeys of the system—who do not represent farmers, in my view? Others may have a different view. I have been critical of the NFF for some time now, and I think it is a great tragedy to see an organisation that could be leading the farm sector degenerate into the representative body that it is. I think it is a great shame—I was involved with it quite strongly some years ago—to see it fall away the way it has. I have had no-one ring me up and condemn me for attacking the National Farmers Federation.

I say to the minister once again: if you are serious about grain growers, you have an enormous responsibility on your shoulders for the next six months. You have the grain industry in your hands. I will be voting for you to take that responsibility. But do not assume that that allows you to just talk to a few people in a room somewhere and make some deal that you believe will solve a few political problems in here and then convince a number of the key wheat growers that that is the way it should be done. That is not the way the rhetoric has been conducted. I urge the parliament to support the concept of a non-binding poll of every registered wheat grower so that you can get their view before any final cabinet decision is taken.

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