Matthew Canavan (Queensland, Liberal National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I would like to focus on some figures too. The figure I would like to focus on is the price of beef in this country—the price of live weighed cattle—which fell to nearly 200c a kilo in 2013 directly as a consequence of the decisions of the Greens-Labor government, which shut down the live cattle trade and caused pain not just for live cattle producers in northern Australia but for the cattle industry across the country. Since this government has come to power and reintroduced the live cattle trade, opening up seven new live cattle markets, the price has gone to nearly 600c a kilogram for live weighed. What is the difference? It is the live cattle market. The problem with the Greens is that they do not understand markets. They do not understand the fact that, if you shut down industry in one part of our country, it can have ramifications for the entire nation. We saw that played out with the live cattle trade. We have had an experiment. Let's hope the Greens and the Labor Party do not get back into government to do that experiment to the cattle industry again.