Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

Well, Assistant Minister, seriously, I live it. I breathe it. I have these people come into my office all the time. I'm not sure how many of them come into your Melbourne office and talk to you about the pitfalls and the shortcomings of what Labor did when they made those changes to the PALM scheme.

I know I was right, because I was the shadow Pacific minister at the time.

Labor then put a pause on it and changed the rules. They did. They backtracked. You can't tell me they didn't, because they did. Labor then went back to the scheme as it was to begin with, because the farmers were leaving it in droves and so were the PALM workers. You know what was happening? The fruit was being left to rot on the ground. The work wasn't being done.

You can throw your head back all you like, Assistant Minister, and make out as if I'm off on the wrong tangent. I am not, because I had that lived experience. I'm there at the front and centre of what the Pacific Australia Labour Mobility scheme is, because the Riverina lives it. We have those workers, we enjoy those workers and we applaud those workers. You cannot come in here, Assistant Minister, and tell me that the changes to that PALM scheme weren't wrong, because they were.

The Minister for Pacific Island Affairs backtracked and backflipped—the member for Shortland—because he knew that he'd got it wrong. He'd listened to Minister Burke and he knew that it was wrong, because the scheme started to fall apart. Don't try and tell me anything else, because I know. It's our farming areas that grow the food, grow the fibre and employ the PALM workers, who benefit from that scheme. They were being dudded by the changes by this Labor government, and that is true.

Now, let's talk about this legislation, shall we? Many businesses in the Riverina, as I said, rely on the migrant workers. It's a regional area that welcomes these—I don't know why you're shaking your head, Assistant Minister. I've said everything that was true, and with the PALM scheme—

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