Rick Wilson (O'Connor, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak strongly in support of the live export trade, which underpins a massive number of businesses in my electorate of O'Connor. The electorate of O'Connor provides around 60 per cent of the 1.5 million sheep that are exported out of Western Australia, worth about $150 million per annum. As I say, the trade underpins a whole range of businesses: truck drivers, feedlot workers, pellet mill operators. These are labouring-level jobs that good, hardworking people in my electorate rely on for their living.

I say to the member for Melbourne, who claims to speak behalf of sheep growers, and I say to the member for Wentworth, the member for Mayo and the member for Denison, who just walked out of this place: come to the Katanning sheep sale in my home town next Wednesday—the minister was there a couple of weeks ago—and speak to the several hundred farmers, the truck drivers, the stock agents and the associated industries that rely on that trade and you will hear a different story to what we just heard from the member from Melbourne. They know that the live export trade unpins the market. It underpins the whole sheep market in Western Australia.

We know there is at least a $30 premium for live export sheep over what the domestic market will pay. But what you probably don't know is that, of the 3.8 million sheep turned off in Western Australia, 1.5 million go overseas. If you dump that extra 1.5 million into the current processing trade, you will crash the market. We saw that in 2011, when the previous Labor government pulled the plug on the live export trade completely and caused chaos, just absolute disaster, for the agricultural industries across Australia. And we're seeing it unfold again. They talk about sheep—that's just a Trojan Horse, isn't it, Member for Melbourne? Are you saying that you support the live cattle trade? Are you saying that as well?

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