House debates Questions without Notice
Invasive Species Management: Red Imported Fire Ants
Julie Collins Franklin, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry
3:19 pm
I can assure the member for New England that we are taking this very seriously as a government, and we're working very closely with the New South Wales department and government in relation to this detection. We are undertaking further surveillance, tracing and baiting, and the testing to date has shown that these ants are not related. The genetic analysis confirms that this is not from South-East Queensland, which is, of course, as the member for New England would know, the only active infestation of fire ants in Australia. So this has clearly come in from elsewhere, and we're doing the tracing, the surveillance and the baiting. At this stage, I can confirm there's no evidence of any spread beyond the site.
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