Richard Colbeck (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

by leave—I move:

That the Senate take note of the government response to the Senate Rural Affairs and Transport References Committee inquiry's report Science underpinning the inability to eradicate the Asian honey bee.

This is a very sad and ongoing saga and it is something that the Senate Rural Affairs and Transport References Committee spent a considerable amount of time on, working very hard to try to get to the bottom of the process behind the decision that the Asian honey bee could not be eradicated from where it has established itself in an area around Cairns. It is reasonable to suggest that members of the committee still have considerable concerns about the process, the way it was managed and the way the decision was made. Unfortunately, events since then do not change the view of many of us who have followed this issue closely.

We do acknowledge, though, that following the hearings that were held and the concerns that were expressed by the committee, the government provided $2 million to support a national pilot program to facilitate management of the Asian bee. But, again, the processes that the government undertook and the way that this issue has been managed have continued to raise concerns. As part of the process, and as part of the funding for this $2 million that was allocated by the government towards the study of the Asian bee, the government was supposed to provide a document to support a national pilot program—a plan—put into place by June.

We hear that just this morning—months, obviously, after the target date of June—members of the industry have been offered and provided with a copy of that plan. This continues the process that we saw during the decision-making discussion around whether or not the Asian bee might be eradicable. The farce continues. During the management of a key meeting in January on whether or not the bee might be eradicable, one of the pre-eminent scientists in this country had his name disappear off the email list, so he was not available to speak and advise the industry at the meeting. We hear now that, through the development of this plan which is five months late, scientists sitting around the panel are only allowed to speak if they are asked a direct question. They are not allowed to have general input. The process has been held confidential to three members of the industry.

It is a great way to manage dissent—that only three members of the industry who are on the panel developing the plan are able to have access to the information. There has been no effective consultation with the industry, no capacity for the development of the plan to be canvassed broadly within the beekeeping and honey industry in Australia. Three people have been allowed to be part of the process. The scientists sitting on the panel are allowed to comment only if they are asked a direct question. The complete farce that is this process continues. Further, we have a number of members of the beekeeping community, about 50 volunteers, working in and around Cairns on the potential eradication of the bee. One of the key assumptions made as part of the process was that the bees would move into the dense rainforest in and around Cairns and that it would be very hard to find them. That was one of the key elements in the decision-making process as put to us, as senators on the Senate inquiry, by departmental representatives. So dense forest was an issue for the potential eradication of the bee.

The observations coming out of that region now are that the bees are in fact not taking up residence in the dense rainforest. There is no food for them in the rainforest, so they might be going in but they are coming back out. One of the criticisms committee members had of this process during the inquiry was that at a critical point for the decision-making process the funding ran out, even though a decision had been made to collect more data. The fact that funding was not available meant that the data was not collected. Now the volunteer beekeepers operating around Cairns are finding a contradiction to what was the accepted wisdom at the time—that the bees would establish in the rainforest. They are telling us that the bees are not establishing in the rainforest, so the reality of the decision made earlier this year may be very different.

I know that Senator Milne has also been quite concerned about ensuring that this process continues. We acknowledge that the government put additional money on the table and we appreciate that. Let us not criticise the fact that there has been a positive move made in that area. But then the report on how to manage the process was five months late, continuing the complete debacle which has been the process right from the outset—when a key member of the committee did not attend a meeting because their email address had slipped off the invitation list. I do not know whether you call it being accident prone, careless or incompetent. I really do not know how to describe this.

Then we saw in the development of a management plan that only three people have been allowed to be part of the process. The key scientists, the people who really understand the Asian honey bee and its characteristics, who might have known what to do, were sitting around the table and could speak only when they were directly asked a question. This process has been so intensely controlled to manage against dissent or discussion that it is just absolutely absurd. For the government to control and restrict it to three people and not allow effective discussion throughout the rest of the industry is completely outrageous.

We appreciate that the government has accepted a number of our recommendations—they have stepped away from a couple of elements of what we asked them to do—but the practical processes they have undertaken right throughout the incursion of Asian bees into Australia really has been a comedy of errors. We questioned the decision that the bee was not eradicable and we questioned it based on advice from scientists who said there was not enough data to properly make that decision. We questioned the fact that the scientists were allowed to sit around the table but not be part of the discussion and that the key scientist was not at the meeting where the decision was made.

