Sharman Stone (Murray, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We are an island continent and that has been very much to our advantage when it comes to quarantine issues. We have managed to have an amazing run. Perhaps it is good luck, but I would like to think that it is also good management. We have not had diseases like BSE, mad cow disease. Rabies is not rampant through the country but, of course, we are always under threat.

When I was recently on a trade mission to Korea and Japan, the thing that was stressed to me again and again was Australia's disease-free status and the importance of that to them in importing our beef and our dairy product. They talked again and again about the fact that Australia did not have to use a lot of chemicals, because we were so disease free. It is a major marketing plus for us.

All of this is in jeopardy if we slash the funds to biosecurity so much that our quarantine services cannot do the work they know themselves they must do to guard against diseases entering this country, whether it is in manufactured product, fresh product or livestock.

Unfortunately, we are again under threat. Would you believe that this time it is from the importation of fresh potatoes. Until now we have never allowed into Australia the importation of fresh, uncooked potatoes. That is because we have been blessed with disease-free status in not having such things as potato cyst nematode, the zebra chip complex or the black wart disease. They are all quite romantic names but they would all spell death to the potato industry if these diseases got loose in our country.

Unfortunately, we now have agreement that there is really no big deal or problem with the importation of fresh potatoes from New Zealand. New Zealand has those diseases: the potato cyst nematode, the zebra chip complex and black wart. The biosecurity assessments of the risk associated with those diseases has been totally inadequate. We have a lot of strong scientific evidence which shows that there is an extremely high risk of a fresh potato coming into Australia with soil. The potato is, apparently, required to be washed. But, unfortunately, you cannot test a fresh potato for the psyllid species which carries some of these diseases unless you actually destroy it. So how are we going to have conveyor belts of potatoes or inspectors of these products who can actually tell whether or not the disease is there without destroying the product? It is a nonsense.

I have to tell you that these diseases, in particular the Candidatus Liberibacter solanacearum, otherwise known as zebra chip disease, also affect tomatoes, eggplants, carrots and capsicum. So if this disease gets loose in Australia we are looking at $1.5 billion worth of fresh vegetable production each year potentially destroyed. Why would any country say: 'That's okay. Let's take the risk. New Zealand is our friend'? I am afraid it is not about friendship; it is not about closer economic relationships. It is about quarantine; it is about biosecurity protection.

The problem for the potato growers is very like the problem the apple and pear growers faced when they were fighting the prospect of fresh apples coming in from New Zealand which could carry apple and pear fire blight. The potato growers are facing a wall of secrecy when it comes to what in fact are the standards and protocols in New Zealand potato packing sheds. Apparently they are not to know. Apparently their inquiries are not valid. Well, the Australian potato growers do need to know in order to assure themselves that the protocols are adequate, because the standards imposed under domestic policy requirements by New Zealand are not the same as Australian protocols. Australia's protocols are in line with the EU directive. So New Zealand's protocols are inadequate. But apparently we are going to say, 'That's okay. We'll stand back and wave the product through.'

AUSVEG, who I trust implicitly in their scientific analysis and the work they have done here, say that the Department of Agriculture, Forestry And Fisheries in PRA—pest risk analysis—consistently put forward statements as fact without providing any references to back up their statements, making it easy for observers to misinterpret fact from opinion. DAFF has continually confused absence of evidence with evidence of absence of a disease. This is inexcusable, especially when DAFF claims that it uses a science based approach to its work. A lack of research into an area does not signify it as an area not worth consideration. So they have to have more rigour. We must have complete objectivity here. Poor science will not do. Our huge industry— (Time expired)