Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party, Shadow Minister for International Development and the Pacific) Share this | Hansard source

Dog racing! I just heard dog racing from the member for Warringah. It's because they want to ban everything. The dog-racing ban didn't work so well for the New South Wales government when they tried to implement that. The member for Warringah, who represents a sprawling electorate of 68 square kilometres in leafy coastal Sydney, would know all about the feelings of our cattle producers and the work that our sheep farmers do! I know—and I know that the member for Flynn knows, because he comes from cattle country. And the member for Wannon, who was a very, very good trade minister in the Morrison government for two years, represents an electorate which produces fine sheep, just like the Riverina produces. Why should our sheep markets here in the eastern states be affected by a decision made by this Labor government, albeit for over in Western Australia? But, rest assured, when the sheep are phased out, there's going to have to be something done with those sheep. They'll be shipped to the eastern states and our markets will suffer as a result.

When Labor, through a kneejerk reaction to a television program on the national broadcaster, shut down our live cattle trade in mid-2011, the cattle prices at Wagga Wagga slumped the next week. That's because they were fearful—and markets are driven by fear and greed. There were concerns that cattle from the northern part of Australia would end up in our saleyards, end up in our abattoirs and end up competing with the prices of our locally produced cattle in the Riverina. It's not too distant to say—and my local stock and station agents are already saying this—that a shutdown of the trade in the west will affect our markets in the east. It will affect our markets in Wagga Wagga. Just last December, because of any number of factors, sheep were selling for a dollar a head in the Wagga Wagga saleyards. Imagine trying to make a buck when your sheep are being sold for just a dollar. It doesn't even bear thinking about how much it cost you to transport those sheep to the yards, let alone paying the agents and all the rest.

This is a folly. The Exporter Supply Chain Assurance System is in place and is working well, and it's something that other countries, which will now fill this trade, do not have in place. What we have is the situation where the sheep are very much looked after; the sheep have pens in which to move on the ships and their panting, their breaths are measured. They have veterinarians on board, making sure that their welfare is first class. But that market will now be filled by countries which do not have the ESCAS system, or one like it, in place. What the teals and Labor would have you believe is that, well, Australian sheep will be okay, but to hell with those foreign-bred sheep. I say: shame on them!

I was watching television last night—one of the rare opportunities I ever get to sit down and watch TV—and there was an advertisement by the RSPCA no less boasting about the fact that, because of their diligent work, free-range hens are now able to lay in peace and indeed pigs are able to have big pens in which they can roll around in the mud. The RSPCA, no doubt cheering this home too, was very satisfied with that outcome. This is the same organisation which twice visited a farm near Wagga Wagga where re-homed brumbies were being allegedly slaughtered. It is now the subject of a police inquiry and of another state government inquiry as well and that is a good thing. But the RSPCA saw no problems there. They pick and choose which animals they are going to look after and which animals they are not. Rest assured, sheep were being very well looked after when they were exported to the Gulf states. The trade minister knows that, the former trade minister knows that, everyone on this side speaking in favour of the amendments put to this bill knows that as well. Indeed, the minister, Senator Murray Watt, three days before the budget, skulked his way over the west, did a Zoom meeting, didn't face up to the farmers, didn't eyeball the farmers, and announced this terrible, shameful policy which is going to see the trade shut down.

Then the member for Rankin, just three days later, stood at that very dispatch box and said he was going to put up $107 million to stop farmers doing what they have done for generations. Think about that—$107 million to stop farmers farming. I mean, it makes no sense. The member for Warringah also stated in her contribution that there will be money for rural financial counsellors. We want to make sure the mental health and mental welfare of our farmers is everything it should be, not paying money to counsellors in Western Australia to go and see if those farmers are okay because the rug has been pulled from underneath them by this anti-agriculture government, and that is what Labor are. They are anti-agriculture, as evidenced by this bill.

On 3 June, Minister Watt wrote to the House Standing Committee on Agriculture and instructed it to conduct an inquiry into the bill. However, it only involved two public hearings, offered just a week for submissions and provided a report on 21 June, two weeks after the inquiry started. This is not stakeholder engagement. This is not consulting our farmers, who deserve better. Our exports need to be upheld just to pay for the cost-of-living crisis brought about by this government. And, of course, a rushed process led to the chair recommending support for the bill.

The federal coalition stand in solidarity with Australian farmers. We always will. I am the son of a sheep farmer. I can just imagine what he would be thinking. The only time he ever protested in his life was when he came out the front here when the Hawke government came into power and was so anti-farmer, so anti-agriculture. It was the only time Dad ever protested.

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