Mehreen Faruqi (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak to the Inspector-General of Live Animal Exports Amendment (Animal Welfare) Bill 2023. Before I get to the substance of the bill, I have to say that this is a completely missed opportunity. I'm going to move some amendments that will give the bill some substance. I hope that the government senators and other colleagues will support them.

After a decade of neglect, we desperately need bold, transformative reform from the highest level of government in this country to protect animals. We need an independent office of animal welfare and a strong, uniform, properly enforced national legislative framework for the protection of the welfare of animals. More than that, though, we need to rethink our entire relationship with animals, and that starts with recognising and enshrining in legislation the reality that animals are sentient beings who feel pain and pleasure and deserve our care and respect. They have intrinsic value beyond the needs and desires of humankind. Animals aren't just commodities or property. They have every right to live, exist and thrive on this planet, just as we do. And they have every right to live lives free of pain, suffering and fear, just as we do. We need a relationship with animals and the natural world which is driven by and based on compassion and respect, not profit and exploitation, and that requires us to challenge the extractive and exploitative incessant-profit driven system that we live in.

Just as we cannot save the planet without ending the excesses of capitalism and neoliberalism, we cannot achieve animal justice without challenging the mindset which views the natural world as something that must be commodified and controlled. We need to challenge the arrogant notion that we own the natural world, rather than being part of an ecosystem and perhaps one cog in its wheel.

Australia is shamefully behind when it comes to caring for animals. Across the nation, grotesque systemic abuse of animals continues. Sheep, cattle and other livestock are shipped across the ocean in horrific conditions, often packed so tightly in heat that is so sweltering that they cook from the inside in a trade that can never be made safe for any animal. Hens suffer in tiny, dark and filthy cages where they spend their entire lives struggling to move or stretch their wings. Pigs live their lives in metal crates they can barely lay down and spend their final moments grasping, shrieking, frothing at the mouth, thrashing around and in absolute terror as they suffocate in chambers. Cows are kept in a permanent state of pregnancy and milked beyond normal capacity with their tiny calves removed and killed.

Around 700,000 poddy calves are killed in their first week every year. Horses are whipped and raced to exhaustion then slaughtered mercilessly at abattoirs when they are no longer winning cash for their owners. Greyhounds suffer thousands of injuries on Australian tracks every year. So many have died cruel and premature deaths on Australian racetracks this year alone. These are just some examples that show these cruel practices have to end. And, of course, Australia's weak policies and lack of strong laws to protect our environment and climate result in immense suffering to animals as well as their habitats and homes being destroyed by land clearing, forest logging and climate induced bushfires. Nearly three billion animals—mammals, reptiles, birds and frogs—were killed or displaced by the devastating 2019 and 2020 bushfires. This ranks as one of the worst wildlife disasters in modern history.

Time and again corporations, whether they be in the racing industry or the live export companies, cover up, lie, mislead and find excuses for the horrific brutality they inflict on animals. And time and again successive Australian governments and ministers from both sides wilfully ignore the systemic abuse and look away as brave whistleblowers and animal welfare organisations go to great lengths to shine a light on the torture and terror being meted out to animals in slaughterhouses, on live export ships, in greyhound racing, in horse racing and elsewhere. I do want to thank the animal welfare activists and advocates who are growing in number every day for their courage and for their love for animals.

The sad truth really is that the Greens are the only party in here with a genuine commitment to animal welfare, and our record speaks for itself. We have fought long and hard to ban the cruelty that is the live export trade, which—and I say this again—can never be made safe for any animal. We have worked tirelessly to expose the cruelty which lies at the heart of the horse and greyhound racing industries, and we have pushed to shine a light on the brutal, horrific and torturous realities of factory farming. The coalition and Labor really are out of touch when it comes to the importance of animal welfare. Independent polling shows that more and more people care about animal welfare. Over 80 per cent of Australians are concerned about animal welfare, and 64 per cent of Australians agree that racing animals like horses and greyhounds for gambling and entertainment is cruel, and that number has been growing steadily over time. It was 59 per cent in 2022 and 55 per cent in 2021. Almost 60 per cent of Australians that are eligible to vote are more likely to vote for a candidate who advocates for stronger animal welfare standards for farm animals.

People want a government that has the courage to recognise that animals have rights and deserve protection, and that government should deliver that protection. While this bill is a tiny step forward, it really demonstrates that Labor lacks the courage to take that full step towards animal protection. Like with so many other policy areas, Labor has presented a solution which is completely inadequate to address the scale of the problem. They have offered tinkering around the edges when we need big, bold shifts. While it was good to see Labor moving towards ending live sheep exports, they went to the last two federal elections with this policy and are moving at a snail's pace. Labor has refused to commit in this term of parliament to legislating an end date for the phasing out of live sheep exports, so I don't know how long we will have to wait, how long those sheep who faced this cruelty will have to wait. Again, independent polling shows that 59 per cent of people want to phase out live exports within two years. Over 43,000 Australians have signed a petition calling for an end to live sheep exports as quickly as possible, and this was tabled in the House by a member of the government just a couple of months ago.

