Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern Australia) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Deputy President, I appreciate your protection. I did not hear it, but anything that came from Senator O’Brien would not worry anyone, certainly not me. The issue here was clearly explained by my two colleagues who spoke previously in this debate and who clearly have a very intense knowledge of this disease and of the research that is necessary to address it. The issue is that the current government is cutting back funding that is so essential for research into this disease.

As a Queenslander, two of my former constituents are those who have suffered as a result of the Hendra virus, and I feel for and sympathise with their families. There is nothing we can do or say today that will overcome the distress and sadness experienced by the families of those two very highly regarded and wonderful men who succumbed to this disease in the course of their work. What we have to do is ensure that this does not infect nor affect other vets and people working with this program.

I will just give Senator Carr a bit of a clue. In our time in government, the CRC system suggested we should no longer have a reef CRC or a rainforest CRC. Accordingly funding was cut. What did the Howard government do? They had good representatives in Far North Queensland, in North Queensland and along the Queensland coast who were interested in this and who petitioned the Howard government—all Liberal people, I think—to ensure that a completely new research institution was set up to be permanently funded, apart from the CRC program. That is what you do, Senator Carr, if you are interested in this. It might have missed funding in the CRC that you are responsible for, but you set up another organisation, as we did with MTSRF, the new organisation that was set up to investigate and continue the research into the reef and the rainforest.

What we are saying on this side is that everyone is concerned about the disease. There is no question about that. What we are angered about is that the time when this CRC should be increasing its work, at the time when the CSIRO should be increasing its work, the Labor government of Mr Rudd has cut funding to this CRC and at the same time has cut back funding to the CSIRO in the last budget. You cannot argue with me about that. Have a look at the budget papers. This is the concern we have on our side and the government must increase funding for this research.

Question agreed to.