It now appears, through observations being made by beekeepers and the volunteers who have taken it upon themselves to continue the work in and around Cairns—and we know that is by the agreement of the government—that their observations are indicating that the bees still may be eradicable. Yet the government persists with the line that it does not believe this bee can be eradicated even though the basic premise we saw during the inquiry was that there was not enough information to make that decision. While I acknowledge the tabling of the government's response, I still question their management of this overall process because it appears to me, with the key report being five months late, there is still a lot to be desired as far as the process is concerned.

Christine Milne (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to note the government's response to the inquiry report Science underpinning the inability to eradicate the Asian honey bee. While I acknowledge the $2 million which the government provided to support a national pilot program, the whole point of the Senate report was that senators from all political parties wanted to make sure that eradication was reviewed. We wanted a review of the decision not to eradicate the Asian honey bee. The $2 million has been put into facilitation of the transition from eradication to the ongoing management of the Asian honey bee. In other words, the money has gone into upholding the decision that you cannot eradicate the Asian honeybee. There is no evidence to say that you can eradicate it or that you cannot eradicate it. That is the problem. That is why, after taking a lot of evidence, we recognised that the big problem was the lack of data that was collected on the incursion of the Asian honey bee—where it had spread, how it had spread, what it was feeding on, what the impact of the cyclone was and so forth. We wanted data collection and the beekeepers wanted data collection, and they had indicated they were prepared to put in a big voluntary effort to go up there, collect the data and see what was going on. In fact, as Senator Colbeck just mentioned, data coming out of the effort of those volunteers has shown that the expectation that the bees would get lost in the rainforest and breed up there, making them impossible to eradicate, was in fact quite wrong. The evidence is showing that they go in but then come out of the rainforest.

The issue I have with all of this is that a decision made by the management group not to eradicate was not based on evidence but based on an assumption that the bee would not spread. Therefore it became a cost decision of state governments. The state government representatives on the management group voted not to go for eradication because of the additional costs, the Commonwealth did not want to take on the additional costs, and the upshot was: 'Pull up the ladder, Jack. We're all right. It will spread in the tropics but it won't spread further south than that.' My big concern has always been that not only is it going to be a major problem in tropical Australia but the fact that it has spread throughout the highlands in PNG suggests that it is only a matter of time before it spreads to more temperate regions in Australia.

One of the real concerns I had with all of this was that nobody but nobody had taken into account the impact on Australia's biodiversity of the Asian honey bee incursion, which is why one of the recommendations of the committee was that biodiversity be taken into account and written reports be made on the likely impact. There is a high expectation that it will displace native bees—and again I come back to the fact that evidence based research is just not there.

Throughout it was: yes, it is going to have a major adverse impact on the beekeepers; yes, it is going to have a major adverse impact on wiping out European honey bees, reducing their production levels; it will also have an impact on the cross-pollination services that the European honey bee makes in horticulture. But nobody was talking about what the impact would be on Australia's biodiversity—what the impact would be on native bees, nectar-feeding insects, bats et cetera. Nobody could say because the work had not been done. I was horrified when I found out that the representative of the department of the environment who appeared at these talks was there as an observer and did not speak. Whether they knew nothing, whether they chose not to speak or whether they had no questions directed to them really does not matter, because the upshot is that biodiversity was not taken into account.

The government, in its response, has said:

The Government notes that as part of the decision making process, National Management Group members already consider biodiversity consequences of the establishment and spread of a pest or disease.

Really? I think that is misleading the Senate and I am now very motivated to find out, under FOI, exactly what the management group took into account in relation to the spread of the Asian honey bee. I can tell you, Madam Acting Deputy President, they did not take into account the biodiversity consequences.

Subsequent to the decision to allow the Asian honey bee to spread and to manage it, the Wet Tropics Management Authority has said that the adverse consequences on the wet tropics are likely to be considerable as a result of the spread of this Asian honey bee. Where was that in the consideration? It was nowhere. It was not raised once by anybody in the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry. It was not raised once by anybody from Biosecurity Australia. I do not believe the impact on the wet tropics was considered at any point, nor do I believe that the Wet Tropics Management Authority was actually asked for its view, just as I do not believe CSIRO was asked for its view on biodiversity. But I intend to find out, since the government has said quite clearly, in black and white:

The Government notes that as part of the decision making process, National Management Group members already consider biodiversity consequences …

I do not think anybody could tell you right now what the biodiversity consequences of the Asian honey bee incursion are likely to be, because very few people are out there doing the research. The one officer at CSIRO who has done 20 years of research in this field was not asked for his views on the impact on biodiversity.

