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Further information on One Nation’s Enterprise Agreement Vote

Three examples of Labor MP’s gutting jobs and workers and an expression of appreciation for three Labor MP’s who approach us face-to-face and honestly deal with issues.
The Labor party as a whole no longer protects workers.

Today’s Labor party savages workers and families. Labor has lost relevance and instead of caring about workers and being honest many Labor MPs tell lies and omit facts.

What works with us and what we like is for MP’s to approach us openly, bring data and share it freely to back up their request, and above all, to be honest.

Transcript

Following last week’s parliamentary sessions in Canberra here’s a longer video with more facts on policies hurting workers and a compliment to one New South Wales senator who approached us openly and respectfully on an issue.

Let’s set the record straight on a recent change to federal regulations, to allow employers and employees to quickly amend an existing Enterprise Agreement to deal with the COVID-19 crisis and keep their business going and employing people.

For businesses that are struggling to survive due to COVID-19, this allows employers to ask employees to vote on changes to an existing EA more quickly, in as short as 24 hours, rather than the normal 7 days. Unprecedented times call for flexibility for employers and employees.

We agree that some businesses need this and workers in those businesses understand. It was One Nation though that negotiated with the government to add the 12-month sunset clause, so that if employees agree to amend their EA for COVID, all pay and conditions would return after 12 months.

That’s fair. Typically, Labour then spread the lie that these temporary changes with a shorter voting period would be permanent, when they’re not. Remember, the regulation does not force you to agree. If you lack adequate time to vote on it, you can vote no.

So, to Labor’s Tony Burke and Joel Fitzgibbon, you have been caught lying to the workers you claim to represent. Labour seems to hate that it was One Nation who negotiated with the government to improve the bill, and made amendments to protect workers and workers’ rights.

And I put on notice any employer that thinks of using COVID-19 to screw workers by taking advantage of new regulations when COVID-19 restrictions have not affected them. In places like mines with 24 hour shift-work, employers would be crazy to give only one day to vote because that would force some workers to come in to vote on their day off or after a long shift on night work.

And workers who are annoyed would likely vote against the amended EA anyway. Anyway, as far as we know from listening to miners, COVID-19 is not affecting most mines’ operations. Remember, the new regulation does not apply to voting on a new EA, only to changes to an existing EA.

The regulation that is part of the COVID-19 response package only improves the flexibility for those businesses where employers and employees need a quick change to deal with COVID. We all know that life is about making choices, especially in politics where we face so many different people’s competing needs. Quite often, we have to choose between two difficult choices.

On one hand the viability of employers to protect jobs, and on the other hand protecting workers and worker’s rights. To make sure workers are protected while giving employees and employers greater flexibility to negotiate changes quickly to keep people in work, One Nation added the 12 month sunset clause.

The government agreed and will change the regulation. That means that after 12 months an EA with COVID changes returns back to the original conditions. This was done by One Nation to protect workers from employers in case those employers later tried to make COVID changes continue forever.

We’re in unprecedented times, yet we will not let this pandemic be used as an excuse to drag this out any longer than it should. One Nation identifies real issues and protects workers’ rights. Let’s get the background facts on what happened.

Labour has been sidelined with two things, the focus on the government during COVID and a lame federal leader in Anthony Albanese after a distrusted leader in Bill Shorten. A few weeks ago a journalist asked me for comment on the possibility of voting on Labor’s disallowance of the regulation.

What disallowance? That was news to us. When there is a real issue though, Labour contacts us to get our support. Union delegates contact us. Yet we heard nothing from unions or Labour. It was not a serious issue and Labour did not make an argument for it.

Later, when we saw the disallowance motion on the senate agenda we contacted Labour and we contacted union delegates. Union delegates said they had no issue. We reviewed the regulation and realised that some employees and employers would want to negotiate changes quickly to keep people in work under COVID isolation rules, others would make no changes and others still would make minor changes slowly to remain viable.

