Barnaby Joyce (New England, National Party, Minister for Agriculture) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you very much for the opportunity to speak on the Farm Household Support (Consequential and Transitional Provisions) Bill 2014. This becomes the second iteration of a drought policy. I took the first part through the cabinet and the parliament at the end of last year. That allowed the movement of tens of millions of dollars into drought affected areas and also allocated $10 million towards water infrastructure. At that point, we hoped and prayed that we would get rain and the issues would be alleviated. Of course, that was not the case. This brought us to the position where we had the second iteration, of which this is a crucial part.

Prior to this, we had the transitional farm family payment. The trouble with that transitional farm family payment was that it was not accessible to enough people to deal with their financial trauma. In many instances we had people who had no access to money whatsoever, none. They were actually ruled out from having access to social security by reason of the asset test. When the asset test comes to a position of $1.5 million and you have a property worth $3 million, which is not unusual nowadays, with debts of $1 million without any real desire for the bank to go any further than that—they actually were outside the assets test. What does this mean? The differentiation for them is that we had houses with no money going into them at all. They did not get Newstart; they were not allowed to get Newstart. They had no access to income from the farm because they were in drought. They could not just close the gate and walk out the door because you are actually bound by law for the maintenance of your stock and other vital components of the farm.

No matter which side of the chamber you are on and who you are, there is something inside you that says something has to happen, that this is not right; that our fellow Australians and fellow Australian families should not be put in this sort of condition. When you get to an area you can see that sort of pall of depression and darkness that falls over people as they say: 'Well I cannot see a way out. I cannot even clean up the accounts in town. I cannot go to town because I am a bad debt. If I go to town, how do I pay for my fuel? How do I clear the chemist account? How do I deal with all these other things about which people say, 'That doesn't happen in Australia'. Well it does. There is no more vital sign of misery in our nation that we refuse to see than rural misery, where people live in a diminished condition. Not only that, these people live in a diminished condition miles away from the benevolence of the government that is apparent in the multiple hospitals and schools that you would see in larger urban settings.

I said that at the start because it is very important that people clearly identify the difference between doing it tough in the country and doing it tough in other parts. I am not saying for one moment that there are not people in the western suburbs of the major cities, or in other areas, who are doing it tough as well. This is a particularly cruel form where not only are you without your regular income stream, which is tenuous on many occasions by reason of the fact that is it is related to the vagaries of the weather, but also you are taken away from any social security settings. It is vitally important that we immediately change this.

I commend the support of the coalition and the Prime Minister and the support of the opposition in saying that, on this occasion, people on either side of the political divide are not going to let this human misery continue. So what this legislation allows people to take the limit from 1.5 to 2.55 million and their house is exempt as well. Exempting your house, your primary domicile, probably gets you close to a $3 million net asset limit. If you go away contract harvesting, if you go away working on the road or if you go doing some work in one of the mines, it allows you to earn up to $80,000, provided that your interest bill is bigger than that because we know that, when the money turns up, the banks will just hoover it up and send it straight off to fix them up. At least, it allows you some sort of mechanism to earn some external income. This allows off-farm assets for a couple, for partners, of about $280,000 as well. All in all, it is a good outcome.

I have had some people say it was rushed. The member for Moreton said it was rushed. It was not actually. He should be aware of his own government's position. The first time we started reviewing this was in 2008. On this issue, we are bringing forward and adjusting the settings, but the overall scheme is something that we have been looking at for some time. It is part of a process of dealing with the issues of drought into the future. We will have other settings in other parts, to which we wish to ensure people will get access. We will make sure that people will get access to $280 million at four per cent, or a million dollars or 50 per cent of the facility, whichever is the lesser, so that people can have access to money. It is not part of these bills but, in similar settings, is part of the drought package. That gives people access to money to replant, to restock, to try to get cash flows moving again.

I will be happy to say the interim farm household allowance is currently working under executive orders. What we are talking about is the settings as of 1 July. I suppose people are wondering, if we are talking about this legislation now, how on earth are people are getting access to it? It is happening under executive orders. I want to remind people that we already have about 83 claims that are true. So 83 families now have access to this scheme, which is uncapped. Whoever is out there in need and is listening, this scheme is uncapped. You will get access to it if you fit the criteria. We are seeing right now that people are doing precisely that—they are fitting the criteria. Before with the interim farm family payment, when I went to some towns only one person in the whole town it. It was not really ticking the box.

We have also had some other discussions. With the greatest respect, there was one where the member for Hunter asked for clarification about the costs associated with the farm household allowance and the $99.4 million that was agreed to by the Labor government in 20013-14 as the cost of the allowance over the forward estimates. This included $37.3 million for the Department of Human Services to administer the allowance. Of this 30 million was set aside in 2013-14 to build a dedicated IT system to support the payment and for case management of the allowance. Again, this was the setting put in place by the former Labor government. The member for Hotham brought up that her husband's family was associated with the dairy industry and noted that the scoping meetings—they are not happening any more—would bring an end to civilisation as we know it. We will still have as required—

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