Tony Pasin (Barker, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Infrastructure and Transport) Share this | Hansard source

As the member for Barker, I represent more wine grape growers by value and by volume than any other person in this place, and it's my melancholy duty to inform the House that global attitudes to the consumption of wine have changed. As a result of that, we have a two-billion-litre oversupply of red wine in this country. To put that in context for those who might be listening, that's 859 Olympic swimming pools worth of wine in storage surplus to demand. What has that done to the commodity price? It has crashed it. What do we need? We need a government that will stand up and support the wine grape growers of this country. They are in desperate need.

It costs an inland warm region, like the Riverland in my electorate, around $400 a tonne to produce wine grapes that are converted into wine. They're currently receiving $100 to $150, $160, $170 or $180 a tonne—significant losses. What we don't have is a minister who's prepared to go to the region, talk to the region, develop a plan and work with the region. When we faced our challenges in government—COVID, no less—we had a plan, we implemented it and we saved lives and livelihoods. I ask the minister to do the same—get to the Riverland, talk to these people and help them.

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