The key though, is that we saw a loophole that needed to be closed. So we approached the government and explained it. The government agreed with us and is amending the regulation to protect workers’ rights. That change that One Nation senators proposed was to put a sunset clause on any changes to protect workers after the COVID crisis ends. To protect workers.

Now, desperate Labour MPs, like Tony Burke, Joel Fitzgibbon, Katy Gallagher, falsely and needlessly mislead and worry honest workers in an attempt for political gain. We though in One Nation got to the core issue and fixed it to protect workers’ rights.

By the way, let me remind you that Tony Burke, when he was Labor’s Environment Minister, pushed anti-coal measures that are still hurting our coal industry and therefore hurting coal miners. And raising electricity prices that are still hurting all workers and all family householders, and exporting manufacturing and processing jobs to China.

So let me remind everyone, that Tony Burke enacted drastic UN regulations that gutted our fishing industry and gave power over our country to faceless unelected UN bureaucrats. Now, he dares misleads people about the disallowance motion and forgets to tell people that One Nation negotiated changes in the regulations to ensure workers rights are protected.

As for Joel Fitzgibbon, after he was nearly tipped out as the rep for Hunter, last federal election, he started to talk more about coal. Yet his words remain hollow, because his Labour party bosses continue anti-coal policies.

Where the old and real Labour party protected miners and workers, today’s Labour party protects the UN and pushes UN policies. These days Labour does not care about Australian workers. Labour hurts Australian workers.

Labour tells lies to Australian workers and Labour hurts our democracy. Another example of Labour mismanagement of workers is immigration policies, immigration numbers. After One Nation alone for years called to cut immigration numbers, recently Labour senator Kristina Keneally wrote an article calling for immigration to not be the same after COVID as before.

Yet she and others had been viciously and falsely labelling our demands for immigration cuts as racist, xenophobic, Islamophobic. The reality is that we could see that huge immigration numbers suppress wages, raise house prices, put pressure on infrastructure like roads, hospitals, schools and drive casualization of the workforce.

So last week in the senate I moved a matter of public importance motion that became a test of her commitment to her new words. You know what? She hid the whole day until after my motion had been debated.

Labour MPs refused to back her call for lower immigration numbers. Remember, the largest intake of temporary visa workers in any year occurred when Bill Shorten was minister for workplace relations under the Gillard Green’s government and authorised them.

Labour hurts Australian workers. Labour does not care about Australian workers. Labour tells lies. I take this opportunity though to express appreciation to Senator Tony Sheldon from New South Wales who approached us about getting Dnata employees in airline catering to be put on the government’s JobKeeper programme despite the government saying that welfare would not go to 100% foreign owned companies.

Dnata is 100% owned by a Middle Eastern country. We asked Senator Sheldon for data and gave us some. We asked the government for data and got plenty.

We then realised that these days domestic flights usually provide minimal food such as packaged peanuts, no big meals International flights though cater for solid meals yet most of those flights won’t start again until early next year, maybe mid next year and JobKeeper ends in late September this year. Plus, JobKeeper payments are taxed.

JobSeeker though is open to Australian workers, are not taxed and often come with additional payments such as family allowance and rental assistance. We checked the data and JobSeeker payments are comparable with JobKeeper after tax is removed from JobKeeper.

More importantly, JobSeeker continues beyond September and into next year so Dnata workers will be better protected on JobSeeker. We made a decision on the facts we gathered and in our view it is better to put the situation openly to Dnata people, many of whom will not have a job after September and need to sign up for JobSeeker as soon as possible.

Now we appreciate Tony Sheldon’s care and his open approach to us to consider his motion, we trust Tony because he’s honest. He’s a former TWU union delegate, like Senators Glenn Sterle and Alex Gallacher, who we find are excellent to deal with in the senate and are knowledgeable and caring.

Like Pauline and me, One Nation values honesty.

