Source: The Daily Advertiser, Wagga, Editorial
Senator Bill Heffernan when speaking more as a Junee farmer rather than as a renowned head-kicking politician, shows a greater appreciation of life on the land than his Melbourne and Sydney colleagues combined.
While there seems little Federal Parliament can do to prevent the forthcoming dramatic mid-season price reductions for milk, Senator Heffernan, as chairman of a Senate committee inquiring into food production, intends to turn up the heat on the milk giants.
Predictably the two biggest producing companies have welcomed the opportunity to appear before the committee, where they will be expected to explain why farm-gate prices fell by an average 32 per cent in February, but in some cases as high as 39 per cent.
No doubt the companies will be able to justify their financial responsibilities to their shareholders by achieving responsible bottom line results in some of the toughest economic times in years.
However, they have been warned by Senator Heffernan that they will also be expected to "explain their actions to see if they are logical and in the national interest."
In a blunt warning the Senator said his obligation was "to make sure it remains worthwhile for farmers to get out of bed each day to produce what most Australians take for granted - clean, green tucker."
And of course this is part of the problem which is not going to go away any time soon; city-slickers who don't know, don't want to know and sadly couldn't care less.
Not known for generally working together, Federal, state and local governments surely have a duty of responsibility that Australian dairy farmers are not destroyed financially by arrogant, self-serving and heartless conglomerates, and that every Australian is able to afford and enjoy the finest award winning locally produced milk products every day.
