Joel Fitzgibbon (Hunter, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Agriculture) Share this | Hansard source

That was a filibuster, but I agree with the minister that our clean, green, safe image is our greatest competitive advantage. I challenge the minister when he is next on his feet to tell us what any initiatives of the government—this government—have added, in the course of the last ten months, to biosecurity in this country.

The minister likes to talk about concessional loans in the areas where he feels confident, and of course he has some advice about three states. My advice was different. We will have to agree to disagree on that, Minister. But you did not answer my specific question, so I am therefore going to come to some conclusions about the answers. You chose not to guarantee this House that the $40 million would be returned to the original concessional loans package; therefore, I can only come to the conclusion that that money is back off to consolidated revenue and will be denied to the farm enterprises of this country.

You did not deny that no-one in this country is a beneficiary of your drought farm financing package so, on that basis, I assume the answer to that is 'yes'—that is true: no-one is yet a recipient. You did imply that it is all fixed now and ready to go but my advice is still is that it is only Queensland farmers that have access to that scheme, so if you are not prepared to tell me otherwise then I think it is reasonable for me to assume, and for farming families out there across the country to assume, that that is also true. I would invite you to answer those questions.

Of course, you did not advise me that consultation was undertaken with the smaller states before that money was ripped away from them so, again, I can only assume that you are confirming by your silence the assertion I have made.

I want to move on to research and development. I made the point at the end of my opening remarks that it is research and development and innovation that, more than anything, is the extension that will bring us the real opportunities in the dining boom. I do note, and I congratulate the government, for fulfilling its election commitment to put an extra $100 million into R&D—over a four-year period, I should mark. But that is a welcome thing. I invite more detail from the minister about how that money will be spent, and I also ask the minister: what the net effect of R&D is in agriculture, given that it seems he did enhance R&D spending on one side but cut R&D funding to organisations like RIDC—the Rural Industries Development Corporation—to organisations like the CSIRO and to various CRCs in this country? Indeed, this includes certain higher learning institutions. So I do ask the minister whether he can tell us what the net contribution to R&D in the agriculture sector will be as a result of those two sides of the formula?

I would also ask him about another very important area, and that is regional sustainability. It was a great disappointment to me that resource sustainability did not form part of his terms of reference for his agricultural white paper. I just do not understand how you can talk about agriculture's future in this country and the opportunities in Asia without talking about how we produce more food with the same limited and, in some cases depleted, people, land and water resources. That leads me to questions on a bill that has just been introduced today, and that is the government's Carbon Farming Initiative. He might want to address my primary concern in that area, and that is the likely noncompetitiveness of the agriculture sector when bidding for funding under that scheme.

I would expect, Minister, that there are many other areas of the economy which will be able to abate carbon much more cheaply and competitively than will the agriculture sector. Therefore, I am concerned in this reverse auction-type arrangement that the government proposes in the parliament, that the agriculture sector simply is not going to be able to compete for funding under the new Carbon Farming Initiative, and therefore will be cut off from assistance under that scheme.

In addition, I understand that the R&D component of the former regime will be reduced, if not abolished, further undermining the capacity of agriculture to secure credits under that scheme. So if the minister could help us better understand that, that would be very much appreciated.

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