I do urge the government to listen to the community and to members of its own party and in this term legislate an end date for the phase-out within the shortest possible time frame and to support a transition to local processing systems for chilled and frozen meats. Given we are on the way to shutting down live exports to better protect animal welfare, why are Labor refusing to improve sheep welfare in the meantime? Labor voted against my disallowance motion to overturn the Morrison-era changes to the Northern Hemisphere summer ban, sealing the fates of thousands of sheep who will continue to be shipped across the ocean at some of the hottest times of the year, against the advice of animal welfare experts. Until this trade is ended, the government should commit to implementing a full Northern Hemisphere summer ban from 1 May to 31 October to ensure that sheep are not put at an unacceptable risk of heat stress.

It should also ensure that basic transparency measures to keep exporters accountable and protect animals, like the deployment of independent observers, are operating, as they should, on every ship. Currently, independent observers are being deployed on only a handful of ships, with exporters treating their deployment as an optional extra. The department should be forcing exporters to make space available because independent observers are critical for monitoring heat stress and animal welfare.

Another of Labor's key election platforms was to establish the office of the independent inspector-general of animal welfare and increase accountability and transparency for reporting of animal welfare breaches. Labor claimed that the inspector-general of animal welfare's role was to include reporting to parliament on any allegations of breaches of animal welfare standards and investigations undertaken, as well as any sanctions or other actions taken for breaches of Australian animal welfare standards. Animal welfare advocates were rightly excited by this. Sadly, though, this is not what Labor is delivering with this bill we're debating today.

This bill merely tweaks the role and scope of the current Inspector-General of Live Animal Exports, and this is really disappointing. Animal welfare experts have rightly observed that most of the proposed functions under the bill could be carried out by the existing inspector-general and that this bill is a very small step and more about rebranding than about substantive reform.

We heard loud and clear in the inquiry on this bill that the model created by this bill falls short of the expectations of animal welfare advocates, who are demanding an independent, new statutory office with the power to improve animal welfare across all Commonwealth regulated fields, not just in relation to live animal exports. Animal welfare experts emphasised that , at a time when Australia is facing increasing international pressure from trade partners to lift its animal welfare standards, limiting the scope of the inspector-general to live exports is a significant missed opportunity. The government's excuse for delivering such a limited model, despite its ambitious election promises, is that the Commonwealth's power to regulate animal welfare is limited. But that excuse doesn't stack up. The Parliamentary Library has confirmed that the Commonwealth can legislate extensively on animal welfare under several constitutional heads of power, including trade and commerce with other countries, and, among the states, taxation, quarantine, corporations and external affairs. So there is a huge category of animals the Commonwealth could and should be protecting but has chosen not to in this bill.

I will be moving an amendment to extend the scope of the inspector-general to include welfare oversight for these categories of animals. Animal welfare stakeholders, including Australian Alliance for Animals and the RSPCA, strongly support this amendment. I will also be moving Greens amendments to require that the person appointed to the inspector-general role actually has animal welfare expertise, because, believe it or not, there is currently no such requirement. How is it justifiable to appoint someone to a role with the key responsibility of animal welfare and not require them to have that expertise? What a farce. It defies all common sense.

We will also be moving amendments to require the inspector-general to declare any conflicts of interest which may prevent the proper performance of their functions. This is a really crucial amendment because conflicts of interest have for far too long plagued and undermined the Commonwealth's ability to protect animals. The department of agriculture has a long history of failing to prioritise animal welfare because it is fundamentally conflicted, given that it is also responsible for promoting the interests of the industry. Animal welfare will always come second to industry profits, so we must make sure that that's not the case for the inspector-general.

Finally, I will be moving amendments to enshrine the sentience of animals as a guiding principle for the inspector-general. Animal sentience is the reason that animal welfare matters, and it's already recognised in the Australian Animal Welfare Strategy and the Australia-UK Free Trade Agreement. So why not recognise that in law? Recognising animal sentience isn't theoretical or an abstract concept. We must accept that animals can feel pain and distress. We must accept our moral responsibility to minimise the harm they suffer because of human activities. Many other nations like New Zealand, Sweden, Peru, France and Spain have recognised animal sentience in their laws and it's high time Australia did it too. The Australian Capital Territory recognises it and Victoria has just made moves to recognise animal sentience in their laws. Animals deserve that at the very least.

In addition to the amendments the Greens will move in the Committee of the Whole, I move the Greens second reading amendment on sheet 1975:

At the end of the motion, add ", but the Senate:

(a) notes that this bill:

(i) barely expands the functions and remit of the existing Inspector-General of Live Animal Exports, and

(ii) is a wasted opportunity to provide transformative improvements in animal welfare; and

(b) calls on the Government to:

(i) recognise that animals are sentient beings that deserve our care and respect,

(ii) recognise that animals have intrinsic value, separate from the needs of humans,

(iii) in this term of Parliament, introduce legislation to specify the end date for the phase-out of live sheep exports within the shortest possible timeframe, and

(iv) establish an Independent Office for Animal Welfare which provides oversight of animal welfare standards to the full extent of the Commonwealth's power".

This amendment calls on the government to recognise that animals are sentient, establish an independent office of animal welfare and in this term legislate an end date for the phase-out of live sheep exports within the shortest possible time frame.