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Blank cheque to United Nations

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Government votes to give the United Nations a blank check to fund 5 international bureaucratic organisations.

Transcript

Thank you, Mr. Acting Deputy President. As a servant to the people of Queensland in Australia, I oppose this bill, One Nation opposes this bill. And we do so because we support and love our country, we support Australia. One Nation opposes any remuneration bill, that does not specify how much money is being spent. So do the taxpayers know right now, that this bill has no spending limit?

It’s an open check to the UN. Now I understand that the agreements we signed specify how total budgets are to be broken up amongst members, but not how much the total budget should be. How can we do this? There are five different UN organisations that are subject of this bill. The Global Environmental Facility, to take an example, has grown from $1 billion in the original agreement that we signed to $4 billion today.

The World Bank’s international Development Association, has gone from $24 billion to $35 billion in just the last two years, our money. This bill gives the United Nations a blank check, to waste taxpayers money and just hold their hand out for more. That is the UN hold its hand out for more. Mr. Acting Deputy President, I do not believe these organisations are good value for money.

In fact many are corrupt to the core. The World Bank’s International Development Association, spends 24% almost a quarter of its public funds, of its funds on public administration. A quarter blown out the door through administration, and 19% almost one fifth on subsidising renewable energy. That does not lift people out of poverty, because it’s too unreliable, it consigns people to poverty, that’s what it’s doing to this country.

What does the World Bank’s International Development Association spend on health, Mr. Acting Deputy President? Any idea? Just 8%, and on education? The one thing that does lift people out of poverty, also a measly 8%. Perhaps the International Development Association, could spend more lifting people out of poverty, if they were not spending $3.3 billion every year on administrative expenses, $3.3 million, including our cash.

The Asian Development banks, Asian Development Fund, has been providing low interest loans to lift people out of poverty since 1974, 1974. So in 46 years, their low interest loans, have not lifted the people of Asia out of poverty, but maybe the millions more we are about to give these Asian Development Fund will do the trick. Maybe the past 46 years, nothing much, but let’s see what happens.

Actually, Mr. Acting Deputy President, I’m not sure why we’re even funding the Asian Development Fund. They currently have $457 billion in outstanding loans, 457 billion. Now, I’m not suggesting that the scheme has been unsuccessful, the two largest recipients have done extremely well. India has $68 billion of those loans, and then now the world’s fifth largest economy.

Not because of the Asian Development Fund I might add. China has 62 billion of those loans, and is now the world’s second largest economy. I really wonder if they’re using that to buy up islands and make islands sorry, in the South China Sea. Perhaps if Australia can get some of these loans, we can stop Australia sliding out of the top 10 of world’s largest economies.

And I’ll remind everybody Australia, that early last century, in the early days of our federated nationhood, Australia led the world in per capita income. We were number one in the world. We now sliding out of the 10 heading to slide out of the 20. Oh, sorry, we’ve already slid out of the 10. The top 10 largest economies.

Australia should be grateful, that at least the Asian Development Bank is careful with its administrative expenses, only spending $1 billion last year on administration. I did note this though, the Asian Development Bank, Asian Development Fund, spent $25 million last year on salaries and expenses for the board of directors.

Their 12 member board of directors, $2 million per director seems a little high for unelected internationalist bureaucrats. Or as the prime minister said, unaccountable internationalist bureaucrats. When the Asian Development Fund, talk about lifting people out of poverty, I don’t think the Australian taxpayers would take that to mean, the Asian Development Funds Board of Directors being lifted out of poverty.

The Multilateral Fund for the implementation of the Montreal Protocol is another soak for taxpayer cash. Montreal Protocol on substances that deplete the ozone layer, yeah, that’s another title. Montreal Protocol on substances that deplete the ozone layer, was ratified in 1987. It requires countries to reduce levels of production and consumption of ozone depleting substances, according to an agreed schedule.

