Gavin Pearce (Braddon, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

And I'd appreciate it if the same was applied to me! I listened to the member for Hunter, who made a number of outlandish claims and innuendos relating to our side. I listened to the member for Moreton, who said that there are no more farmers on our side. He rambled on for several seconds about that. Well, I can tell the members, through you, Mr Speaker, that I am one. My family has been farming in Tasmania since the mid-1800s. At 14 years of age I was a dairy farmer, and I continued to be a dairy farmer until the age of 18 when I joined the military. So I know a little bit about farming. At the moment I have millions of dollars invested in the agricultural business I have along the north-west coast of Tasmania, and I've had to lease that farm out so that I can come and fight for farmers in a similar vein in this place. So I know about farming and I know about our dairy industry. I understand the pressures and the hardships that our farmers face each and every day as they go about investing millions of dollars into something that they don't know will pay off in the end. I've been there and I've done that, so I understand.

In Tasmania, where I come from, my electorate is home to Australia's largest dairy. In fact, my Braddon electorate is full of dairy farmers. They're doing quite well, thanks very much, and they're doing quite well because of a strategy that's been put well in train by our strong Liberal Hodgman government. We've invested in tranche 3 irrigation in our state—in fact, along the north-west coast of my electorate—and that's enabled our farmers to grow, to expand and to have confidence. I think today is a classic example of why we should maintain a steady hand and a sure head. The last thing our farmers need is policy being kicked around this place like a political football, because at the end of all this ranting, raving and finger poking are farmers that are hurting—real live human beings that have got a future to look forward to. A steady hand and a wise head is what this industry needs at the moment.

From the other side I've heard a heap of rubbish in relation to regulating an industry that plays in a deregulated market. That is like placing a round peg into a square hole. It won't work. We've seen it in the wool industry with the Australian Wool Corporation and it didn't work there. Our farmers don't want that. What they want is for us to apply, like I said earlier, a sure head and a steady hand. Instead of kicking this topic of regulating our industry around like a football, they want us to listen to them, to their industry providers and to their peak bodies, who say that they don't under any circumstances want that industry regulated. You may say that this minimum price, this floor price that you are willing to apply, is not regulation. Well, I'm saying that, if you are applying any fix to a particular price within an industry, that is, in fact, regulating an industry. It's not what our farmers need, it's not what our farmers want and it's not in the best interests of our industry—definitely not.

A sure head and a steady hand—that's what we're applying here. Our government has announced over $7 billion in measures to help drought-affected farmers across Australia, including our dairy farmers. Since 2013 our government has approved almost $915 million to 1,675 farm businesses under the concessional loans scheme. You say we don't do anything. As of 30 June 2019, $201 million to the dairy recovery concessional loans have been approved, benefitting 347 farmers. At 6 September 2019, approximately 1,200 farmers and their partners were on farm household allowance, and that has been extended through our strong support of our industry. Funding is continuing to roll out to help those hit by the aftermath of the Murray Goulburn crisis. That is just one crisis that one particular company inflicted on our industry, but don't blame the industry. Don't regulate our market. Instead, what we need is a code of conduct, and we need it fast.

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