Dean Smith (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

It was just over two years ago this month, on 5 March 2015, that I drew the attention of this chamber to a matter of increasing seriousness for many pastoralists across Western Australia, one that should be of growing concern for everyone living across my great state. The issue, of course, was wild dogs and their propensity to attack livestock across Western Australia anddestock pastoral lease holders of a viable source of income. Two years later, wild dogs are continuing to cause havoc and heartache for many Western Australian pastoralists, especially those located in the southern rangelands of Western Australia, as well as sheep farmers in the north-eastern Wheatbelt. Wild dog attacks are now estimated to cost the Western Australia livestock industry around $8.7 million annually in lost production and management time, and are becoming both an economic and social drain on many regional communities, with more and more stations and farms forced to destock.

Two years ago, I mentioned the devastating impact that destocking had on the Dowden family, who live at and run Challa Station in the Murchison part of Western Australia. Challa Station has been in the Dowden family since 1888, and ran some of the largest flocks in the state until Ashley and Debbie were forced to destock in 2008 because of wild dogs attacks. I mentioned Ashley and Debbie's words back then. Ashley and Debbie said:

We were mustering for shearing and putting them in holding paddocks and going in the next morning and there were dead sheep everywhere from dog attacks.

The goats disappeared, followed by the sheep … and they paid the bills. If we were lucky, there was a bit left over to put in the bank to cover the hard times.

The pastoralists themselves were the next to go and next, of course, will be the sustainability of the land, because no-one will be left to manage it.

The devastating flow-on effects from wild dog attacks are enormous. Many pastoralists, after being forced to destock, are faced with selling their station at a loss and trying to find work in an economy where regional jobs are scarce to say the least, or, like the Dowdens, faced with the challenge of switching to cattle, which is a more costly exercise, especially when you do not have an income due to stock losses from wild dog attacks.

With no sheep, there is no work for shearers, no work for wool pressers, no work for fencers, no work for caterers and no work for shed hands—many of whom are local Indigenous people. With work drying up, people move to other locations, destroying the viability of local businesses and sporting and service organisations, adding to the pressure on regional towns across Western Australia.

Unlike those on the other side of this chamber, I and my Western Australian Liberal colleagues, particularly the member for Durack, Melissa Price, have—as have many of my coalition colleagues in Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria—visited the stations and farms and listened to farmers and pastoralists like the Dowdens, whose lives have been so drastically affected by wild dog attacks. We have been active participants in baiting days, by cutting the meat, preparing the baits and, most importantly, sitting with pastoralists and their families and listening to their concerns and pushing for action: action like the completion of the Murchison region vermin cell fence, a 480 kilometre fence line that is needed to again make the wild dog problem manageable; action like repairs to the state barrier fence; and action like funding for executive officers for regional biosecurity groups to coordinate wild dog control activities.

Earlier this month, I was pleased to visit outside of Geraldton—almost 450 kilometres north of Perth—joining the Minister for Regional Development, Senator Nash, to announce $2½ million in federal funding to boost wild dog control management in that part of Western Australia. Consistent with the Western Australian Wild Dog Action Plan—another initiative funded in part by the coalition government—$1½ million will provide much needed support to landholders to increase their capacity to manage wild dogs by working more effectively with industry and community biosecurity groups. A further $1 million in competitive grants will go to regional wild dog fencing.

While this announcement is a great outcome for regional Western Australia and for affected communities, especially across the Mid West of my state and is also a positive sign of growing cooperation between the state and the federal governments on this issue, there remain concerns from those from the front lines over how this funding will best be managed. Again, I commit to them that I will be a champion for their local interests to make sure that that federal funding finds its way to their local issues.

Murchison Regional Vermin Council chairman and Yalgoo shire president, Neil Grinham—who runs Meka Station—said in Farm Weekly on 10 March: 'Funding was always welcome, but it had to be put to good use and not go to waste as it had in the past.' Part of the problem, according to pastoralists like Neil Grinham—who has been fighting for state and federal funding for wild dog control since the mid-2000s and whose shire is primarily composed of 26 pastoral stations, all of which have been decimated by wild dogs—is that the state wild dog action plan, which provides a $20 million commitment to wild dog control, does not recognise the importance of ground projects like the Murchison cell fence. In the Farm Weekly article, Neil goes on to say: 'This funding will be for trial cluster fencing. It will cost us and not be as effective as vermin fences, baiting and dogging programs.' He goes on to say: 'If I had a choice on what to do with the $2½ million, I'd put the Murchison fence up, and if I had more money we would break it into cells to control the outside.' He goes on to say: 'We need to stop them,'—the wild dogs—'moving south. We need to close the gap first.' He goes on to say, 'It is like we are living in a boat with a very serious hole in it.'

These sentiments are echoed by Murchison pastoralist Ashley Dowden, who said in the same article in the Farm Weekly: 'Any funding to go towards dog control is good, but there are holes in the state plan, but, as I see it, it will fail because there is no money for ground work and no money to clean the dogs out.'

Two years ago, I laid down the challenge to then WA Minister for Regional Development, Terry Redman, to give this project his urgent attention and provide some hope and assistance in a part of WA where it is desperately needed, because this issue has gone on for too long and has now become the subject of bureaucratic pettiness. Today, two years later, I lay down the same challenge to the new Minister for Regional Development and Minister for Agriculture and Food, Alannah MacTiernan, to not ignore the plights of the pastoralists in the Murchison and to fund this fence. I challenge the new Labor government to put aside Labor's partisan approach to regional Western Australia and to not play politics with the livelihoods of WA pastoralists, their families and their communities. Federal or state; Liberal or Labor: we all have an obligation to do more to assist in this critical matter.

The pastoral industry is and always has been the major source of economic wealth in the Western Australian rangelands: creating jobs and empowering communities. While the small-stock pastoral industry continues to decline, mostly due to wild dog attacks, it is not too late to save this important industry. As I have mentioned in numerous addresses to this chamber, the ability of our nation's regions to achieve their potential requires a government with the commitment and drive to turn talk into action. We are all living witnesses to how inaction on wild dogs has permitted the destruction of much of the small-stock industry in Western Australia—inaction caused by ignoring the pleas of landholders and giving preference to the self-interest of external stakeholders and departmental bureaucrats. Today I add to my calls by calling on Alannah MacTiernan and the new state Labor government in Western Australia to give their utmost attention to the urgent need to combat the plague that is wild dogs across the rangelands of Western Australia.