Andrew Wallace (Fisher, Liberal National Party, Shadow Cabinet Secretary) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the important matter of agriculture. People often may see the seat of Fisher for its glorious Sunshine Coast beaches, but they don't actually go west of the highway. But you don't even have to go west of the highway; we have some fantastic agricultural businesses operating in my seat of Fisher, including one of the largest eastern seaboard fisheries, operating out of the Mooloolaba harbour, in prawns and tuna. I want to send a shout-out to Heidi and Pavo Walker of Walker Seafoods, who are fantastic local businesspeople in my electorate. They are a sustainable fishery and they do a great job, so a shout-out to all of them and to all the people that work on our wharves at Mooloolaba.

I also want to take the opportunity to welcome my friends from the Queensland parliament that are here today. I think they're here to learn all about the Federation Chamber, so I'm hoping that they're acting like sponges and taking in all of this wisdom that they're no doubt hearing. I want to send a shout-out to my good friend in particular, the member for Glass House, Andrew Powell, who's doing a great job as the state's new tourism and environment minister.

It's a good segue when we're talking about agriculture, because all people see in the federal seat of Fisher are the beaches, as beautiful as they are, but the seat of Fisher is still classified by the Australian Electoral Commission as a rural seat. Some of my rural colleagues and my state colleagues might have a bit of a chuckle about that, but the seat of Fisher still holds very important agricultural industries in the farming of pineapples, bananas, strawberries of course; so many different industries that are the lifeblood of Australia. The Sunshine Coast could very well be the fruit bowl and the food bowl of our country.

The challenge that we face, of course, is that our real estate prices are so high that it is very difficult to make a go of farming on the Sunshine Coast on a broad scale. But if you go to any farmers market on a Saturday or Sunday morning, you will see so many small farmers and boutique businesses that are selling their wares. It is a great privilege to be the member for Fisher because, while agriculture is a smaller part of what we do in Fisher, it is a very important part.

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