The government refuses to take into account the second recommendation that relevant scientific agencies be asked to provide written advice through the national management group or consultative committees with regard to biodiversity. The excuse for not taking that up is that it 'may hinder action being taken in a timely manner'. I have never heard so much rubbish in my life. If you want to take action in a timely manner you need to find out quickly what the likely consequences are so that you can design the action to make sure you protect that which needs protecting from a pest incursion.

I believe the spread of the Asian honey bee is going to be an absolutely huge natural disaster for Australia's biodiversity. The Asian honey bee takes up small cavities. Small cavities are known to be the breeding places of birds and insects. We are going to see a major consequence in the loss of native bee populations and impacts on insects. I can assert that. I do not have an evidence base for that, but nor do these people have an evidence base to suggest that there will not be impacts on biodiversity. The impacts I am talking about have been put to me by experts in the field. The point that Senator Colbeck was making and that I am now making is that senators across all political parties asked that the money go into an evidence based campaign to get up there and find out exactly what is going on so as to make an informed judgment. After the senators asked that that happen, there was a meeting convened and we now get the answer that the group:

… reconvened on 12 May 2011 to consider the impact of the Consultative Committee deliberations on the original decision on eradicability. Although consensus was not reached, the Group determined that it is not technically feasible to achieve eradication.

They have no basis for that. Either it is or it is not, but there is no evidence to support either case. The point the experts were making ad infinitum was: we need to collect the data before we can make an informed decision about whether we can eradicate or whether we cannot. That is what the Senate was asking the government to do—not to put $2 million into switching from eradication to management, running up the white flag and saying that is it, the Asian honey bee is here so we will just have to live with it.

The consequences of this incursion of the Asian honey bee will be huge. Whilst I accept there will be a huge impact on honey bee production, on cross-pollination services across Australia and on amenity in the community—they nest all over the place—the main issue that has not been considered is biodiversity consequences. I am very unhappy with the government's response on that particular recommendation.

Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern and Remote Australia) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the Senate for the opportunity to speak on the government response to the report of the Rural Affairs and Transport References Committee. The spread of the Asian honey bee has been worrying me for some time. I come from North Queensland and I look after northern and remote Australia issues for the coalition. This is simply another case of the government's out of sight, out of mind approach. We have a minister who is completely out of his depth when it comes to anything to do with agriculture, fisheries and forestry. This is the first government for a long time that has had only one minister covering this portfolio. Whether the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry is interested or not, I am sure he does not have time to give to this particular issue, as with many issues in this portfolio, the attention that it demands. Agriculture, fisheries and forestry issues sit in the rural and regional parts of Australia, the more remote parts of Australia, including Northern Australia. There are no votes there and the minister has clearly shown on a number of occasions he has made decisions that he has no interest in—as I say, it is the out of sight, out of mind approach.

I congratulate Senator Colbeck on the great work he has done and on the issues he has raised, and I acknowledge that other senators have been very concerned about this matter as well. This response by the government deserves much fuller debate but again I despair—because of a motion supported by the Greens and the Australian Labor Party this morning we are not going to have an opportunity, apart from today, to discuss government responses to committee reports or to discuss the literally hundreds and hundreds of government documents that have been tabled in this parliament for scrutiny. Because of this guillotine decision earlier today, for the rest of this parliamentary year—for the rest of this calendar year—there will be absolutely no opportunity for senators to hold the government accountable for all these government documents and government reports that are brought into this parliament every week.

We hear about the new paradigm of open accountability, but where has it gone? The Senate's ability to look at government documents and committee reports at the appropriate times on Wednesday and Thursday afternoons is an essential part of a parliament keeping a government accountable. I think this is about the fourth or fifth week running that the government has done away with that opportunity for senators to look at these matters. This government response deserves much greater attention but it is not going to get it. By the time the Senate gets back to this report, the Asian honey bee could be anywhere. As Senator Colbeck points out, this is an issue which should be subject to intense scrutiny. Senator Milne is talking about a freedom of information request because she is unhappy with the response of the government. Senator Colbeck raises some issues about the conduct of this inquiry which really bring the honesty of this government to account. We know this government is led by a Prime Minister who told a deliberate lie before the last election, but you would think there would be a certain basic governmental honesty in relation to all of these documents.

