John Cobb (Calare, National Party, Shadow Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you. The Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry might recall that, back on 25 February 2009 in company with the Minister for Climate Change and Water, he stated:

… the Government has always acknowledged that you do need to have some land use change, and that will be an implication and outcome of the White Paper—

The white paper from late last year on an ETS—

But our advice has always been that we’d be looking at marginal land.

The Minister also stated:

The advice that came back to me was that under the White Paper and the proposals that are there, prime agricultural land would not be at threat. It would be marginal land, where the economics stacked up, for people to be looking at doing more tree-planting.

What will be the land use change the government has always acknowledged is needed and that will be an implication and an outcome of an ETS, as it was then, which is now a CPRS? Where will that land use change take place and how? What is the actual definition of marginal land that you were referring to when you stated: ‘Our advice has always been that we’d be looking at marginal land’? Could you tell us which maps you are using to define marginal land? In answer to a question from the Leader of the Opposition, you indicated that he did not know what he was talking about, yet your own indication seems to be that your definition of marginal land is not the same as ours.

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