Bruce Scott (Maranoa, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

There has been a debate about foreign investment in this country recently which has got political, and I think many misleading statements about foreign investment have been made. I just want to outline our oldest agricultural company's history in this country. Would you believe that the land that they managed is still done so by them today? The oldest agricultural company in Australia is the Australian Agricultural Company Ltd, AAC. It was established in 1824 and it is the oldest continuously operating company.

It has had many different owners over time and the original company had to raise capital in England, which they did. They had to raise one million pounds in order to be granted one million acres in Australia. The member for Hunter, who has walked in, will be interested that that original grant of land had to be out of the settled areas of the colony. It was, in fact, from Newcastle to Gloucester. That was the original AAC—Australian Agricultural Company—land. The land that was granted was for the production and cultivation of agricultural products, obviously, mainly wool.

Interestingly, there were 30 members of the House of Commons who were initial investors and who contributed capital to raise that one million pounds. Included in that list of shareholders at the time was the great reformer, William Wilberforce—and we all know the wonderful work he did in the House of Commons for many years to bring about an end to the slave trade, which ended emancipation. He was a great hero for all of us and, I think, should be an inspiration for many of us in this place.

The Australian Agricultural Company, since that date, that settlement and that grant of land, and once the bill went through the House of Commons and received royal assent from the King, have been producing agricultural products and for some time had a coal mining operation. They have also been producing food in Australia. In fact, in my own electorate they operate an irrigation and cotton farm near St George, just below Surat. They have a very well established feedlot in the Darling Downs, near Dalby. They hold some 600,000 head of cattle on their books through 19 cattle stations and two feedlots, and they hold today more than 7.2 million hectares of land across Queensland and the Northern Territory, which is equal to about 1.1 per cent of the landmass of Australia.

This land was originally wholly owned by foreign investment that started the Australian Agricultural Company in 1824. The Bank of New South Wales, which is now Westpac, claimed to be the oldest company established; it was established in 1823. But AAC is the oldest continuous company and the very oldest agricultural, food producing, company in Australia. It is a proud history, and it underpins and puts to rest this notion that foreign investment could be bad for the agricultural sector in Australia because they will own this land, they will lock it up, they will not produce food or, if they do produce agricultural products, they will take them offshore and value-add offshore.

This is one of the best examples that I can give this parliament, that I accept that foreign investment is important for agricultural development in Australia. It will be needed long into the future. The current proposal for the purchase of Cubbie Station and the group of properties that they hold—not just the one at Dirranbandi but also the anchorage property at St George—is a good one. The proponents certainly do not own it at this stage; they have got to work through the process of the guidelines which have been given to them.

But what I say to the Treasurer is this: he should not in future release a statement on a Friday afternoon, that he knows would create a political situation, approving the sale of Cubbie Station under certain terms and conditions, and then hope it will go away. He should be more open about it. He needs to make sure that in the future, while ever he is Treasurer, that it is not done on a Friday afternoon when the media shut down. It should be open and be more transparent. He should ensure that when he releases a statement about why such a foreign investment is in the national interest, whether it is to do with agriculture, mining operations or housing in urban Australia, he does not do it on a Friday afternoon.

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