Warren Snowdon (Lingiari, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for External Territories) Share this | Hansard source

Can I firstly thank the member for Berowra for his chairing of this committee and his engagement with us on the committee process. I thank the committee secretariat, who are in the audience, for their wonderful work. I do want to pay particular attention to my two Labor Party colleagues who were on the committee: the member for Newcastle, Ms Claydon; and the member for Werriwa, Ms Stanley. They are a constant source of advice, support and companionship. I am sure the Chair would agree that we've worked very collaboratively on this inquiry. It's a tribute to him and the way he's chaired it that we're able to do it in a such a productive way, so thank you very much to Mr Leeser.

The Chair has gone through the reasons why this committee was set up and has given some history of the events of this year—COVID and what happened as a direct result. I will concentrate for a brief little while on some of the recommendations, but before doing that I want to thank the witnesses. There are many who were frustrated because we couldn't go and talk to them. That's sad. We would've liked to have visited some of the remote stores which we were hearing stories of, but we were unable to because of COVID and the restrictions around travel. Nevertheless, we did have an interaction and we were able to produce, I think, a timely and very good product in terms of this report and its recommendations. This report provides a way forward around the issues to do with food security and pricing, store management and licensing and oversight. If you look at the recommendations as a whole, they are comprehensive but they actually provide a substantive means by which we can change things. That to me is what's most important, and I hope the government looks at the recommendations sympathetically and that we get a response in a timely fashion so we can get some work done and some changes made in these remote places.

What is readily apparent to those of us who've got any understanding of the bush is that remote communities suffer in terms of access to fresh fruit and vegetables, food security generally and the pricing of goods. This is because of the isolation, remoteness, community size and a whole range of factors which mitigate against them having the same opportunities that you would have going to a local IGA here in Canberra or, indeed, in Alice Springs. What we did see was that there are some real benefits for those stores that are a part of a network like the Arnhem Land Progress Aboriginal Corporation or Outback Stores. The differences the networks can make in terms of procurement, logistics and supply chains make a substantial difference in the way the stores can ensure food security in many remote places. That's not the case for small independent stores who suffer because of their lack of purchasing power, their isolation, lack of logistic support and the supply chain networks that exist in these other organisations. What we did see as a result of this inquiry is that there is a need for more competition in the wholesale market. We looked at some possible ways of dealing with that, and they're addressed in the report.

The issue of rebates was a significant point of discussion during the course of the inquiry. The committee was of the view that there needed to be far more transparency around rebates and a lot more information given to communities about the way in which rebates work and how they are utilised. There were significant recommendations in the report around the whole notion of food security. The committee recommends that the Australian government, in partnership with the states and territories and First Nations people, develop a strategy for food security and nutrition for remote First Nations communities. There used to be such, and it's now important we develop a new one. Given the agreements that have been made at a national cabinet level, I see no reason why that shouldn't happen quickly.

The chairman mentioned the COVID food security working group. Recommendation 11 in the report goes to the issues we learnt from that food security working group, including identifying improvements to logistics, assessing the viability of warehousing greater volumes of food and groceries in the more remote communities of the supply chain, and a range of other issues. When we contemplate the whole of this report, there's a great deal of benefit in it, and I do commend it to members of the parliament and to the government, most particularly. I hope they give us a timely and well-rounded response supporting the recommendations.

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