Now, I expect Australian taxpayers thought that the ban on CFCs in the 80s, was the end of the CFC crisis. I won’t even mention well I will mention, that the hole in the ozone layer stopped growing, before the CFC ban came in, and is better explained by natural variability, caused by variations in solar energy, than by world killer spray cans.

The UN though, has spent half a billion dollars a year, half a billion dollars a year, including our money on the Multilateral Fund for the last 25 years for nothing. In true Yes Minister style the Multilateral Fund has kept itself in line for taxpayer handouts by moving on to other substances that also have nothing to do with the ozone layer, and they’re in general use in situations where they’re very hard to replace.

And that includes refrigeration. At this rate, refrigeration will be relegated to the footnote of history. This won’t be a problem Mr. Acting Deputy President, because with renewable power, everyday Australians won’t be able to afford to run our refrigerators. Except perhaps for those UN Development officials with the $2 million a year price tag.

They should be kept, they should be keeping them more way nice and cold. Now let’s turn to the Global Environment Facility Trust. Mr. Acting Deputy President, the Global Environment Facility Trust, I saved the best to last. The Global Environment Facility Trust, was founded at the 1992 Rio Earth Summit, to fund developing countries and countries with economies in transition to meet the objectives of the International Environmental Conventions and Agreements.

The $1.5 billion a year to keep the global climate warming con going, to enable the UN parasites to continue sucking our blood through deceit and lies. I noticed that a generous federal government, as increased their contribution, to the Global Environment Fund, Global Environment Facility from $23.5 million, just two years ago to $38 million last year.

That’s an increase of about 60% in one year. So in the World Wildlife Fund, is used as a source for global warming proof, remember, they funded by the Global Environment Fund. Funded, Mr. Acting Deputy President to keep the greatest scientific swindle in history alive. I’m going to discuss the bigger picture for a minute.

And don’t take my word for it. Mr. Richard Court, the Premier at the time of Western Australia, a Liberal premier Rebuilding the Federation. In this book on page eight, he details the process that the international is used to usurp our sovereignty, take over our governance and put in place UN regulations. And he deals with the UN or other unelected international body.

Our Constitution has been pushed aside, bypassed, by these criminals in the UN and other slick gangsters. And Mr. Richard Court, remember was the Liberal premier, he details that and he did so 26 years ago. I’ll now read from UN Agenda 21 booklet, the opening page of the introduction. This came about at the UN Rio Declaration, UN Rio Convention in 1992, which Paul Keating’s Labour Government signed on our behalf.

Quote, Agenda 21 stands as a comprehensive blueprint for action to be taken globally, from now into the 21st century, Agenda 21, by governments United Nations organisation, development agencies, nongovernmental organisations, and independent sector groups, in every area in which human activity impacts on the environment.

In every area in which human activity impacts on the environment. That is every area of our civilization. Continuing the quote, the agenda should be studied in conjunction with both the Rio Declaration, which provides a context for its specific proposals. Specific proposals, that’s where the nitty gritty is, and the statement of first principles.

It is hoped, it is hoped that the first principles will form the basis for a future international level agreement. And that is how they put in place global governance, and that is how according to Richard Court who was absolutely correct, that governance then takes over ours. We have the UN’s Lima Declaration signed In 1975 by the Whitlam Labour Government ratified the following year in 1976 by the Fraser Liberal National Party Government.

Destroyed our industry deliberately made it clear that they were transferring it. By the way, the United States didn’t sign it. Several major European countries didn’t sign it, and I don’t think Japan did. China did it was a beneficiary. The UN’s Rio Declaration in 1992, brought about the Agenda 21, which I’ve just discussed, which is now killing land use for all of our farmers, it’s killing employment, due to its so called sustainability.

And it’s killing governance, through the climate change commitments. Which are not commitments until it legislated through here or bypassed through here. The UN’s Kyoto Protocol in 1996, the UN’s Paris Agreement which is now decimating our industry and exporting jobs in 2015. Red type strangling our country, green type strangling a country, blue type strangling our country.

