Nola Marino (Forrest, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Education) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I want to urge the government to take foot-and-mouth disease very seriously, especially here during question time, which we haven't seen them do. At the dairy conference I was at recently and post that meeting, the concern was palpable. In fact, it was far worse than that. Every farmer knows how serious this is. Every livestock transporter, abattoir or regional small business knows how serious this is. Yes, the government does need to do more to invest in Indonesia to try to keep this disease out of Australia—to keep the virus out. Be a good neighbour and fully resource the efforts, all of the efforts, in Indonesia. That is the best way forward.

We need to see every passenger and piece of luggage screened. Everyone returning is a potential risk. Taking only a risk based approach to this is not enough, because foot-and-mouth disease is such a significant risk. It's one of the greatest challenges we face. Relying on an incoming passenger's card as to whether they've been on a farm or are bringing meat—they don't always tell the truth, and we saw that in Darwin today—is simply not enough. The government has to take this extremely seriously and insist on actually screening every passenger coming back into Australia. We don't know how many passengers have actually been screened. There have been thousands coming back to Australia.

We know that one positive test, as we heard in a briefing, will stop all meat exports around Australia for at least two years. Just one positive test would mean at least two years. We know that 70 per cent of Australia's livestock production is exported and 90 per cent of Western Australia's livestock production is exported.

As I did earlier on, I want to make this more real for anybody who's watching it. People in this place know that I am part of a dairy farming family, in Harvey in Western Australia. I want to talk about what this would mean to our dairy farming business. On the advice of the Chief Veterinary Officer, a regional veterinary officer could come and test if there was a suspicion of foot-and-mouth disease on our property. One positive is all it would take. There'd be no milk pick-up. There'd be nothing and no-one moving in or out of that property, and those beautiful cows that we've spent 50-plus years breeding to wonderful pedigree bulls, those beautiful cows that are so much a part of our lives, would be shot and burned or buried—every animal on the property and potentially other associated properties.

There'd be a three-kilometre radius around our property for testing, and if any future tests proved positive that perimeter would move out further and further and affect more and more farmers and more and more of our community. There would be culls at each one of those places—every one of those animals—and there would be no animals on our farm until the regional veterinary officer said so, and that would be at least two years. Look at all the effects on local businesses in our patch, in our part of the world and right around Australia if that happens. And if it gets into the feral pig population and other feral animals, good luck in trying to control it! We are so concerned about this.

As I said earlier, as well, I just looked simply throughout my own area. Who would be affected? Besides the immediate—dairy farms, not having a business, and the farms and beef—Harvey Fresh's milk and dairy products would mean no movement there and no processing there. Harvey Beef—no exports. Harvey Water, which supplies irrigation; our local LP & JA Fryer, who supply to farmers; Milne Feeds, with feed; livestock agencies; Peter's Factory down the road in Brunswick; V&V Walsh abattoirs; Dardanup butchers; and livestock transporters would stop immediately, as would fuel companies and supermarkets. This will have an effect on the whole region.

I am urging the government: do everything you can. Throw everything you need to at this, particularly starting in Indonesia. And please encourage every passenger—we need every passenger to be screened and tested. They need good information: 'This is the risk we face. Please bear with us.' It's not okay just to take a risk based approach to identifying people; every individual is a potential risk coming back into Australia, and we need to apply the utmost rigour to the screening as we do to the mail coming in, and we need to stop any— (Time expired)