Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Hansard source

in reply—First of all I thank everybody who has participated in the debate on the Rural Adjustment Amendment Bill 2009. The amendment in this legislation involves only half a dozen words, but it has provided an opportunity for broad-ranging debate, and I certainly welcome that. Some people have used the debate only in part to give me a whack back for the different things I have said during question time—and good on them, that is part of the banter back and forth. Overwhelmingly, this debate has been an opportunity for people to put on the record the extraordinary levels of hardship they have seen and to deal with the policy challenges. We all acknowledge that we have not got this right yet. The emotion that has come out in some of the speeches—and I was not able to be in here for many of the speeches today—

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