Nova Peris (NT, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I too rise to speak on the Food Standards Amendment (Fish Labelling) Bill 2015. Like my colleagues who have spoken earlier, I support the intent of this bill. I will tell you why: there is nothing better than eating Northern Territory seafood. I encourage everyone to travel to the Northern Territory to try our local Territorian barramundi and mud crab and all the other delights from our seas, rivers and pristine waters and our world-leading, clean aquaculture farms.

When people eat seafood anywhere in the Northern Territory, they know that the seafood they purchase is local or at least caught or produced in Australia. However, with the omission of country-of-origin labelling on menus, consumers can be misled, believing the seafood they purchase to have been locally produced. To counter this—it has been heard many times in the chamber today—the Northern Territory introduced legislation so that consumers in the Northern Territory know where the produce originates. However, such legislation does not exist in the rest of Australia.

The national adoption of this type of legislation is important for local jobs and because eating local produce is a key aspect of the whole seafood experience. It is also vital to our tourism industry. People in the industry know that tourists do not come to Northern Australia to eat barramundi farmed somewhere else in the world, such as an Asian port. I agree with the Northern Territory Seafood Council and local producers who are advocating on this issue and with whom I have recently met.

The Northern Territory Seafood Council actively seeks mandatory labelling of seafood to ensure the consumer is able to make a fully informed choice about the seafood that they purchase. They say that the omission of comprehensive labelling, including details of the country of origin of seafood, is misleading to the consumer. I totally agree with this. I believe Australian consumers are willing to pay more for quality Australian seafood. The general perception in the Australian community is that the seafood they buy is local, and the Northern Territory Seafood Council believes cheap imports are damaging the high-quality reputation of Australian seafood. I commend their work across sectors and there is no doubt that Australian seafood is an important asset—as I said previously and I will continue to repeat it—to our tourism industry.

We should be supporting our industry and the Australian Seafood industry cannot price compete against cheap imports from fisheries without assistance. Senator Whish-Wilson spoke about it earlier on: what we are asking for is red tape within this industry. Assistance can come in the form of closing those loopholes in country-of-origin labelling for cooked or precooked seafood sold by the food services sector. Consumers deserve to be informed about the origin of their seafood, especially when choosing from the menu at a restaurant and in the supermarket freezers and fridges.

It is a legal requirement that seafood sold to the Australian public must be clearly labelled with its country of origin. These regulations were introduced by the federal government to ensure the Australian consumer can be accurately informed about the origin of their seafood. However, as we have heard many times today, there has been an exemption for seafood sold as cooked or precooked seafood in the food services sector. The parliamentary inquiry into the current requirements of seafood labelling came up with one simple recommendation: implement country-of-origin labelling throughout the supply chain by removing an exemption that exists there already for seafood sold in restaurants. The recommendation from the inquiry—and I am sure you know this very well, Acting Deputy President Sterle—says:

The committee recommends that the exemption regarding country of origin labelling under Standard 1.2.11 of the Australia New Zealand Food Standards Code for cooked or pre-prepared seafood sold by the food services sector be removed, subject to a transition period of no more than 12 months.

The 12-month transition is to allow restaurants to change their menus.

I understand that some coalition members have been working against country-of-origin labelling, and I hope that their position will change through the course of this debate. Labor is ready to constructively consider the detail of the government's proposal and its implementation when it is released. However, at this stage, we are not holding our breath. We know that the agricultural white paper is still to be delivered and the seafood industry is therefore rightly concerned that this recommendation to remove the exemption for restaurant menus, like many other things under the Abbott government, may now be lost. I personally thank Senator Xenophon and the crossbench for their work in bringing this bill to the Senate. Labor thanks them for their work. I can assure you that I will continue to work to see the intent of this bill implemented, with amendment.

However, due to some serious technical concerns with the bill, we cannot support this bill in its current form. We have heard that several times throughout the debate today. Senator Williams did touch on that in his speech today. The bill cannot achieve its desired outcome because the parliament cannot direct Food Standards Australia New Zealand to amend the Food Standards Code. Only the Australia and New Zealand Food Regulation Ministerial Council has the authority to amend the Food Standards Code. However, this bill attempts to create the pathway for an amendment to the Food Standards Code to occur and that has been established by the intergovernmental agreement. It is almost certain that the states, whose support will be needed to approve the standard, will have an adverse response to this.

