Perin Davey (NSW, National Party, Shadow Minister for Water) Share this | Hansard source

I could spend my whole time just rebutting one senator's contribution, but I actually want to rebut the whole way Labor treated this issue during question time today. This government has today cemented its antifarming agenda. After the PM's performance at the Minerals Council last night, where he walked into a room full of miners and talked about how good transitioning and battery power would be, you can tell this government doesn't listen to the industries that keep this country going.

In reply to my first question about their anti-ag policies—about the biosecurity tax, ute tax and truckies tax—we got platitudes about how Labor care for all Australians. Well, if they care for all Australians, what about the Australians who are paying 12 per cent more on their grocery bills? They're also paying more on all of the input costs that contribute to those grocery bills. That's gas, which is up 33 per cent; that's electricity, which is up 14 per cent; and that's insurance, which is up 17 per cent. Not only are they contributing to higher grocery bills; every single Australian is facing those higher costs at home as well.

Then, when I asked why they're focusing on water buybacks rather than addressing the real environmental degradation, such as carp, I was instructed to rephrase because 'water isn't in agriculture'. Seriously? We all know that agriculture is highly dependent on water, be it through irrigation or through rainfall and climate conditions. But I rephrased. I asked why they continue to take water out of irrigated agriculture, harming our irrigation communities, because this government continues to ignore even research from the likes of the University of Adelaide, who just recently reported that negative whole-of-icon site scores for the Coorong and Lower Lakes were not only lower this year than in January-February 2022 but also at their lowest recorded health since the end of the millennium drought and the commencement of the Basin Plan. Think about that.

This government ignores the fact that irrigated agriculture is now extracting less than a third of the flows in the Murray-Darling Basin, less than the scientists decreed would be sustainable diversion limits, but this government still goes out with a chequebook to rip water out of productive agricultural use. The minister today didn't even try to address the issues of Tasmanian pea farmers or fruitgrowers around Shepparton, who have had all their contracts cut because the big supermarkets find that it is cheaper to import than to buy Australian grown produce.

So, while Senator Sterle still stands up and talks about our great agricultural export statistics, they've got to realise that our agricultural exports are growing in spite of this government, not because of this government. Senator Sterle had the hide to discuss forestry exports. That's coming from a Labor government when Labor is closing native forestry across Australia. In Victoria, they've shut native forestry. In Western Australia, they've shut native forestry. This government has to stop ignoring the facts—that its policies are leading to a decline in Australian agricultural capacity to produce. With the Murray-Darling Basin Plan, we're seeing a decline in dairy and other irrigated commodities, and it continues on and on.

Question agreed to.