Matthew Canavan (Queensland, Liberal National Party, Minister for Resources and Northern Australia) Share this | Hansard source

I thank Senator McKenzie for her question and congratulate her on her re-election and her continuing support for the dairy farmers of Victoria—an incredibly important industry for her state and, indeed, for our nation. As many in this chamber would know, there are many in the industry who are doing it very tough at the moment given the global price environment and the decisions made by Murray Goulburn and Fonterra recently to retrospectively cut farmgate milk prices. Those decisions made by Fonterra and Murray Goulburn are decisions that the government are concerned about, and that is why we have acted quickly in response to them.

We have listened to the concerns of dairy farmers, holding a number of meetings in the last few months, and during the election campaign we announced a $579 million dairy assistance support package. The cornerstone of that package is low-interest loans for dairy farmers of up to $555 million at an interest rate of 2.66 per cent that can be taken over a 10-year period, including a five-year interest-only period. That will help bring down interest expenses for farmers as they refinance and will give them greater cash flow. We are also funding more Rural Financial Counsellors, one-to-one business advisory support for farmers and assistance to help farmers access other forms of assistance and support, including the farm household allowance; a dairy coordinator to help link farmers with state support as well as federal support; and $2 million to establish a milk commodity price index, to give more transparency to farmers to help them plan their operations.

We as a government are confident that this industry will remain fundamentally strong. It is going through a difficult time, but it will be strong again. We are also contributing $20 million to the Macalister Irrigation District, underlining our confidence that the dairy industry will recover from this. We will do everything we can to support it through these difficult times.