Joe Ludwig (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Manager of Government Business in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

Dealing with the last issue first, I took the decision to suspend the trade to Indonesia because of our concerns about animal welfare. It is about ensuring that we put a supply chain assurance in place which ensures the safeguard of animal welfare outcomes.

In terms of the live cattle trade, I do believe it has a strong long-term future. I want to see this trade resumed as quickly as possible, not one day later than it needs to be. It is an important area. The best outcome for the Northern Territory, Western Australia and Queensland, which manage the live animal export industry, is for this trade to get up and running as quickly as possible.

In the short term, the government has provided three types of assistance. Firstly, the government has provided for unem­ployment—in other words, for those people who have been made unemployed as a con­se­quence of the suspension. The government will provide income subsidy assistance for those people who have been affected by the suspension. Secondly, the government has provided assistance to the supply chain, for those people who are onshore in the supply chain, and the industry has provided $5 million for onshore supply. Thirdly, the government has contributed $30 million to assist those hardship cases where the suspension has impacted on businesses and producers in the live animal export industry.

This industry does have a strong and sustainable future, but we do have to get the animal welfare issues right to ensure that it does continue for the longer term. That is the important issue that we both are working cooperatively to resolve. (Time expired)