Justine Keay (Braddon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in support of the member for Hunter's amendment to the Primary Industries Research and Development Amendment Bill 2017. In particular, I wish to highlight this government's failure to have evidence based policies to support the efficient allocation of taxpayers' money. This side of the House will be supporting this legislation, but I have to say there are a number of issues where the government has failed to efficiently use taxpayers' dollars and, importantly, has failed industry through research, development and marketing.

I want to highlight an issue directly related to this legislation, on which it seems the former minister for agriculture, the member for New England, completely dropped the ball: the Australian Wild Abalone campaign. The Australian wild abalone industry has a beach value of approximately $180 million, and my state of Tasmania is the biggest contributor to this nationally, with $100 million in value coming from my state. In fact, the Tasmanian industry harvests, processes and exports the world's largest abalone resource, supplying over 25 per cent of total annual global production of wild caught abalone product. Abalone is Tasmania's most valuable wild harvested marine resource and one of the state's largest export earners. Tasmania harvests 1,850 tonnes of live weight abalone annually, over 95 per cent of which is exported, principally to the Asian markets of China, Hong Kong, Singapore, Japan and Taiwan. This in turn generates some $200 million worth of associated economic activity into the state's economy. So you get the picture that this is quite big for a small state like Tasmania.

There are, however, opportunities for increased growth in associated and complementary industries, such as food tourism, particularly targeting Asian markets, which we do very well in in other sectors. The industry recognises the opportunity to significantly increase industry returns via investment in a strategic market development program such as Australian Wild Abalone. The wild fishery already competes on the international stage against an increasing farmed-abalone sector. Production has shifted from wild caught to farmed, and over 90 per cent of the world's abalone comes from aquaculture. The Australian Wild Abalone campaign is designed to meet these international challenges and, as mentioned, generate new industry opportunities. This is what we should be supporting wholeheartedly. It has a crucial role to play in supporting the long-term future of the Tasmanian and Australian wild caught abalone industries. The Australian Wild Abalone campaign highlights that abalone is harvested from pristine ocean waters, which are abundant in Tasmania, that it is managed in an ecologically sustainable manner and that the product is certified for export under the EPBC Act, to name a few points.

The legislation we are debating has a role to play in supporting the Wild Abalone campaign through the Fisheries Research and Development Corporation. The FRDC will be given a new capacity to undertake expanded marketing activities. The Seafood Cooperative Research Centre has previously been collecting funds from Abalone Council Australia to facilitate the Australian Wild Abalone campaign. I don't know about you, Mr Deputy Speaker Buchholz, but talking about abalone is making me a little bit hungry. It was proposed that these marketing funds held by the Seafood CRC would be rolled over to the Fisheries Research and Development Corporation by 30 June last year, but because of the former minister's bungling this did not take place, and the legislation is only before us now. Industry, sadly, has been forced to make other arrangements as an interim measure.

The previous minister's focus, it seems, was on the relocation of the APVMA, the Australian Pesticides and Veterinary Medicines Authority, to his own electorate, and the establishment of the Regional Investment Corporation in a National Party-held seat in Orange without any business case. Among the previous minister's failings is that the $272 million Regional Growth Fund announced in May last year has only just now opened up for applications, nearly a year later. The fund is meant to support projects in regional Australia in areas that are undergoing structural adjustment.

My electorate, which includes the West Coast of Tasmania, would strongly argue that they are undergoing structural adjustment—the long-term shut-down of the Mount Lyell copper mine, the recent closure of the Edith Creek Murray Goulburn Plant in Circular Head—and would welcome the opportunity to apply for these funds. As I've said, they've just opened up, so we've missed nearly a year of opportunity to actually get things moving for these areas in regional Australia that are undergoing structural change.

I also want to use this time to talk about research, development and extension work that particularly relates to the Tasmania fruit fly emergency that we are now seeing. Sadly, more fruit fly has been found in the southern part of Tasmania, which is absolutely alarming, and the member for Hunter mentioned this earlier. An emergency has been caused by biosecurity failures at a national and state level under conservative governments. The Tasmanian government cut biosecurity funding. Funding cuts were also made by this coalition government. This government restructured the way funding was delivered to Tasmania to what is now a fee-for-service model. This sounds great on paper, but what this means on the ground is that Biosecurity Tasmania has had to do more with less, because there is now a 20 per cent reduction in Commonwealth payments.

The new minister, sadly, does not even know what is going on in Tasmania. The fruit fly emergency threatens the state's $200 million horticulture industry. Valuable exports into overseas markets have been compromised by fruit fly. This is incredibly serious for Tasmania. The markets are being closed. Farmers are being forced to destroy fruit. The Tasmanian brand has, sadly, been damaged. I hope we can resurrect this damage, because it is so vitally important for my state. Tasmania's agricultural minister described this issue as a 'national system breakdown'. I want encourage the new minister; I want him to take on more responsibility. I want him to make biosecurity, particularly regarding Tasmania, a front issue, a priority issue. It is imperative for this state, and I'm sure for other states, that biosecurity is front and centre, that it hits you in the face when it come to a state like Tasmania, that you are compelled to be part of that shared responsibility.

