Fitting agriculture into debate

Much media attention was given to the first election debate between Prime Minister Scott Morrison and Opposition Leader Anthony Albanese.

You’re probably not aware, there was another debate: The Rural Press Club debate between Federal Agriculture Minister David Littleproud and Shadow Agriculture Minister Julie Collins in Canberra.

You’d be forgiven for not having heard of Ms Collins. She’s held the shadow agriculture portfolio for less than a year and is from Tasmania, so not likely to yet have ventured into your patch.

She also appeared at the National Farmers Federation Conference the week before and gave a prima facie adequate performance.

It’s a tough gig against the, ‘I’ve been everywhere, man’, David Littleproud who could talk under wet cement and is the leader-in-waiting for The Nationals if, or when, Barnaby Joyce exits stage right.

Agriculture is not a natural fit for many Labor MPS and it’s not front-ofmind for the Federal party.

Sure, there are key regional seats – but in mining areas or seats that Labor can’t win.

Julie Collins has not yet been able to come up with a new policy specific to agriculture, other than the $500-million reconstruction fund announced before the election was called.

She has said some significant announcements for agriculture would be made later in the campaign, but in the meantime, she’s left with criticizing the Coalition for ‘inaction on climate change, crippling worker shortages, and a severe timber shortage’.

Anthony Albanese has hinted at allowing working visa-holders to stay in Australia, but it is still a ‘watch this space’ in the closing weeks of the campaign.

So, what did Mr Littleproud offer during the debate? He said he was ‘proud to announce a $75-million Future Farmers Guarantee’ for loans of up to 40 percent equity for new properties capped at $1-million’.

Yet when I spoke to him on ‘Country Today’, he admitted that it wasn’t new funding, rather a, ‘reallocation out of the funding from the Regional Investment Corporation’.

Mr Littleproud’s other claim was: ‘The biggest infrastructure spend in our nation’s history: $21 billion. Never before has a Federal Government invested so much in regional Australia.’

It might be, though I doubt that in real terms. The big catch here is it’s targeted to marginal seats in the Hunter Valley, Queensland, and Western Australia. No mention of Victoria. So how did he respond?

“What Victoria needs to understand is the existing program will continue,” he said. “These are going into regional areas that have issues with their industries changing, traditional industries having to transition – read mining, particularly coal – but it’s also about where a significant portion of that is around water infrastructure.

“And unfortunately we need the states to play with us on this and Victoria has said there are no dams to be built in Victoria.”

I made mention earlier of Barnaby Joyce, Nationals Leader. The closest he’s got to Victoria is a quick stop at Yarrawonga last week. It will be interesting if he makes it any further south. It’s no secret he’s not much liked by the state Nationals, and there’s no love lost with Federal Nationals MP Darren Chester in Gippsland.

I’m betting he’ll spend much of his time pressing the flesh in those regional areas north of the border that his party needs to win if it’s to stay relevant to the Coalition.