Blue type is UN type, oh, where does UN blue type work? Fishing industry, we now have 36% of the world’s marine parks in this country alone 36% more than one third. Where do we where do we import, we import now three quarters of our seafood from China. Sorry, three quarters of our seafood is imported, the greatest biggest exporter is China, which has a tiny coastline and 53 times the population.

So the UN doesn’t touch China, but strangles our industry, and we happily pushing jobs off overseas closing down industry, fishing included. Oh, and we can’t get permission to lift the damn level at war again but damn, because the UN doesn’t like it. Oh, and World Heritage Sites, there’s another way the UN controls us. And then we have the globalist mantra of interdependency.

And that’s what these bills push. Interdependency means we are dependent on another country, it means we are dependent not independent anymore. Australia used to be number one in the world, in terms of per capita income.

And then we started shoving all of our jobs offshore, and now we are dependent on other nations. To speak nothing of the corruption, that the UN has nothing of the accountability that it doesn’t have. As I said in my first speech in the Senate, in 2016, we need exit, Australia exit the UN. The best thing we can do for people in poor countries, is to kill the UN.

Get back to accountability and create the business environment not an environment for parasites. The best thing we can do for our country, is to restore our sovereignty, restore our governance and restore our independence. We need to not fund entities like the UN.

Instead look after ourselves, make yourself strong again, so that we can help neighbours as they need. Thank you Mr. Deputy President.

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Enterprise Agreement Vote Explained

Last week in the Senate Pauline and I negotiated with the Government to change new COVID regulations to protect workers rights .Yet when some MPs feel like they are losing relevance, they panic and spread misinformation to score cheap political points. These MP’s show they do not care about workers and are not honest. See for yourself. One Nation will always protect workers and workers’ rights

Transcript

Let’s set the record straight on a recent change to federal regulations to allow employers and employees to quickly amend an existing Enterprise Agreement to deal with the COVID-19 crisis and keep their business going and employing people. For businesses that are struggling to survive due to COVID-19, this allows employers to ask employees to vote on changes to an existing EA more quickly, in as short as 24 hours, rather than the normal seven days.

Unprecedented times call for flexibility for employers and employees. Now, we agree that some businesses need this and workers in those businesses understand. It was One Nation, though, that negotiated with the government to add the 12-month sunset clause, so that if employees agreed to amend their EA for COVID, all pay and conditions would return after 12 months. That’s fair.

Typically, Labor then spread the lie that these temporary changes with a shorter voting period would be permanent, when they’re not. Remember, the regulation does not force you to agree. If you lack adequate time to vote on it, you can vote no. So, to Labor’s Tony Burke and Joel Fitzgibbon, you have been caught lying to the workers you claim to represent.

Labor seems to hate that it was One Nation who negotiated with the government to improve the bill and made amendments to protect workers and workers’ rights. And I put on notice any employer that thinks of using COVID-19 to screw workers by taking advantage of new regulations when COVID-19 restrictions have not affected them.

In places like mines with 24-hour shift work, employers would be crazy to give only one day to vote because that would force some workers to come in to vote on their day off or after a long shift or night work. And workers who are annoyed would likely vote against the amended EA anyway. Anyway, as far as we know from listening to miners, COVID-19 is not affecting most mines’ operations.

Remember, the new regulation does not apply to voting on a new EA, only to changes to an existing EA. The regulation that is part of the COVID-19 response package only improves the flexibility for those businesses where employers and employees need a quick change to deal with COVID. We all know that life is about making choices, especially in politics where we face so many different people’s competing needs.

Quite often we have to choose between two difficult choices. On the one hand, the viability of employers to protect jobs, and on the other hand, protecting workers and workers’ rights. To make sure workers are protected, while giving employees and employers greater flexibility to negotiate changes quickly to keep people in work, One Nation added the 12-month sunset clause.

