Linda Reynolds (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I too rise to speak on the Inspector-General of Live Animal Exports Amendment (Animal Welfare) Bill 2023 and the issue more widely. First of all, I commend a number of my colleagues here this evening. I commend my good friend and colleague Senator Brockman for his impassioned and very coherent summary of the issue that is now confronting us, the impending ban on the live export of sheep. There is no-one who knows more about the issue and there is no-one more passionate about the farmers and the communities across Western Australia that will be impacted so negatively.

I also congratulate other federal colleagues—obviously, Senator O'Sullivan; Rick Wilson, who has been an incredibly passionate advocate because the majority of the 3½ thousand farmers and supporting communities that will be devastated are in his electorate of O'Connor; and, of course, Melissa Price, who has also been a tireless champion for her farmers and for the industry. I would also particularly like to note my state colleague Steve Martin MLC, who has done an extraordinary job on this issue. Not coming from a farm myself or from the land, I've learnt a lot from my colleagues, and I'm incredibly proud of how as a Liberal team we have stood together in support of Western Australia, standing up against this outrageous knee-jerk reaction by the Labor Party yet again.

This is not only appallingly bad government policy. It's also, as Senator Brockman has pointed out, a pattern of behaviour by Labor when in government. Their knee-jerk reaction which is still having ramifications across Australia, including Western Australia, was their ban on the live cattle trade. As Senator Brockman has said, you can be absolutely certain that more will come. I'll come to the bill in the moment, but I want to talk about one aspect of this philosophical approach by Labor which has been informed, as Senator Brockman so eloquently said, by extremists and radicals who are incredibly misguided and selfish.

Australia plays an important role not only in feeding the rest of the world but also in ensuring that nations who have protein deficiencies can get the protein that they need. In denying this protein to some of our poorest nations who we support with its provision, nobody has stopped to think about the implications for them.

Now, why do we have live meat and animal exports? Firstly, for cultural and religious reasons, and secondly, because the countries who most need our source of protein quite often don't have cold chain infrastructure, and certainly many of their houses do not have refrigeration. So it is essential that we get the livestock there so that it can be slaughtered locally and provided to the people who simply don't have the cold chain provisions.

Protein is an important part of human diets, but an estimated one billion people today still suffer from a serious protein deficiency. The problem is most severe in Central Africa and South Asia, where about 30 per cent of children consume far too little protein. While work is being done globally—scientific work on new forms of protein or artificial forms of protein—these are probably decades away. And this ideological deception—criminal actions, in some cases—not only is hurting many Western Australians and other Australians but also is incredibly selfish. You will be denying the export of animals and meat that comes from a country that now has the highest animal welfare standards in terms of transporting animals, and consumers will go elsewhere, to countries that don't have the same standards that we do here in Australia. It's a bit like the way those opposite think in terms of minerals. Nobody mines minerals in a more environmentally friendly, slavery-free and ethical way than Australia does. But they think: 'Hey, that's okay; we'll just let people get it from other countries, where there is human slavery in the supply chain, where mining is far dirtier on the environment. But hey, I feel okay about this.' That's exactly what those opposites are caving in to in this circumstance.

Let's look a little bit further at the impact on Western Australia, and the independent panel that Minister Murray Watt introduced. He first announced in a Sky News interview in June 2022 that he would end live sheep exports but that it was justified on the basis of evidence. Well, as we've heard time and time again in the inquiry and also in this chamber, there is no evidence, because the evidence demonstrates that we have made significant improvements in how we deal with live animal exports. So he's not been able to point to any of the evidence, and in fact if anybody reads the West Australian today they will find—and, again, I won't go over the ground, because Senator Brockman very effectively went through that—that the Emanuel case, after several years, completely collapsed, because there was no credible evidence. So, what evidence is Minister Murray Watt talking about? We don't know.

But the independent panel on the phasing out of live sheep exports was appointed, as I said, by Minister Watt. He mentioned it in 2022, and he appointed the panel in March 2023. Now, this panel conducted consultations with stakeholders and received more than 4,100 submissions. The panel also received submissions from international live animal export trading partners. And together with feedback from public consultations that were conducted throughout rural Western Australia, these submissions make it absolutely clear that ending this trade will hurt not only farmers but the entire ecosystem that supports them. It will certainly also damage our international reputation, because we have the reputation as the best supplier of clean, green sheepmeat that is humanely farmed, transported and exported according to Australia's now incredibly stringent animal welfare requirements. The value of this trade has recently been assessed as $143 million, and it supports, as we've heard, about 3,500 regional jobs, the majority of which are in Western Australia.

There are also other pressures currently on the industry. The shortage of labour in abattoirs, coupled with the Qatar Airways decision made by the Labor government, means there is very little capacity for the over half a million sheep that will no longer be exported after this ban takes effect. It's also worth noting that the types of sheep ordered for the Middle East market are lighter in body condition and older than is the preference for the Australian domestic market. So what is going to happen to over half a million sheep?

Since the panel was formed in March 2023, WA farmer confidence has plummeted and sheep prices have scandalously dropped, to $1 to $2 per head, per sheep. This time last year, they were worth between $150 and $180 a head. Recently a WA farmer advertised 600 sheep to give away for free, and he's now facing the prospect of having to shoot the remainder of his sheep. Fortunately, the live sheep trade has just resumed after the summer moratorium, with over 100,000 sheep already shipped from Fremantle port, somewhat relieving the current glut that is predicted to create an on-farm feed shortage later this summer.

While both Ministers Watt and Farrell maintain the live sheep export phase-out will not affect the cattle trade, if anybody here believes that is true, they are dreaming. What the ministers haven't acknowledged publicly is that some Middle East markets receive their cattle in co-shipments with sheep. For example, on the day the conflict broke out in Israel, 5,000 cattle and 3,000 sheep arrived from Fremantle to Israel. Prior to this year's northern summer moratorium, 4 out of 11 vessels had sheep and cattle on board shipments out of Fremantle.

While the opposition will not be opposing this bill, I think the context and the scandal of what this government has done should be yet another stain on those opposite. Somewhat humorously, Senator McGrath stood up just before question time to talk about all of the Labor government's achievements, and he couldn't think of a single one. Sadly, in just 18 months, the list of things the government has got wrong—turning the nation's economy backwards very quickly, releasing violent offenders out into our streets—goes on and on and on. Sadly for Western Australia's farmers, for our economy, for food security and for protein deficits to be filled, this will go down as another completely outrageous, unnecessary and punitive acquiescence to the animal welfare groups, who are incredibly selfish, who lie, and who do not care one jot about the impact they have on food security elsewhere. They certainly do not care as we on this side do, particularly my WA colleagues, about the families and lives that they are ruining. All I can say is shame on you.