There is a lot of work to be done with the states and here in the ACT, but not with the Northern Territory. As I have outlined, we do not need to work on this because already have legislation to support our industry with clear food labelling that indicates the country of origin of the seafood. It promotes and endorses local produce. Labor supports the intent of this bill in principle, as I have already mentioned. We support the policy intent and we encourage any and all parties interested in seeing this amendment to the Food Standards Code to make an application through the process to Food Standards Australia New Zealand.

Labor has a strong record in this area. Senator Carr touched on it earlier. We have a vested interest in promoting the country-of-origin labelling. Industry would remember that in 2011 Neal Blewett delivered the Labelling logic report which provided comprehensive advice to government on food labelling. The report noted that:

… there are a few inexplicable primary product exceptions, and the Panel believes the loophole should be closed and that CoOL should be extended to cover all primary products for retail sale.

The report also recommended that Australia's existing mandatory country-of-origin labelling requirements for food be maintained and extended to cover all primary food products for retail sale.

The Labelling logic report has been Labor's blueprint for the reform of food labelling. Labor has already delivered on some of the key recommendations of this report, such as front-of-pack nutritional labelling. Labor has had a clear vision to improve food labelling for Australians. Therefore, we eagerly anticipate some strong actions to match the words of the Minister for Agriculture, who said:

Australian consumers have made it clear they want unambiguous and more consistent country of origin food labelling, so they can make more informed choices about the food they buy.

That was said by Minister Barnaby Joyce on 1 April 2015, but we are still waiting.

The Master Fish Merchants' Association of Australia have said:

The current exemption from country of origin labelling obligations for seafood which is sold for immediate consumption denies consumers access to adequate information on the origins of their food.

They also said it was inconsistent with the labelling obligations placed on fresh seafood retailers. Coles has said:

We believe all domestic and imported seafood sold in Australia should have CoOL to assist consumers make an informed choice about the origin of the seafood they purchase.

So, let me again touch on our leadership in this area in the Northern Territory. The food service industry in the Northern Territory has implemented a labelling scheme that requires the food service industry to appropriately label country of origin information. The Northern Territory system uses a license requirement to display 'imported' on imported fish. Our experience in the Northern Territory has demonstrated that the food service industry was initially resistant to the idea of displaying country of origin information on seafood sold for immediate consumption. But resistance soon dropped after implementation, as consumers were pleased with having the information they needed to make informed choices. That can only be a good thing.

Labor supports the intent of this bill, and we have heard the community demand for reform. Labor acknowledges that broad support for these measures has been demonstrated by consumer groups, the seafood industry and conservationists. We also acknowledge that some sections of the food service industry may have concerns about this measure. However, the parliament must balance the needs of the public for improved consumer information and the need for Australians to have confidence in the food safety and labelling system.

I am determined to ensure that our Northern Territory produce is able to be labelled when sold throughout Australia's restaurants. We need to find a bipartisan or multipartisan solution on this issue that is vitally important to Australian consumers and producers. If the government is serious about improving Australia's country of origin labelling, a good first step would be to address the recommendations of the bipartisan or multipartisan report of the Senate inquiry—which I think you, Mr Acting Deputy President Sterle, spearheaded—into this issue. The report has been with the government, as I understand it, since October of last year. I think we all need to listen to the industry, listen to the consumers and listen to Australians—my constituents. They are screaming out for people to come and visit the Northern Territory to see where this produce goes, from farming right through to the plates of the top-class restaurants.