The government agreed and will change the regulation. That means that after 12 months, an EA with COVID changes returns back to the original conditions. This was done by One Nation to protect workers from employers, in case those employers later tried to make COVID changes continue forever. We are in unprecedented times, yet we will not let this pandemic be used as an excuse to drag this out any longer than it should.

One Nation identifies real issues and protects workers’ rights.

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One Nation calls for Australians to buy Australian-Made

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One Nation Senator Malcolm Roberts urges Australians to unite under our flag and buy Australian-made and Australian-owned.

“While the COVID 19 crisis reminds us of the importance of supporting Australian-made, it also shows we no longer make many essential goods here on our shores, which become a major security threat,” stated Senator Roberts.

Successive Australian governments have allowed, encouraged and at times driven our manufacturing industry to move off-shore leaving us dependent on overseas countries like China for basic goods.

In his senate speech on 8 April, Senator Roberts stated that Australia’s productive capacity has been smashed under Liberal-National and Labor-Green governments blindly adopting the globalist strategy of “interdependence” that has made us too heavily dependent on foreign sources.

One Nation calls on the Australian Government to immediately prioritise creating an environment where Australian businesses grow and thrive and are not hamstrung by a globalist agenda.

When Australia was in need of urgent medical supplies to treat people with COVID19 we were reliant on suppliers in China rather than having our own thriving manufacturing industry.

Australia’s manufacturing sector has deteriorated over the years with only 6% of GDP coming from manufacturing, down from 30% fifty years ago. 

Senator Roberts implores the Federal Government to remove government-imposed regulations like the self-imposed Paris Agreement, pointless climate regulations, unnecessary over-regulation and other government hurdles and instead encourage our manufacturing industries.

Senator Roberts added, “Our manufacturers have endured a new high in 2019 for electricity input prices, which now averages over 90% higher, almost double, than the prices in 2010. Gas prices have increased nearly 50% over the same ten-year period.”

“Australian energy prices have gone from the cheapest to the most expensive in the world due to climate policies and that is making manufacturing unviable in Australia.”

When the COVID19 virus has passed and we are left to repair a broken economy, we will need to reassess the importance of previous spending commitments, such as billions of dollars wasted in subsidising intermittent wind and solar power to virtue signal to the United Nations.

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Water Security for Farmers and Coronavirus – Rural Queensland Today with Ben Dobbin

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Ben:

Welcome back to Rural Queensland Today. 8th of April on a Wednesday morning, so much still going on with COVID-19. We know that the line is flattening, the curve is starting to flatten, but it’s still a long way to go. Senator of One Nation, Malcolm Roberts, joining us this morning on Rural Queensland Today. Malcolm, good morning. Thank you so much for being with us.

The federal government’s COVID-19 stimulus package needs to be addressed so more Australians can be more [inaudible 00:00:28] on food production. Now, One Nation has called for a guarantee of water for farmers to plant essential crops this month and this would go a long way to feeding the nation in very tough times.

Malcom Roberts:

Yes, and good morning Ben and thank you for the invitation to join your show. Yes, we have asked for that because farmers are needing a drink of water for their crops by April 15th, sorry, by May 15th so that they can get their winter crops in and going. That’s needed and that’s not going to be a subsidy or anything like that, Ben. That’s going to be pure wealth created just out of water that’s natural. It’s just been withheld from farmers mate and we need to give it back to them.

Ben:

Well, I mean there’s so much has changed. I mean Vietnam have banned exporting their own home grown rice to Australia and so we actually need to prioritise our food production for Australians because we’ve seen now what a risk to our health by letting anybody into this country. And I don’t want to in any way, I’m not trying to be racist, I’m not trying to be, but our biosecurity failed us and now is, more than any time, is where we need to shore up our food and shore up our buyer security, if ever there’s been a time. And this would go a long way to growing essential crops for the nation.