Sadly, the current agriculture minister—who I do have some respect for, I must say—chooses to blame the states without even knowing all of the facts. Yet again we have the state blaming the Commonwealth and other states, so it's a bit of a mess. In reply to a question in this place he said it was 'all Victoria's fault'. But it is a national breakdown. If the minister had been paying attention to answers given by Biosecurity Australia officials and Plant Health Australia officials during Senate estimates, he would have known—or should have known—that the advice is that the source of fruit fly outbreaks around Devonport in my electorate and George Town in the electorate of the member for Bass is still not known.

I'm prepared to give the new minister the benefit of the doubt as he comes to grips with all the former minister's failings. My invitation remains—and I mean this sincerely—for him to visit my electorate. I did invite the previous agriculture minister to visit the north-west of Tasmania and meet with my dairy farmers—no strings attached. It was completely for their benefit, not any political benefit and, sadly, that minister ignored my request. The new minister can come. I don't care if he comes with the Tasmanian Liberal senators, though there is only one in my electorate, Senator Colbeck. He should come and speak to the growers in my electorate. While he's there, come and see all the wonderful things we do. Come and see our abalone industry and many other sectors of primary industries in our state. Let's just see what he does.

We also know, from Senate estimates in late February, that Plant Health Australia conducted a biosecurity exercise in Tasmania for fruit fly. This exercise in itself has remained shrouded in secrecy. We do not know how prepared Tasmania was for a fruit fly incursion. Clearly, they weren't very well prepared at all. Plant Health Australia claims to not know the outcome. What did work well in that exercise, what didn't, what measures were needed in Tasmania to prevent fruit fly incursions—we don't have answers to those questions and I think the Tasmanian public and those growers need to know.

Bizarrely, this government and Plant Health Australia officials say the exercise has nothing to do with the fruit fly emergency in Tasmania because it was only looking for exotic fruit fly, not the endemic Queensland fruit fly that we see. But the actual protocols remain the same. Being an island, you would think you would know that if it's exotic or if it's Queensland then those protocols would be the same. A fruit fly is a fruit fly and will devastate our horticulture sector.

I've also invited Assistant Minister Ruston or Plant Health Australia to come to my electorate and look farmers in the eye and tell them that this work has nothing to do with them and has no relevance to the current fruit fly emergency. The secrecy of Plant Health Australia and the actions of the assistant minister in Senate estimates and Tasmanian Liberal Senator Colbeck in running defence and diversions can lead to only one conclusion: that Tasmania failed. This government is too busy running a protection racket, rather than being honest with the Tasmanian community and farmers. If I'm wrong on this, I'm happy to be proven wrong. I would welcome either the minister or Plant Health Australia coming clean on the exercise that took place.

Plant Health Australia collects a levy from Tasmanian farmers to support their work. Part of their work is the development of the Emergency Plant Pest Response Deed. This government, along with all state and territory governments, are signatories to the deed. Tasmanian primary industries minister, Jeremy Rockliff, signed off on a new deed last year. Plant Health Australia says that they are interested only in exotic fruit fly, not the endemic Queensland fruit fly that has reached Tasmania. While I appreciate the need to have rigorous measures in place to prevent incursions of exotic species of fruit fly in Tasmania, the Queensland fruit fly is an exotic species to us in Tasmania. Under the deed, farmers who are subject to an exotic pest incursion are able to access reimbursement for costs associated with such an event. So, technically, you would think, Tasmanian farmers should be able to access compensation because of a Queensland fruit fly. But, sadly, that's not the case. And this is what the state minister for agriculture signed Tasmania up to.

Our farmers pay a levy in good faith to Plant Health Australia. While Fruit Growers Tasmania are aware that, due to this technicality, farmers are unable to access any support, I am sure many farmers would be shocked to know that the levy they pay to support the deed does not allow them to obtain compensation in this emergency. Fruit Growers Tasmania believes that the deed needs reviewing, and I support that call. The Queensland fruit fly is an exotic species to Tasmania, and I call upon the state, the Commonwealth and Plant Health Australia to work with Fruit Growers Tasmania to revisit the deed. All levels of government should be working together to support Tasmanian farmers who have been affected by this biosecurity failure. Rather than shift blame among themselves, it is time all parties came together and worked collectively to resolve this situation. Measures must be put in place to prevent this type of incident ever occurring again. It is so sad to go and see these farmers and see how limited they are now in the exclusion zones, and the impact this has had on their productivity and the markets that are now shut down to them because of the protocols in place—which you can understand, but this should never have occurred in a place like Tasmania.

On this side of the House we already have a $2 million commitment on the table to support increased biosecurity in Tasmania to ensure that this doesn't happen again. Labor has acted, while those opposite have stayed silent. In so many areas the other side, in particular the Nationals, pay lip service to the regions and our farmers. Just once they should step up to the plate and do something to support Tasmania's farmers. Our economy depends on it. Jobs in regional communities depend on it. And our farmers, who work so hard—tirelessly, day after day, exporting and trading on the Tasmania brand—deserve support from the other side of the House more than ever. Thank you.

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