Darren Chester (Gippsland, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise on behalf of 100,000 Landcare volunteers throughout Australia to ask a few simple questions of the Prime Minister and the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry. On Tuesday night the Treasurer announced an $11 million cut in spending on Landcare, as part of an $80 million cut to the Caring for our Country program. The first question is: why? Why does this government, which pretends to care about the environment, target the people who actually get out on the ground and undertake practical environmental work? Unlike the bureaucrats in Canberra and the ministers who back this decision, these volunteers are the people who are actually on the ground, getting their hands dirty and getting the job done. These are the practical environmentalists of our nation. They are out there doing revegetation work, erosion control and removal of weeds and assisting in pest animal control. The list of works they undertake is endless.

Cutting Landcare funding by $11 million is a kick in the guts to every volunteer who has given up a Sunday morning to plant trees, to remove weeds or to otherwise make a difference to the environment in their local community. Why was Landcare targeted when the same budget announced a $15 million climate change advertising campaign as part of more than $120 million for government advertising this year? It is so typical of the Prime Minister and this government: all talk and no action. They would rather run a propaganda campaign talking about the environment than support the practical and direct environmental action undertaken by our Landcare volunteers.

It is with a sense of enormous frustration that I make my comments here today. Landcare is an organisation that has enjoyed bipartisan support across its 20 years of history. It is an Australian icon, the envy of many nations throughout the world. It is an organisation that has stood the test of time. Landcare volunteers want to know if the current minister even tried to protect them from these budget cuts. Did he even put up a fight? Did he kick down the doors to the Treasurer’s office and demand a fair go for Landcare? Somehow I doubt it. Just as the Prime Minister is too gutless to govern, just as the Prime Minister runs away from a political fight and sends out junior ministers to announce any bad news, the minister for agriculture has form when it comes to Landcare. He has allowed the number of professional facilitator positions across the country to be slashed and now he has allowed an $11 million budget cut this financial year. The volunteers, like me, are frustrated. But they are also angry and disappointed.

The National Chair of Landcare, David Walker, has publicly criticised the decision and there will be many more critics to come—including people like Robert Belcher. Robert Belcher has chaired the Snowy River Interstate Landcare group in Victoria for 20 years. He told ABC Rural this week:

This is a continuation of the slide downwards and the money flow going through the natural resource sector is being cut and I agree with the NFF … we are poised and involved with stewardship type programs to try and encourage more sustainable farming exercises given the necessity to produce food now and into the future …

But the Rudd government doesn’t really understand rural communities and don’t think it understands the Landcare network and how powerful that can be.

That is the crux of this issue. This government does not understand regional communities. It does not understand Landcare. It would rather run advertising propaganda campaigns than support practical environmental action. I urge the 100,000 Landcare volunteers and the 4½ thousand Landcare groups to swamp their local newspapers with letters to the editor, to call talkback radio, to write to their local Labor MP and to send this government a message that they are sick of being taken for granted. (Time expired)