Andrew Willcox (Dawson, Liberal National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I've always found the member for Hunter to be a very straight shooter. Unfortunately, on this one, he's missed the target by a long way. He's missed the target by an extremely long way. Let's have a look at what Labor has done. Labor has done nothing for the agricultural sector but tie it up in red tape and green tape.

Let's have a look at what else they've done, starting with the fishing industry and the ban on gillnets. The banning of gillnets put over 90 fishermen in my electorate of Dawson out of business. This wasn't done by any scientific means. This was political science. This was a sneaky little deal done by the environment minister, Tanya Plibersek, to make UNESCO and the Greens—under the Labor-Green alliance—happy, all under the guise of saving the Great Barrier Reef. Newsflash—a gillnet doesn't go anywhere near the Great Barrier Reef. Can you imagine what a net would be like around coral? It's too silly for words.

What have they done with biosecurity? Labor is proposing to tax our farmers for the biosecurity risks of their overseas competitors. Nowhere else in the world does this, but this is what they're trying to do. It's absolutely ludicrous.

The family car and ute tax is another assault on rural and regional Australia. When you're a farmer, you can't use an electric vehicle. They can't carry the weight, they can't tow the load and they can't cover the vast distances. There are not electric charging stations within close proximity to be used. Now the vehicles that we drive—like Hiluxes, Rangers, Patrols, LandCruisers and those sorts of things—are going up in cost by between $10,000 and $20,000, according to our car dealers, all to try to get people into this electric fantasy that simply won't work for rural and regional Australia.

One of the biggest blights I've seen is the killing off of the live sheep trade. Make no mistake. We understand it's live sheep today and cattle tomorrow, all under the guise of keeping your little mates from the Greens happy, so you can roll over and get a little belly tickle from the Greens. We get it. We see it all the time. But I've been over and seen Western Australia and I've been on the live sheep boats. I've seen the ventilation that comes down and looks after the live sheep. I've seen the pens and how much room they have in there. I've seen firsthand that they have a vet on board and that all the people around the area are looking after the sheep. This is what they do. But no, what has Labor done to keep their Greens mates happy? They shut this industry down. These are multigenerational farms. I've spoken to farmers from WA who are the fourth and fifth generations—not for long!

Value add? I tell you what, they're totally delusional. You need to get out and go and actually talk to some of these people.

What's Labor done for energy for farmers? The electrical bills have gone up by more than 30 per cent; they can't afford to pump water. And to add insult to injury, what are you doing? You're putting solar panels on good quality agricultural land. You're putting solar panels on land that grows good-quality food and fibre that feed the nation. This is what you actually need to happen. Electricity bills are going through the roof under those opposite, and this is after a promise that we would be $275 better off. Where's that? 'By 2025'? Here we are. Electricity prices are going through the roof. Why not provide some cheaper electricity so that farmers can grow some more cane? The cane photosynthesises, pulls carbon out of the air and is better for the environment.

While we're talking about water, what about cutting all the dams? That's the other thing you've done. For Urannah Dam in my electorate, there was a commitment for $480 million, and what did those opposite do? They came in, slashed and burned. When you slash, you can't grow anything without water. But you probably wouldn't know because you probably don't know what a farmer looks like. Then there's the killing off of the agricultural visa—what a turnout that is—just to keep your union mates happy. What about the workforce shortages? It's absolutely ridiculous. It's clear that Labor is no friend of farmers, fishers and miners. Vote them out at the next election. Get rid of them. Get us back on track.

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