Jan McLucas (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Mental Health) Share this | Hansard source

Good, tell us about it. He said he spoke to the council and to others about the problems that Mornington Island experiences with illicit use of alcohol. The council had told him that people were using Vegemite to do that. He is quoted in inverted commas on the ABC website as saying:

I have seen first-hand the impact of home brewing which included Vegemite as an ingredient and many community members have told me about the problems it is causing.

So he went and Mornington Island and someone told him it was a problem but did he ask his department? Did he actually ask for any scientific evidence? He did not. Dr Claudia Vickers was asked by the ABC whether this was possible thing to do. She said:

It is not impossible, but it is highly, highly implausible.

She said:

There is nothing alive in the Vegemite that you can use to make beer with.

As you will remember from when we were children, it is yeast extract; it is not live yeast. It is highly implausible that it could occur.

Senator Scullion has a department. I would suggest to him that he starts to use the information that that department can find for him without just making up the story to fill in the time, frankly. (Time expired)