Lisa Chesters (Bendigo, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Workplace Relations) Share this | Hansard source

It's not just Labor that's saying this, but farmers, reporters, communities, councils: you cannot just talk about drought; you need to also talk about climate change. If you don't talk about the two together you are, quite frankly, not doing your job. Farmers For Climate Action have been loud and vocal on this issue for quite some time, calling on the people in this place, and in particular their elected representatives, the government, to make sure that we have real action on climate change and that we are getting ready to tackle drought. That is why it is disappointing that the government have not acknowledged their mistakes in the past. As the member for Hunter said, it was this government, when they first came to office in 2013, that axed the COAG process that established an agreement between the states to develop drought resilience policies, working together at a state and federal level. Just imagine where we'd be today if we had continued that work, if this government hadn't been blinded by their ideology and abolished that process? Imagine where we'd be today, helping those farmers and their communities to adapt to climate change, to make sure that we're ready and that we're tackling it? Agricultural issues and climate change across states—that's the cooperation that's needed.

I do get disappointed that you hear from the Nationals all the time, 'What about the farmers?' They are important, but what they never raise in this debate is the impact on people who work on the farm, the impact on the supply chain jobs. Just take what is happening to our rice industry in the Riverina. I've been there and spoken to those farmers. I been up on the header and spoken to them. I also visited SunRice and spoke to a number of the workers there. Unfortunately, because of the impact of drought in the Riverina and the cost of water on the temporary market—it's gone up to $400—they are now scaling back their operations. A hundred jobs in the supply chain of SunRice will go. That is a big impact on that community in food manufacturing. When we have a drought, because we haven't acted sooner, it does have an impact throughout the supply chain. It's not just the food manufacturing jobs that are impacted by drought; a lot of the businesses that support farmers also go through tough times.

If we are going to be a country that grows things, we need to be a country that has long-term drought preparedness policies. We need to look at carbon farming. We need to look at ways that farmers can diversify. We need to share experiences about how to best use the resources that we have. Everybody agrees that you need water to grow things. The way in which we manage water going forward needs to be calm and methodical. You can't just throw cash at it. There needs to be science involved in this. We need to work towards it.

One of the previous speakers spoke about the RIC, as it's called, the Regional Investment Corporation. I want to acknowledge the role that the Bendigo Bank is playing, as a lot of this work has been outsourced and subcontracted to it. Through its community banks and through its own rural finance corporation, Bendigo Bank works closely with farmers, ensuring that they have the capital to do these investments and—most importantly, because cash flow is low—working on hardship with them.

The previous speaker also mentioned the importance of rural financial counsellors, and I completely agree. That's why it was so disappointing that one of the things this government did was sack all of the rural financial counsellors in my electorate. They closed that office down. They sacked those rural financial counsellors because we were past the drought, not realising that the next one was just around the corner.

When we talk about decentralisation and the need for jobs, let's not forget that they also sacked the 60 workers at the Australian Emergency Management Institute in the Macedon Ranges. So, for all the talk about the jobs they're creating, they're not talking about the jobs that they've axed, the people they've sacked in regional areas. Farmers and communities are also complaining about the complex process and the delays in getting through to Centrelink, trying to get their farm household assistance—there's no mention of that failure in this motion.

If we are serious about supporting farmers, the workers in the agricultural industry and the supply chain then we need to restore and rebuild the agreement that was reached with the states back before this government came to office.

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