‍DR ANNE WEBSTER MP

SHADOW MINISTER FOR REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT, LOCAL GOVERNMENT AND TERRITORIES
SHADOW MINISTER FOR REGIONAL COMMUNICATIONS

FEDERAL MEMBER FOR MALLEE

Topics: VNI-West project, farmer protest, property rights, court ordered property access, Victorian government bullying behaviour, potential for farmer arrests, asbestos in wind turbine components

Price  

The Allan government is facing rising community anger over the new laws which allow power companies to basically force access onto properties in preparation for construction of this thing called the VNI West project. Peta has talked about it a lot, I've talked about it on the Friday show a lot. That's a major transmission line - it's a massive project which is being built to link up renewables developments in Victoria and New South Wales. So, it'll connect the two states, and they need to be brand new lines. Last week, Peta was joined by sheep farmer Ben Duxson, who had this to say after farmers went out and blocked Vic grid workers from forcibly entering their properties,

Duxson  

We've been in this fight for three years. They're trying to bulldoze their way through our farms out here, the locals are fed up with it. We've always pushed back on it, and we're continuing to push back. We'll stand with fellow farmers, with the community, with every energy consumer in Australia, every taxpayer in Australia.

Price  

I watched that interview, what a ripper bloke Ben is. Joining me now, the Member for the Mallee, Nationals MP Anne Webster. Nice to see you again. What are you hearing from locals on the ground like Ben? I mean, he made it pretty clear there that they're not going to unlock the gate. They're going to stand in the way. That means they could face massive fines Anne and even jail time under the Allan government's legislation. Is that not right?

Webster  

Look, it's absolutely outrageous. I spoke with Ben today, I spoke with several other farmers today. They are actually buoyed - I know that might sound strange,  but they are buoyed - by one another's support. Farmers are standing alongside farmers. They are strengthening. They've got people ringing up from Melbourne saying, we want to come and stand with you. And I said to one of them, I said, “You know what? It actually makes me proud to be Australian. It makes me proud that you as farm as food producers and fibre producers are standing together and wanting to protect what is so precious to Australia, our food production into the future.” The Victorian Labor Government has been atrocious. There is not a word that could describe that government and the way they have bullied and intimidated and harassed these farmers, and today, I heard from many of them telling me that when VicGrid turn up at their gates, they are standing there wanting access, the group say “Access denied” There is nothing that VicGrid can do about that, until there is a court order that permits them to go on to the land. They don't have that court order, so they have to go away, but they stand there with their bodycams on and, you know, just pressing and intimidating farmers. I find it appalling. This is two weeks out from harvest, two weeks what kind of biosecurity mess are they going to be leaving behind if they go on to these properties at this time?

Price  

What's your gut feeling about what a court will do when these power companies turn up asking for a court order to give them access to a property that a farmer won't doesn't want them on

Webster  

Well, I mean, ultimately it will, it will end up with inevitably, police arrests. At the moment, the police really don't have anything to work with, from what I'm being told, and so I just think we are entering into a very murky place in Australia's history and in Victorian history. You know, you spoke earlier about Dan Andrews, and I just think that this is much the same, this bullying, overlord kind of tactic by the Victorian Government. They can't get what they want through democratic means. So, they really form this bullying overlord behaviour. I can't describe it another way. It's really socialist in the way that they are treating producing communities.

Price  

And Anne, you and I both well know that local police in those areas are mates of the farmers. They drink in the same pub, they play in the same footy teams. Their families live together and make up the community. Do you really think, does Jacinta Allen really think, that she's going to set the local police officer against the local farmer who he plays on the half back flank for in the local footy team?

Webster  

Oh, look. It just goes to prove Steve how out of touch the government is. And you know when you consider that, this week, we have learned that asbestos is in the brake pads of 5 per cent of the wind turbines that have now been rolled out across Australia. When we were in government, we put a ban on asbestos being brought into the country. Does this mean that Goldwind, who brought those Chinese brake pads into Australia, are they going to be held to account? No, the government is too busy wanting to hold farmers to account. There just needs to be a rethink of what is actually wrong with this whole process and this whole rushed railroading of regional communities across Australia by both the Albanese government and by, in this instance, the Victorian Government.

Price  

Anne great to catch up on. I know Peta will keep on that issue, because it's very close to her heart as well.

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