Dan Tehan (Wannon, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise tonight to speak on behalf of all dairy farmers across Australia, but dairy farmers in south-west Victoria in particular. I call on the Gillard government to understand their plight and to act to try to help dairy farmers in this difficult time they are going through. They are dealing with adverse weather impacts. We in south-west Victoria have not had rain for four months. As we head towards the end of March, dairy farmers are now having to sustain continual grain bills, which are making it harder and harder for them. They are dealing with a dollar that continues to remain high. They are dealing with the fact that this government has had the four largest budget deficits in Australia's history, which continually put upward pressure on interest rates, because they do not allow the Reserve Bank the freedom to move interest rates lower, compared with international rates—the US, the EU and Japan all have interest rates below one per cent.

There is the carbon tax. The average dairy farmer is being hit by the carbon tax, on-farm, anywhere between $5,000 to $10,000. Then there are dairy processors in the Murray-Goulburn—$14 million per annum is their carbon tax bill. And what of their competitors in the EU? Dairy processors in the EU get 93 per cent carbon credits for what they process. We will be competing with them in a carbon market. If we cannot get rid of this Gillard government our dairy farmers will be in an even worse situation.

And what about market access? This government could move now to help get access to the Japanese market, our largest market for dairy exports. What do they need to do? They need to drop this silly approach to investor-state relations. If they could fix this investor-state dispute resolution mechanism and get rid of this blanket call that they will not allow it in any free-trade agreement, the Japanese government could move on a free-trade agreement. They should be asking the Japanese Prime Minister to visit and they should be saying, 'We are serious about negotiating. If you will move on agriculture and allow us to get access for our dairy products, we will look at the investor-state resolution.'

I am glad that the Attorney-General is in the chamber tonight, because he is one of the orchestrators of the carbon tax. I say to him once again: given the current crisis in the dairy industry, have another look at your policy. Do something for those dairy farmers. Their plight is getting worse and worse. If they do not get rain, we are going to see a continually growing problem. You can give them immediate respite if you drop the carbon tax now. That will put at least $7,000, $8,000, $9,000 or $10,000 immediately back in their pockets and it will not mean that processors are passing on the costs that they have been hit by as well. Please, look at that policy.

There are other things that this government can do. It can drop its approach to regulating everything. It can make it easier for these farmers to be able to get on and do what they do well. It can look at its workplace relations policy. Dairy farmers used to be able to get someone in to help them to have some respite from the twice a day, seven days a week milking. Previously they were able to get a worker in for an hour and a half, but, under the re-regulation of the workforce, they now have to get them in for three hours. That means, if you want relief on a Saturday from your milking, you have to employ someone for six hours when you only want them to do three hours' work. They know that it is not fair if they have to do that. The government should know that that is not fair. That is something, once again, which can be changed quickly.

I call on the government to be empathetic. I call on them to listen. I call on them to understand what dairy farmers are going through at the moment. It is tough enough with the competition that is occurring between the supermarkets, with what that is doing in the liquid drinking milk area. There is also difficulty when it comes to competing because the government continue to put business cost upon business cost upon business regulation on our dairy farmers. It has to stop. They have to change what they are doing to this important industry to our country.