Scott Buchholz (Wright, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Once again, Beaudesert, situated in the heart of the Scenic Rim, is putting its case forward to be known from this time on as the thoroughbred capital of Australia. It is doing an enormous job in backgrounding thoroughbreds for the industry. It is strategically placed exactly halfway between the Cairns and Melbourne thoroughbred industries, which puts Beaudesert at the central part of the industry. Of course, we compete for that title against Scone, but more recently we have been doing some stuff that Scone is not.

I want to give my acknowledgement and congratulations to Peter Gray and Rod Richardson. Both of them have been thoroughbred and racing owners and trainers for over 20 years. More recently, these guys have chartered a 747, decked it out—custom fit—with 80 stalls, and sold 79 horses in one sale to Vietnam the other day, leading the edge in the Australian thoroughbred industry. The care and attention that these horses are shown during transport is leading edge. I think it was said that there was only one other plane, which is owned by some of the families out of the United Arab Emirates, that was better decked out than this plane. Congratulations to our trainers who are out leading the world edge. Scenic Rim should be known from this point on as the thoroughbred capital of Australia.