The federal election is now just a week away and the Tasmanian Farmers and Graziers Association has written to all local candidates to gauge their commitment to progressive agricultural policies for our farmers.
We won’t tell farmers how to vote – that’s not our role. However, in partnership with the National Farmers’ Federation, we will share information about how the future might look for farmers in Tasmania under different scenarios post-September 7. You can see the NFF’s national scorecard on our website ( http://www.tfga.com.au/index.php?cID=1 ).
For too long, governments of all hues have ignored or taken for granted the contribution of our farmers and the agriculture sector as a whole. Political strategists argue that the votes are in the cities so the people who live in rural and regional centres are of secondary concern. They say things like ‘they are farmers, we know how they are going to vote’ or ‘you’ll never satisfy them’.
Politicians and political parties make such assumptions at their peril. Farmers are the backbone of most rural communities – especially in Tasmania. In tough times, they keep those communities going. Our members have made it clear that they will not be ignored and that they have high expectations of an incoming federal government.
With modern communication technology, farmers are no longer out of the loop during the working day. They are tuned in to what is going on. They follow public affairs more closely than most. Ploughing and listening to parliament are no longer mutually exclusive.
In our communication with the candidates, we have nominated these key issues of concern to farmers:
• ensuring that Tasmanian agriculture is on the national agenda and that the unique aspects of the Tasmanian sector are recognised and incorporated into national policy;
• delivering a demonstrable improvement in investment in research, development and extension by 2015;
• ensuring an increase in Tasmanian agriculture’s competitiveness and profitability by, as a start, reducing pointless, overlapping and often contradictory regulatory restraints;
• recognising the cost to farmers of balancing community expectations with respect to the environment (that has been the traditional role of farmers through the ages) and running a viable business. In Tasmania, we want an appropriate funding for farmers who bear a disproportionate share of the cost of protecting and maintaining the state’s environmental estate;
• addressing the cost inequities of moving freight to and from Tasmania and the islands.
Farmers expect politicians to understand these concerns and to deliver real policy initiatives to address them. The TFGA also expects politicians and political parties to commit to genuine consultation with us when reviewing or implementing any measures that will impact on the agriculture sector.
We will keep an eye on what happens after the federal elections, too. There are a lot of opportunistic promises being made. Despite continued statements about the need for fiscal sobriety, buckets of money seem to be mysteriously appearing whenever a poor poll result is announced.
We have all seen the post election response of ‘now we’re in government, we’ve had a close look and the cupboard is bare – so, sorry, but we won’t be delivering on that pre-election commitment’. It is not cynical to recall the core/non-core promise distinction of previous election campaigns.
Farmers are no strangers to the short attention spans of politicians. They will carefully assess the genuine commitment of political parties and their understanding of the real challenges farmers face every day. They will consider all these factors in deciding where place their vote on September 7.
As a peak industry body, our job is to advocate for farmers – not only at election times, but every day. That’s what our members expect us to do. So we’ll be out there holding those politicians accountable to delivering on their commitments to farmers post-election.