Jan McLucas (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary for Disabilities and Carers) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Acting Deputy President, I rise on a point of order. I request that you ask Senator Macdonald to withdraw his comment about the Prime Minister. It was not parliamentary.

Trish Crossin (NT, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Macdonald, I remind you that you cannot impugn another member of the parliament.

Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern and Remote Australia) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I withdraw my comment—I simply say that before the last election the Prime Minister promised there would be no carbon tax under a government she led, and we have just had guillotined through the Senate 18 bills introducing a carbon tax. Senator McLucas can assess that how she likes, but it does not seem to me to be terribly truthful or terribly honest when you promise not to do something before an election to get yourself elected and, immediately you are elected, you completely break the promise. If it disturbs her when I say the Prime Minister deliberately lied, I withdraw. But, as I say, I will leave it to the listeners to work out what it means when you promise a day before an election that you will not do something and then immediately you get into government you do it.

By the same token, the Australian people were promised with this deal with so-called rural Independents that there would be this whole new paradigm of accountability. Where are we in the Senate? All of these government documents and important responses to reports like this report of the Rural Affairs and Transport References Committee are not being considered. There is no scrutiny because the Greens and the Labor Party have chopped off the opportunity for the Senate to do its job and look at these documents. The carbon tax was guillotined, and for the whole week that was set aside for the carbon tax debate we could not look at government documents and could not look at these reports. Then we had an extra week. We all came back for an extra week, just for the Senate, so that we could debate the carbon tax. After one and a bit days of that week, the government and the Greens again guillotined it. But they did not uplift the ability to hold the government to account on many of these documents. And here the first motion for what is supposed to be the final two weeks of parliament this year is the government saying, 'Again this week we'll do away with any ability for senators to do their duty and look at these government responses.'

You will not get any of the media writing about this because it is a left-wing government doing it, but this should be a headline outrage: taking away from this parliament the ability to do its duty and to follow the 'new paradigm' of accountability. There is no accountability here. The government and the Greens—

Brett Mason (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Universities and Research) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No scrutiny.

Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern and Remote Australia) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There is no accountability and no scrutiny of that accountability because the government and the Greens continue to deny senators the opportunity to discuss this. Whilst I appreciate that Senator Milne has something to say on this Asian honey bee business, it does seem a little trite to me that she then gets up and takes 10 minutes of the Senate's time in debating this issue, preventing other speakers apart from Senator Colbeck and me from having a say on this, when she is one of those who supported the motion this morning to make it impossible to properly scrutinise all of these documents and reports such as this. I get very angry about that. One of the real roles of the Senate is to look at all of the government documents, to hold the government accountable, but how can you do that when the Greens and the Australian Labor Party take away those opportunities with what is becoming monotonous regularity?

As Senator Colbeck says, this needs a lot more investigation. It should be debated much more fully in the parliament, but it will be February before anyone else gets a chance to make a comment on this issue. This shows a government that have no interest in these issues. It is the out of sight, out of mind approach: 'Oh, the Asian honey bee will only come to tropical North Queensland. Who cares what happens up there?' Little did they think that it could destroy the horticulture industry by destroying the honey bee. And, as Senator Milne rightly says, little did anyone bother about the fact that it could have a real impact on our biodiversity. Those things just went over the minister's head. For a lousy couple of million dollars, research was stopped. What is worse, as Senator Colbeck points out, when the committee inquired into it, it seems—I was not on the committee, but it seems—that some of the witnesses might have even been gagged, and that in itself should be a reason for a full-scale debate on this in the Senate. But are we going to get that opportunity? Not this year. And, by the time next year comes around, it will be clearly too late.

There is the other issue raised in the debate about the Wet Tropics Management Authority. I would like to say a few words about how their funding has been cut back over the years, and perhaps that is why they did not get the opportunity to alert people to this beforehand.

For all of these reasons, we should have more time to investigate this report. I am just disappointed that the guillotining stops that.

Trish Crossin (NT, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The time for consideration of this document has expired. Senator Macdonald, do you want to continue your remarks?

Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern and Remote Australia) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I seek leave to continue my remarks later.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.