Malcom Roberts:

You’re exactly correct. We had a very strong rice production in Southern New South Wales and that has been decimated by the stupid and corrupt practises that have been going on with regard to water in the Murray-Darling basin. And that has been a fault of the Turnbull Howard government that brought in the 2007 water act and that has destroyed agriculture right across the Murray-Darling basin and it sent water to corporates and taking it away from family farmers.

And family farmers, Ben, are the guts of this country. They’re the core because they’re the ones who know that if you look after the land because you give it to your kids eventually or you retire or you sell it and use the retirement to go and live somewhere else. They’re being destroyed. And that’s what we need to bring back, family farming in this country because that’s where the communities are.

Corporates, global corporates, large Australian corporates don’t give a damn about communities. They don’t give a damn about rural Australia. They don’t give a damn about food security. It’s all a profit. And so what we need to do is restore our communities and their rural sector. There is an ideological assault on rural Australia and it starts with water policy, it continues with energy policy and it’s most of all, it’s about the stealing of the farmers rights to use the land they have bought. I don’t know if you know of Dan McDonalds-

Ben:

Yeah, sure.

Malcom Roberts:

I mean, Dan has said that every input, the farming these days is controlled by some bureaucrat. So farming has been nationalised. It’s no longer a private enterprise business. It’s been nationalised. It’s being destroyed and that’s what we need to protect because this Covid virus has exposed huge gaps in national security. We haven’t got enough face masks. We haven’t got enough ventilators. We haven’t got enough basic stuff. And yet we shifted all the production of this to overseas starting with the UN in 1975, the Lima Agreement signed by the Whitlam’s labour government and then ratified the following year in ’76 by Frazier’s liberal government.

The UN has just, we’ve taken it all off shore and we are now vulnerable. We don’t make masks, we don’t make ventilators, we don’t make cars. We make [inaudible 00:04:05] and we need to get that back into this country. We need to restore our economic productive capacity and their economic resilience. Mate, that’s really been highlighted by this.

Ben:

I agree with you. I mean we need to start building things back in Australia. There’s no two ways about it. Industry needs to happen here and for too long we’ve been relying on doing it cheaper from overseas and bring it in here.

But let’s just get back to what you’re talking about with the Murray-Darling basin. Now we know Queensland New South Wales, Victorian farmers received zero general security water allocation for irrigation over the last three years. That’s a fact. There’s no two ways about-.

They’re trying to get it under control, but big business and foreign owned companies have bought up all the allocation at different stages. They’ve sold it. It’s traded as a commodity. It’s been an absolute mess. Now how would you go about fixing it and can you get the numbers in the Senate to make some change?

Malcom Roberts:

Getting the numbers in the Senate is difficult because there are only two of us at the moment and that’s the big mess. [crosstalk 00:05:02].

Ben:

But there are people who are willing in the LNP and the national party to try and see farmers get more food secure and get more food security here in Queensland and New South Wales and Victoria.

Malcom Roberts:

There are also people in the LNP protecting the corporates and protecting the water act. And that’s what’s caused the disruption of farming in across the Murray-Darling basin, Ben. It’s not everyone in the liberal national party. It’s not for the land.

For example, have a look at Senator Matt Canavan and Barnaby Joyce. They were once the best speakers in parliament against this climate crap. And then they both got in the cabinet and their lips were sealed. And then even Senator Matt Canavan even spoke in favour of this climate nonsense.

And then now that One Nation is making inroads into their vote because we’re supporting coal, because we’re supporting land use being given back to farmers to control, Matt’s come out now he’s talking like one of us, but he still votes with the Trent Zimmermans and the Zali Steggles and the Graves, the same policies that are destroying land use, that are destroying farming, that are destroying [inaudible 00:06:12] in this country.

