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

McCORMACK () (): I will just sidetrack to the member for Lingiari, and I do thank her for her contribution. I do acknowledge that there have been some terrible things said about the Minister for Indigenous Australians, but I also acknowledge that Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price has also been subjected to some very nasty remarks. I would ask Australians, as we count down towards the referendum, that they be respectful. Everybody gets a vote—yes or no—and let's move on as a nation after the vote, whatever the outcome of that vote is.

I want to talk tonight about a couple of rural issues. One is in relation to Transgrid's high-voltage power lines for the HumeLink project. I would urge and encourage the member for Eden-Monaro to listen to her farmers and her community members in trying to have these lines placed underground. I know that James Gooden, who has properties at both Cootamundra and Borambola in my electorate, is a passionate advocate on this very. very important issue. We need there to be common sense. We need to make sure that those people who are on prime agricultural land are listened to and are valued.

Speaking of valuing farmers and valuing what we all live on, I want to express my surprise and disappointment at Labor's decision to axe the National Soils Advocate. Senator Murray Watt, who is the federal agriculture minister has terminated this role. I do appreciate the fact that he reached out to me to alert me to this before it was made public, but I also want to place on record my admiration for former Queensland governor Penny Wensley AC, who has done a marvellous job in this capacity. I do not believe there is any justification for this shortsighted announcement. Soils hold the key to much of what those opposite talk about when they discuss action on climate. Ms Wensley succeeded Australia's first National Soils Advocate, the late Major-General Michael Jeffery AC. He was announced as the national advocate for soil health on 23 October 2012 by no less a person than Prime Minister Julia Gillard.

I do have admiration for Prime Minister Gillard, particularly post her prime ministership. In fact, I reached out to her, when I became the Deputy Prime Minister, to ask her for advice, and she gave me some great wisdom about what to do for regional Australia. I still value that conversation. I like to think that she understood regional Australia and that she cared about the interests of all Australians. When she put Major-General Michael Jeffery in that role, it was a very sensible decision, and I commend her for it. On World Soil Day, 5 December, in 2019, I handed a letter to then Speaker Tony Smith to request the formation of Parliamentary Friends of Soil. I've really appreciated the collaboration and cooperation I've had from my co-chair, Meryl Swanson, the member for Paterson, in this parliament and before that from Minister Linda Burney in the previous parliament. The member for Barton understood how important soils were, and I'm sure the member for Lingiari does too. I know soil is an important cultural aspect for Indigenous Australians, and I do respect that.

Soil is vital to life on this planet. It's home to more than a quarter of the earth's biodiversity. Ninety-five per cent of the world's food comes from soil and soil organisms. Given that, I cannot fathom why we would not continue with a national soils advocate. I believe we should have a minister for soils—separate to, but working in close conjunction with, the minister for agriculture. May we work towards that as a parliament in the future, and may we always value the soils on which we walk and from which we derive our food.