Rick Wilson (O'Connor, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Trade) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Grey for his contribution but also, as the chairman of the coalition policy committee on agriculture, for bringing that committee to Western Australia, as he said, in March. We had a series of meetings around WA regional areas—I think six or seven different meetings—and, as the member for Grey said, they were very well received because the farmers of Western Australia are feeling hurt, they're feeling frustrated and they're feeling kicked around, and at least to be able to turn up and have someone who frequents this place listen to them and take their concerns on board was, I think, a great fillip to them at that point in time.

However, we are here today debating the Export Control Amendment (Ending Live Sheep Exports by Sea) Bill 2024, which is what those farmers that we spoke to in Western Australia desperately wanted to avoid happening. We've seen, since those meetings across Western Australia, a very difficult start to the season. It's starting to pick up now. We've had some winter fronts come through. But there was a very difficult period through April and May where farmers were under extraordinary pressure and weren't able to quit sheep. Processing was overbooked, with months-long waiting lists.

So, under the legislation which we are debating today, the adjustment package actually includes a $6.7 million mental health component. Now, I'm not too sure how many pieces of legislation we've stood up and passed through this place, and certainly while we've been in government I can't recall where, by our own admission, we were going to inflict serious mental health issues upon a particular section of the community. But that is what is contained in this bill—an admission that the farmers of Western Australia are already under incredible pressure, as the member for Grey said, and are going to be under even more pressure now and might require these services.

But, interestingly, the Western Australian agriculture minister has said in the parliament that she can't see how she can work constructively with the federal minister, so I'm not sure who's going to deliver these mental health services. Normally, it would be a state government. In the case of Western Australia, the Mental Health Commission would deliver this assistance to those farmers who require it. The federal government are going it alone because the state have said, 'This legislation is clearly going to impact negatively on the WA farming community,' so they've said that they are not going to work with the federal government. WA minister Jackie Jarvis has said that very clearly. So I'm not sure who's going to deliver that package.

Many people who have spoken on this bill, particularly those on the other side, do not have any particular understanding of how this industry works—and I don't blame them for that—and why the live sheep component of the Western Australian self-replacing merino flock is fundamental to the profitability and ongoing viability of that industry. Eighty per cent of the sheep that are run across Western Australia are merinos. Merinos are bred not for meat—although that's considered to be a byproduct—they're bred to produce wool. When a merino eats a kilo of food, most of the energy it consumes goes towards producing wool and only a small proportion goes towards producing meat. A crossbreed or a British-bred lamb, or a shedding sheep—an exotic sheep—has completely different genetics. They're bred to put the larger proportion of that energy into growing meat and fat, and those are the sheep that the processor is seeking when they go into the marketplace to buy sheep. Bear in mind that 80 per cent of the sheep in Western Australia are merinos, and that's a major component of the flock. It has fallen because of lower wool prices since 1990, with the collapse of the reserve price scheme. The Western Australian flock has fallen from 30 million sheep in its heyday to 12.9 million sheep, I think, at the start of this year. It's estimated it will be down to 12.2 million at 30 June, but, interestingly enough, the Wool Forecasting Committee forecasts numbers to drop to nine million sheep at 30 June 2025 and 7.2 million at 30 June 2026.

So, effectively, we're not just looking at the demise of the WA sheep industry, because once we get down to those numbers we lose critical mass and even the processors that we spoke to at the recent House Standing Committee on Agriculture hearings in Muresk in Northam admitted that once we go below a critical mass it's hard to keep processing plants going. It's very hard for them to be viable and, as the member for Grey said, we can't turn these things on and off; we have to keep the workforce working for 11 months of the year. There's a one-month shutdown when we do maintenance and so on, and then everyone comes back from their holidays and we go for another 11 months. That's the only way to maintain a viable abattoir. So once sheep numbers in WA fall below a certain level and those abattoirs can't keep going for that period of time then their viability goes out the window and we see the sheep industry contract even further and go even further downhill.

That's why it's such an important industry; the merino industry is far more labour-intensive than either the lamb industry or, indeed, the cropping industry. Other evidence that we heard from various farm lobby groups was that the assumptions by the department of agriculture, that sheep producers will move from merino sheep to fat lamb sheep or meat sheep, is actually a false dichotomy. That's because sheep are actually in competition with cropping acres. That's the way these mixed farming operations work, and it's another reason why sheep numbers have dropped—because cropping has become more attractive. Machinery and techniques have improved; Western Australia produced a record crop of over 24 million tonnes in 2022, massively up from previous crops because we're getting better at it. The machinery is getting better and more technical, and the techniques are getting more tailored to the environment.

What will actually happen is not that people will move from merino sheep today; once they lose that live export market, they'll move to cropping acres, which, once again, means lower numbers of sheep.

