Andrew Wilkie (Denison, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

Australia is a wonderful place, and we certainly have a very high opinion of ourselves—sometimes it is too high of an opinion. Sometimes we think that we are a very civilised, ethical, law-abiding place, but the fact is that we have an animal welfare crisis in this country. Some people might think I am over-egging that a little bit, but I am not. I am not just talking about the substantive matter that this bill concerns itself with in the live animal export trade. I will get to the substantive matter shortly.

First, to speak to my point that we have an animal welfare crisis, let us look at some of the facts. Take egg production. We go to the supermarket now and see lots of free-range eggs there on display, but the fact is that about half of the eggs sold in supermarkets currently are not free-range. In fact, the majority of eggs in this country are actually used in the industrial production of food, and the vast majority of them are not produced by free-range hens. So the fact is that the vast majority of egg production in this country is from hens that are stuck in a little wire cage for their miserable lives—and we say that we are an ethical country that treats animals well! Even for the hens that are in so-called free-range conditions the standard that is being applied to them is appalling. The industry thinks it is free-range to have 10,000 hens per hectare. That is one chook per square metre. That is not free-range by any reasonable measure. The standard should be no more than 1,500 hens per hectare. That would be much more to do with the ethical production of eggs.

That is egg production, but what about pork production? Yes, sow stalls are being phased out throughout the country, but it is interesting that currently they are banned in only two jurisdictions: Tasmania and the ACT. In the rest of the country and they are still legal. Thankfully, the industry is phasing them out, but the industry refuses to phase out farrowing crates, which themselves are terribly cruel. They are not much bigger than the sow. There is no straw for them to make a little home for themselves so they can live even a half-decent life.

What about greyhound racing? Much has been said in recent times about greyhound racing in this country, and for one brief moment we thought the now former premier of New South Wales would show a bit of backbone and respond to all of the evidence about systemic cruelty in the greyhound racing industry and finally respond to the public concern about the cruelty—the fact that thousands of healthy greyhounds, more than 10,000, are put down each year because they are not wanted or do not run fast enough. Then there is the live baiting, which is supposedly outlawed but is widely conducted. Everyone in the industry knows that, even the people who are not directly involved in live baiting. They send their young dogs off to a breaker and those people, the owners of the dogs, know full well what that breaker is getting up to—the fact that he or she is probably using live baiting. We had that brief moment of hope when the now former premier of New South Wales said he would do something about it, and the first time a bit of pressure was applied, the first time someone put a blowtorch to his feet, he turned to mush, he turned to jelly and rolled over and the opportunity was lost.

What about thoroughbred racing—the fact that the whip is still allowed throughout this country? How on earth can whipping a horse be ethical behaviour. It is cruel. And this nonsense: 'If we don't whip our horse we won't win the race.' But if no-one is whipping it is an even playing field, so to speak, and it would be fair. If we do nothing else with thoroughbred racing, let's get rid of the whip.

And what about steeplechase racing? It is still allowed in Victoria and South Australia even though every year race after race we see horse after horse taking terrible tumbles, ending up in agony and having to be put down. How on earth, in a country like Australia, in 2017, can we allow steeplechase racing?

What about the puppy farms, the kitten farms? Something like 15 per cent of puppies and kittens are sold in pet shops, and virtually all of them come from puppy farms and kitten farms. We know what goes on in those places—the cruelty. This is ridiculous. This is Australia in 2017, and we have the cruelty with the industrial production of eggs and pork, the cruelty in the greyhound racing industry, the cruelty in the thoroughbred racing industry, the cruelty in the steeplechase industry and the cruelty in the pet shops from the puppy farms.

That brings me to the substantive matter: the cruelty in the live animal export trade. How on earth can any civilised, decent country allow this barbaric behaviour to continue? In fact, not only is it continuing but this government and this agriculture minister rub their hands with glee and celebrate every expansion of the industry, now sending shiploads of beef cattle to China. And the government says: 'Hurrah! This is fantastic!' The Indonesians make it easier to send heavier cattle and to have a more reliable supply chain of beef cattle to Indonesia, and the government rubs its hands with glee: 'Hurrah! We're expanding the industry'—even though the live animal export industry is cruel, is not in our self-interest and does not have popular support.

How many more exposes do we need? How many times do we need to turn on the television or look at the front page of the newspaper and see the cruelty, before a government—any government, any major party—finally does something about it? Yes, it was great that for a short time trade with Indonesia was suspended by the Gillard Labor government, but it was only for three months, and then it was resumed. These days the Labor and Liberal parties and the Nationals are pretty much in lock step with their support for the live animal export trade. How many times do we have to see live sheep buried alive? How many times do we have to see exposes of the cruelty in the slaughterhouses of Indonesia? How many more times do we have to see photos and footage of the conditions on the live export ships? And what about those sheep coming out of an Australian winter and going into a Middle Eastern summer and ending up in the markets—illegal markets—during the festival of sacrifice?

And what does the government say? 'Hurrah! We're expanding the industry!' They do not care about animal welfare. If they cared about animal welfare they would back this bill. They would back this bill which would phase out and eventually ban the live animal export industry; it would be gone within three years. That has to be reasonable. I know that a lot of people will criticise me and say that it should be banned today, immediately. But I will say: 'Okay, industry: I'll cut you a bit of slack; you've got three years to prepare for the change. The condition is, though, that in the interim you have to have much better animal welfare safeguards, during those three years, and you have three years to prepare for the industry to be wound up.' And do you know what? It will be a better red meat industry in this country, because all of a sudden we will not be relying on a cheap product going overseas with no value added—an industry constantly under political pressure because of the systemic cruelty that is exposed week after week as to what goes on in that industry. And let us not forget: the live animal export industry benefits very few people—a relatively small number of big cattle producers in northern Australia and a very small number of exporters—and the cost is the thousands of abattoir workers who have lost their jobs in this country.

The fact is that we should be processing those animals in Australia. And it is cock and bull—a complete lie—for the industry to say that there is no alternative. Of course there are alternatives. We export an enormous amount of chilled and frozen red meat to the Middle East and into Malaysia and Indonesia. It is complete baloney to say that these countries, because of their religious practices, can accept only live animals and slaughter them themselves. We have a number of abattoirs in this country that are already licensed to slaughter animals consistent with religious practices. These Islamic countries are already buying enormous amounts of value-added red meat that has been processed in this country. It has employed Australian workers and it has been done relatively ethically to world's best standards in this country, as opposed to throwing all these thousands of sheep, thousands of cattle onto these huge boats in the most appalling conditions and letting them sail off into the sunset, and who cares about the conditions when they get to the feedlots and the conditions in the slaughterhouses?

It is way beyond time. I think I have now sought to move half a dozen or so bills in this place, and almost none of them have had the agreement of the government or the alternative government to be debated. Let's at least get behind this one. Let's at least debate it, and let's vote on it.

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