At the request of Senators Macdonald, O'Sullivan, Boswell, Eggleston and Back, I move:

That the Senate—

(a) notes:

(i) the plight of the pastoral industry in Northern Australia, exacerbated by the drought, other natural disasters and the live cattle export ban,

(ii) that the Assistant Treasurer (Senator Sinodinos) met with a representative gathering of pastoralists in Charters Towers last Monday, 10 March 2014;

(b) congratulates the Government on the drought package which will provide some relief to the northern beef cattle industry; and

(c) urges the Government to seriously address the ongoing issues which impact on the future of the northern beef cattle industry.

Question agreed to.

I seek leave to make a short statement about the motion.

Leave is granted for one minute.

I would like to note that we did not call a division on this particular motion. I do have some concerns that the motion does not go far enough in terms of urging the government to seriously address the ongoing issues which impact on the future of the northern beef cattle industry. One of the very significant issues that is not alluded to is the impact of climate change. Unless we address the impact of climate change and how it interacts with very significant drought, we are not dealing with other issues which impact on the northern beef cattle industry. It will, in fact, be insignificant if we are not addressing those fundamental interactions of climate change and drought.