Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Finance) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on this important motion. As I do, I would like to answer some of the claims put forward by the member for Hunter, the shadow agriculture minister, who is a good man; I know he has good intent. When he took over the difficult role of agriculture minister, from Senator Ludwig, he did his best to correspond with me as the member for Riverina. The member for Hunter would know what an important food bowl the Riverina is. In fact it is one of Australia's one of the most important food bowls in Australia—if not the most important food bowl in Australia. I do acknowledge that I am biased in saying that.

I invited the member for Hunter to come to the Riverina. I know in good faith he would have come, but then we went into caretaker mode and we had an election and the government changed, thankfully. I say 'thankfully' because when the manmade drought that the previous government, under Labor, enforced upon Australia—and certainly upon the Riverina irrigators—was put forward, it certainly left my people in a very difficult situation. And it certainly was not any fault of the member for Hunter because he did not have the agriculture portfolio back then.

He talked about droughts. I know that the Prime Minister and the Minister for Agriculture made a very important tour of the electorates of Farrer and Parkes in New South Wales, and Maranoa in Queensland, which have been very badly affected by drought going on 18 months now. In fact, in one part of Parkes—the member there, Mark Coulton, told me—the last time it rained, it came down in an absolute deluge overnight, inches upon inches of rain, but they have not seen any since. It is a dust bowl. Or it was, until the Prime Minister arrived. But that is not to say that the drought is over, not by a long stretch. Just because it rains for a day or a week—even if it drizzled on and off for a month—it does not mean the drought is over. These people are hurting, as the member for Hunter quite rightly pointed out. I welcomed the latest farm finance package when it was announced last year, but it did not go far enough and it was very difficult to access for those farmers who were doing it so tough.

The member for Hunter talked about dairy farmers. I would like to quote from a dairy farmer in my electorate. Neil Jolliffe and his wife Simone have a farm at Euberta. It is a generational dairy farm in the Riverina electorate near Wagga Wagga. Back in July 2012, when the price of milk came down to 40c a litre—that is the price that the farmers get at the farm gate—the Jolliffes were very shocked. Simone said:

“A drop doesn’t come as a surprise - we would have been happy with a stable milk price or even a 5 per cent drop—

which she described as:

… more understandable …

She went on:

“Morale is low and from the people who were asking questions and commenting—

at the meeting they attended—

you could hear the emotion in their voices.

“There’s not enough for the older guys to keep going.”

Neil is by no means an older farmer. He is in fact younger than me. But he is a good farmer. He wants to get on with the job, and he wants to get on with the job—not with a handout but with a hand up.

He and so many other farmers in this country, whether they are dairy, wheat, rice or whatever else—and they grow everything in the Riverina, bar, maybe, mangos, pineapples and bananas—need a hand up and good government policy. They are getting it from this side. The new agriculture minister is putting a white paper out and calling for submissions, and I know that there is going to be a forum at Griffith, in the heart of the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area. I welcome people making submissions to that meeting so that their feelings can be known on this important subject.

Australia has one of the most productive and sustainable dairy industries in the world. The amendments in this bill—that is, the original amendments—are aimed at supporting the industry's ongoing productivity. Dairying is a vital industry to many regional communities and to the nation as a whole. Australia's dairy industry is worth $13 billion a year in production, manufacturing and exports, with a farm gate value of $4 billion annually. We exported $2.27 billion worth of dairy products in 2012-13. Dairy is our third largest agricultural commodity behind beef and wheat. I am proud to say that the Riverina produces all three. Australian dairy exports account for 10 per cent of the world's entire dairy trade. That is a lot—10 per cent.

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