Why is that important? Why does that matter? Because the inland rural towns across my electorate of O'Connor, the member for Durack's electorate and also the member for Forrest's electorate, rely on the labour force that supports the sheep industry. It's a highly labour-intensive industry compared to cropping and meat sheep. Once we lose those shearing teams, the trucking contractors, the mulesing contractors, the stock-handling contractors and the stock agents, there's not much left in those rural communities. They're already in decline and struggling to keep the schools open. Once they lose a couple of families out of the school, the next thing is that they've lost their school. And once they've lost their school, how do they attract people to come and work in their town? If they have a family, what do they do? They aren't going to send a primary schoolkid away to a boarding school or to a hostel at the government schools in Albany or Narrogin. They just can't attract people to come and work in those towns. That's why it's so important that we continue to keep the industry viable and to keep those jobs happening.

I want to touch on the animal welfare issue. We all know that we're here because of the incident on the Awassi Express; it has been mentioned by many others. A lot of Western Australian farmers still want to hear what actually transpired between Animals Australia and the whistleblower. There was a lot of money that changed hands. There were allegations made by another whistleblower that the footage was contrived and that it was manufactured because of the amount of money—we're talking around US$107,000—paid to a deckhand whose monthly salary was US$350.

I'm not a lawyer, but I'd reckon that any evidence that was produced in a court of law that had been obtained by that sort of money changing hands would be considered to be tainted. Anyway, that is an issue which we'll continue to pursue. I have 52 questions on notice to the department of agriculture which they have brushed off with a statement of a couple of paragraphs. However, I will not let this issue lie. I can say that to the people at the department of agriculture and others in the minister's office. We'll continue to pursue this until we get a result.

Since that incident, there have been dramatic changes to the way that the animal welfare and the conditions on these boats are conducted. These have made an enormous difference. Things like the stocking density in the pens and the ventilation as measured by the pen air turnover have made an enormous difference, as have the supervision and the reporting on these voyages. The wet bulb temperatures on each deck are recorded every hour; everything about the voyage is recorded.

At the recent House standing committee inquiry, we took evidence from some vets that were part of the Animals Australia, RSPCA and Vets Against Live Export group. One of those vets, Dr Lynn Simpson, alleged that feed shortages on the boats were leading to animals dying of starvation. She also suggested inanition, which is animals not feeding—specifically, that sheep are not accustomed to eating pelleted ration. We had Dr Jane Vaughan, who stated:

Sheep exhibit heat stress in the majority of equatorial crossings … This was demonstrated in 37 of 41 independent observer report summaries between 2018 and 2020.

She said that temperatures on voyages with little diurnal reprieve mean that sheep are experiencing heat stress conditions. She also described manure pads:

Damp, wet, tacky, sticky, sloppy faecal bedding is all indicative that sheep are failing to dissipate heat adequately.

That was the evidence that we heard at the inquiry on Wednesday the 12th here in Canberra.

Subsequent to that, Dr Herbert Rebhan, who is a veterinary surgeon, made a rebuttal submission to the inquiry. He was the registrar for production animals at Murdoch University's veterinary school from 2008 to 2014; from 2014 to 2019, he worked for the department of agriculture in the live animal export division in Perth; and, from March 2020 to November 2023, he worked as a shipboard Australian-accredited veterinarian on live sheep export voyages. He said, 'During this time, I cared for sixteen voyages that exported 899,315 sheep.'

I want to go to a couple of the points that Dr Rebhan made in response to the allegations from Dr Simpson and Dr Vaughan. He said:

My mortality rate ranged from 0.08% to 0.29%, averaging 0.19% (Two sheep out of one thousand). To put this into perspective, the mortality goals on a sheep farm are <2% for the rams and weathers and <3% for ewes and feedlot lambs.

…   …   …

Over my sixteen voyages, the total number of sheep hospitalized and treated was 2182, of which 2056 (94%) walked off the ship healthy and in market condition.

These are the sheep that are identified in a pen that are looking a little bit weak or thrifty. They are taken out of the pen, they are put into the hospital pen and they are treated.

I want to close by saying Mr Rebhan is an American. He studied and did his degree in America. In America, they swear an oath as a vet, similar to what doctors here in Australia do—the Hippocratic oath. The oath is:

… I solemnly swear to use my scientific knowledge and skills for the benefit of society through the protection of animal health and welfare, the prevention and relief of animal suffering …

That's the guts of what, as a vet in the United States, your oath is. He goes on to say over and above the oath:

I would never work in an industry that fails to comply with the veterinary oath.

I'm disgusted with the lies and deceitful tactics used by those with little to no firsthand experience or knowledge of the live sheep export industry who are trying to shut it down.

That addresses as far as I can in the time available some of the animal welfare issues.

I want to touch finally on the Keep the Sheep movement, which has sprung up. I know that many on the other side, particularly those on the east coast, would look at 60,000 sign-ups in the first month—$350,000 raised without a great deal of effort on their behalf—but let me tell you: this movement is a political movement which is gaining strength. It is the proxy for many farmers who are not involved with the live sheep export trade—they might be cattle producers and others—to get behind this and say: 'We have to draw a line in the sand here. If we allow the government to shut down a perfectly legal industry which has done everything that has been asked of it by the regulator, then what industry is next?' Is it cattle? We know that the animal welfare lobby are going after cattle next. They have made that very clear. Is it glyphosate in the cropping program? Is it atrazine in canola programs? So this movement is real. It's going to be effective, and I give it my 100 per cent support. So #keepthesheep.

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