This year I have met with many stakeholders in the Northern Territory, including, as I mentioned, the CEO of the Northern Territory Seafood Council, Ms Katherine Winchester, and a local barra farmer, Mr Dan Richards, who is a proud fifth-generation Territorian. I visited Dan's farm, the Humpty Doo barramundi farm, earlier this year. It started 22 years ago from the humblest of beginnings. He had no infrastructure and little knowledge. However, he had a grand vision of what may be possible. The Humpty Doo barra farm has been an Australian iconic story, an example of why we should be supporting the local industry. In the early days of Humpty Doo Barramundi it was just pure tenacity, resilience and the dream that allowed the operation to survive the endless disappointments that a steep learning curve can bring. There was certainly no money and there were lots of expensive lessons to be learned. The owner and operator, Bob Richards, worked with a small group of volunteer family and friends, and he would go back to the drawing board after each failure and learn how to pull the business through the next step in its development. In 2002 Bob was awarded a Churchill Fellowship to travel around the world and learn from the top aquaculture operations about the sort of knowledge and systems that could be used to produce quality seafood. Bob brought these ideas back to Australia, shared them with the Australian industry and applied them to his own business. Thus the Humpty Doo barramundi farm was transformed.

Humpty Doo Barramundi has grown by an average of 30 per cent per year since 2000. It now employs over 20 people and sells fish into the fine dining and retail trade around the country. It has become the largest single producer of barramundi in Australia, this year producing well over a million kilograms of fresh barramundi for the Australian consumer. And it has the capacity to grow to be many times this size and employ many more Australians. As a regional business it employs a number of Aboriginal people and is actively striving to increase this as a partner through the Indigenous Future Stars program. The Humpty Doo barramundi farm is just one example of what it is possible for Australian business to achieve when there is a strong market for our quality produce. Across Australia, aquaculture operations like Humpty Doo Barramundi have the potential to grow in scale, creating many jobs across the country.

I would just like to tell a story. I took my son, all of 11 years old, there, with his mate—they had just won the footy finals. I said, 'Come on, son; we're going out to the Humpty Doo barra farm.' He said: 'Why are we going there, Mum? We can go to the shop and buy barramundi.' So, I wanted to show him where the produce began. It takes 24 months to nurture from larvae, which they farm—24 months to get it to your plate. You have the Adelaide River, which pumps the water in to the hatchlings, and from there it goes from pond to pond to pond. And the technology behind it is just absolutely incredible. If there is a small failure, whatever it may be, within 30 seconds alarms go off to alert the farm owners that something has gone wrong, which happens very few times. It is such an incredible way of farming local produce from the very beginning, and we can actually see how it gets to the restaurant plates. My son was so impressed. He is not a big fan of raw fish, but he caught his barramundi at the farm and took it to Dan and everything was set up and we had sashimi—fresh barramundi. There is nothing better than knowing the whole chain of the story, from the humblest beginnings to the restaurant plate—the fresh sashimi we had out at the barra farm. This is the way we can tell customers. What they are doing is competing against world prices, which is not good for local produce. We can put an end to that, and I think you said in your speech, Mr Acting Deputy President Sterle, that we need to have the political will to change this, and all governments should come together to make a difference, to support the local industry, to enable them to achieve to their fullest potential.

So I believe, with the appropriate legislative support allowing consumers to differentiate between Australian and imported products—which I just touched on—our high-quality domestic production has the potential to replace and displace a high percentage of our imports, but we can only do that if it starts here, in this place. This will create many Australian jobs.

For several years in the NT, all fresh fish sold in delicatessens or supermarkets, as I said before, have required labels to let consumers know where the product is from. This law has increased sales of Australian seafood. In fact, we are seeing more Australian seafood in NT supermarkets today than we did prior to 2006, when there were no country-of-origin labelling laws. The Northern Territory industry view is that country-of-origin labelling throughout Australia will result in increased sales of Aussie seafood in our supermarkets, like it has back home in the Northern Territory, and it will also increase sales of local and Australian fish in our restaurants. I believe Australian consumers are prepared to pay that little bit more to get quality local seafood and to support the local industry, and I genuinely believe that that can happen in this country. I have heard many times, 'There's no substitute for quality.'

After months of inaction by the government, Labor wait with interest the details of their plan, following their announcement of proposed changes to country-of-origin labelling. Unfortunately, we cannot support the Xenophon bill at this time, but we do support the principle. We need to find a bipartisan if not multipartisan solution on this issue—an issue that is vitally important to Australian consumers and producers. As always, Labor stand ready to constructively consider any positive policy proposals from the government. Hopefully, they can show the same leadership that we have shown in the Northern Territory.