We’ve got farmers who have been told in North Queensland, I spoke to one personally, Central Queensland and Southern Queensland, who would not plant fodder during the drought because electricity prices were too damn high to pump water. I mean this is insane. That’s where we’ve got to with the policies that the liberal nationals have pushed. We’ve destroyed our farming sector [so] that John Howard [could] comply with the Kyoto protocol, which he proudly discussed, has stolen the land rights, the land use rights of farmers in this country. They’ve stolen the water through the water act, which was Turnbull and Howard, and then Howard complying to the Kyoto protocol and the liberal nationals complying with UN agreements, including the Paris Agreement, has wrecked our energy sector.

I mean there’s nothing more fundamental than being able for a farm to buy his or her land and then use it as they want. There’s nothing more fundamental than water. Then there’s nothing more fundamental than energy. Energy prices were decreasing for the last 170 years, relentlessly decreasing in real terms, Ben, and with the policies of the labour greens and liberal nationals party in the last 20 years, they’ve doubled. That’s the reverse of human progress. This is insane what’s going on in this country.

Ben:

Yeah, I think a lot of people are frustrated and clearly you are as well.

Malcom Roberts:

And angry.

Ben:

Yeah, and that’s the big thing. Do you think that they’ve offered enough the government as a stimulus package to try and get this back under control with COVID-19? Was it too little too late? I do know that now is not the time to politicise things, but do you think they’re doing enough?

Malcom Roberts:

Well, I think they are doing enough financially. They’re not doing enough health-wise. The countries that are leading the way and around the world are the East Asian countries of Taiwan and South Korea especially, and to a lesser extent, Singapore.

Now what’s happened is that in the West we’ve tried to balance health and the economics. That is not working. In East Asia, Taiwan, South Korea and Singapore, they made health number one priority. They got it under control, had rapid testing, very widespread testing, not only tested for Covid virus in people but tested for temperature because they would basically say, you’re coming into work today, Ben. Here, take your temperature. Mate, you’ve got a hot temperature over here and then we’ll test you for Covid virus. If you have got no temperature, then you go to work.

When they test you for Covid virus, then they say, “Ben, you’ve got Covid virus. Isolated. Off, away you go.” Or if you’re free of Covid virus you get a little note saying Ben Dobbin has got a high temperature today. He’s free to go to work.

What they did was they isolated the sick and the vulnerable, the elderly, the people with chronic disease problems. They isolated them. And Taiwan has had hardly a blip in its economy. South Korea got off on the wrong foot to start with. It went down Italy’s track and then it quickly copied Taiwan and then they got the back and so got everyone back to work.

What we’ve done is we’ve isolated everyone. Instead what we need to do now that we’ve got it starting to get it under control, Ben, we need to see the triggers in the government’s plan for changing our strategy to isolate those with the virus, isolate those vulnerable to the virus and let everyone get back to work. That time could be coming soon, but the government has not focused on that.

What the government is focused on is compromising health and economic activity. And you can’t do that because you end up undermining the health. What we’ve got to do, Taiwan has got the same population of Australia. They’ve had five deaths and they’ve got it earlier than we did, and they hammered it. And that’s what we need, real leadership, real strength.

At the moment, yesterday, Prime Minister Morrison and his health advisor released the broad statement about their modelling, but they didn’t give us the model. They didn’t tell us what the projections were in the future. We need to know them. They need to stop hiding on that. That’s the other thing they did in Taiwan and South Korea, they gave people the truth, gave people the information. That gives people confidence. It also gives people the sense of responsibility because people who are free to make up their mind usually make it the right way. And that’s what they did in Taiwan. That’s what we need to get to.

Ben:

Fantastic. You said it well. Malcolm, appreciate your time this morning. Thank you so much for being with us on Rural Queensland Today.

Malcom Roberts:

Anytime, Ben.

Ben:

Good on you. Malcolm Roberts, Senator for One Nation. This is Rural Queensland Today across the Resonate Broadcast network.

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