Mr MILLS - 1999-11-23
What conditions apply to businesses exporting food products to East Timor?
ANSWER
Mr Speaker,The Australian Quarantine and Inspection Service has scaled new heights in its Clochemerlian application of the Export Control Act in relation to food products going from Darwin to East Timor.
For some time now, food products have been freely exported into East Timor without coming under the control of AQIS, nor with the need to have certificates issued in terms of the Export Control Act. AQIS has now decided that foodstuffs sourced in Darwin and transported to East Timor will come under their control and require certification under the various Export Control Act provisions. What this is saying is that foodstuffs that are freely available on supermarket shelves in Darwin are not fit for human consumption.
AQIS is doing nothing more than going down the road of mere revenue-raising and job-creation. There is not one sanitary or phytosanitary reason why meat products, dairy products, eggs, fresh fruit and vegetables that are available in supermarkets in Darwin cannot and should not be exported to East Timor.
I contacted the federal government on Friday. I sent faxes to the Prime Minister’s office, to Mr Vaile’s office, to Mr Truss’s office and to Mr Tuckey’s office. I received a phone call back on Friday pleading with me not to say anything. Yesterday afternoon they would not return my calls.
As I said, this is nothing more than a revenue-raising exercise on the part of AQIS. It has nothing to do with food standards, health standards or hygiene. In fact, they hide behind the previous conditions applied by the Indonesians to the import of horticultural products from Australia, which related mainly to the presence of Queensland fruit fly. That can easily be discounted by a mere inspection. But they don’t refer to the previous protocol we had negotiated with the Indonesians, where Australian domestic-standard meat could be exported to Indonesia free of the AQIS controls.
Messrs Truss, Vaile, Tuckey and Downer would be better off staying at home and sorting out AQIS, which is the greatest impediment that exists in Australia to the free trade of agricultural products on the world market. They’d be better of staying at home than shining on the world stage at the GATT negotiations.
This is the mob that caused the royal commission into the meat industry to come about, and this is the mob that haven’t learned. And let me tell you, not only our food exports are under threat. The other goods and services that are provided from Darwin are under threat. Those people supplying East Timor can just as easily get their supplies out of places like Surabaya, Ujung Pandang, General Santos and Davao. If they’re going to have to charter boats from Davao, General Santos, Ujung Pandang or Surabaya for food, they’ll not only put food products on them. They’ll put building products on them. They’ll put on everything they can get hold of.
AQIS have effectively, through this declaration, fixed up any trade potential the Northern Territory, and indeed Australia, had with East Timor. I call upon the federal government to overturn this decision and get some rationality back into our trade.
ANSWER
Mr Speaker,The Australian Quarantine and Inspection Service has scaled new heights in its Clochemerlian application of the Export Control Act in relation to food products going from Darwin to East Timor.
For some time now, food products have been freely exported into East Timor without coming under the control of AQIS, nor with the need to have certificates issued in terms of the Export Control Act. AQIS has now decided that foodstuffs sourced in Darwin and transported to East Timor will come under their control and require certification under the various Export Control Act provisions. What this is saying is that foodstuffs that are freely available on supermarket shelves in Darwin are not fit for human consumption.
AQIS is doing nothing more than going down the road of mere revenue-raising and job-creation. There is not one sanitary or phytosanitary reason why meat products, dairy products, eggs, fresh fruit and vegetables that are available in supermarkets in Darwin cannot and should not be exported to East Timor.
I contacted the federal government on Friday. I sent faxes to the Prime Minister’s office, to Mr Vaile’s office, to Mr Truss’s office and to Mr Tuckey’s office. I received a phone call back on Friday pleading with me not to say anything. Yesterday afternoon they would not return my calls.
As I said, this is nothing more than a revenue-raising exercise on the part of AQIS. It has nothing to do with food standards, health standards or hygiene. In fact, they hide behind the previous conditions applied by the Indonesians to the import of horticultural products from Australia, which related mainly to the presence of Queensland fruit fly. That can easily be discounted by a mere inspection. But they don’t refer to the previous protocol we had negotiated with the Indonesians, where Australian domestic-standard meat could be exported to Indonesia free of the AQIS controls.
Messrs Truss, Vaile, Tuckey and Downer would be better off staying at home and sorting out AQIS, which is the greatest impediment that exists in Australia to the free trade of agricultural products on the world market. They’d be better of staying at home than shining on the world stage at the GATT negotiations.
This is the mob that caused the royal commission into the meat industry to come about, and this is the mob that haven’t learned. And let me tell you, not only our food exports are under threat. The other goods and services that are provided from Darwin are under threat. Those people supplying East Timor can just as easily get their supplies out of places like Surabaya, Ujung Pandang, General Santos and Davao. If they’re going to have to charter boats from Davao, General Santos, Ujung Pandang or Surabaya for food, they’ll not only put food products on them. They’ll put building products on them. They’ll put on everything they can get hold of.
AQIS have effectively, through this declaration, fixed up any trade potential the Northern Territory, and indeed Australia, had with East Timor. I call upon the federal government to overturn this decision and get some rationality back into our trade.
Last updated: 09 Aug 2016