Tony Pasin (Barker, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Mr Deputy Speaker, you know well that the coalition government is delivering measures to support farmers—in particular, farmers experiencing hardship. There are concessional loans and the farm household allowance, where $1.1 million a week is being paid out on average, and there is the Rural Financial Counselling Service—

Mr Brian Mitchell interjecting—

The member for Lyons obviously does not care about farmers in hardship. We had better get that on the record!

But I want to refer specifically, if I could, to the concessional loan products. In the 2015-16 financial year the government made available $250 million in drought concessional loans and drought recovery concessional loans. Due to the election caretaker period, we extended those loans to 31 October so that a new scheme could be established on 1 November 2016. These loans are currently being delivered on behalf of the Commonwealth by the states and territories.

Mr Champion interjecting—

The member for Wakefield might want to listen to this! In South Australia it is being delivered by PIRSA and by his good friend Leon Bignell. I know there is a factional divide between them, but he is still his good friend. He has been an abject failure in this regard! He has been allocated—

Mr Champion interjecting—

Well, that is true—he is no friend of mine, because I am a friend of farmers and he is not! Sadly, he is the Minister for Agriculture, Food and Fisheries in South Australia.

But let's just focus on why he is no friend of farmers in hardship in South Australia, and this is the so-called minister for agriculture in South Australia. We made a whopping $10 million available for drought concessional loans in South Australia and $10 million for the drought recovery concessional loans. Mr Deputy Speaker, you have heard that his agency, PIRSA, was responsible for managing that process.

Now, these are loans where farmers get access to a concessional 2.66 per cent interest rate for 10 years, with interest only for the first five years and P&I for the second five years. Loans are available for up to 50 per cent of total eligible debt, or $1 million—whichever is the lesser.

You would have thought that, if the minister for agriculture in South Australia was a fierce advocate for farmers in South Australia, particularly those suffering hardship, he would have ensured all of that $20 million was made available to them. But, sadly, Minister, I can report to you, and you know well, that a paltry $2 million was made available to farmers in South Australia in hardship—a paltry $2 million.

The sad thing in South Australia is that farmers have been deterred from making these applications, because of the actions of the South Australian minister and his ineffectual agency PIRSA. We now have a situation where only three farmers have accessed these drought concessional loans but, more disturbingly, under the new dairy loans, farmers have further concerns in South Australian. One of these concerns is with PIRSA and the way they are approaching this. Whereas water entitlements are accepted as security in other jurisdictions on a case-by-case approach, PIRSA have told the industry that they will not accept water as security for loans. This is nonsensical with respect. Every banker I know in the agrispace understands that these entitlements are tradeable and are a security for a loan. So my question is to the minister for agriculture here federally: what is our government doing to make concessional loans available in my state of South Australia so that we ensure farmers get the assistance they need?

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