Glenn Sterle (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to contribute to this take note of answers debate and the motion moved by Senator Back. Before I go any further, I would like to clarify a few things. As part of my role on the Senate Standing Committee on Rural and Regional Affairs and Transport, I, along with my colleagues Senator O’Brien and Senator Back, visited the Australian Animal Health Laboratory in Geelong about five or six weeks ago. It was an opportune visit for us and an experience that certainly enabled us to take away with us a knowledge of the great work that is being done down there by the good folk. We were welcomed. The only thing I must say—and I think it is important that we clarify this—is that it is a bit concerning that, when we have a lot of rural and regional affairs inquiries we are swamped by the number of coalition senators who cannot wait to get their heads in there and have something to say about agriculture, because they are the gatekeepers of all intelligence on the farms, it seems. Or they think they are.