Quarantine threats endanger the whole country and are “vastly” more dangerous to Australia than drug smugglers, Barnaby Joyce has said amid speculation that his cabinet colleague Scott Morrison wants control over biosecurity.
Speaking at the Northern Australia Food Futures Conference in Darwin on Wednesday, Joyce said he appreciated the concerns of farmer groups that quarantine, or biosecurity, could become less of a priority if it was transferred from his agriculture ministry to Morrison’s immigration department.
President of the National Farmers’ Federation, Brent Finlay, said in his on-stage interview with Joyce that biosecurity was a “die-in-the-ditch issue” for agriculture workers and there were concerns about immigration being involved in the issue.
Joyce said he accepted the concerns raised and told the delegates that one small mistake in biosecurity by food producers could have huge ramifications.
“If you get it wrong you have a product that nobody wants and we can’t afford for that to happen, so we have to be diligent in saying we own this space, this is the way it works and this is the way it stays,” he said.
The Australian people need to understand the importance of biosecurity, Joyce continued, as the consequences from someone bringing a biological threat through customs are “vastly bigger than the person coming through to hurt themselves because unbeknownst to them, they’re going to destroy us all”.
“If someone comes through the airport tomorrow and they’ve got drugs on them or whatever, that’s bad, but they’ll probably stick it up their noses or whatever they do with it,” he said.
“But if they come from an area that has foot and mouth … they don’t know they’re doing anything wrong. They’re ambivalent and sometimes ignorant of the threat they’re carrying.”
Recent reports have speculated that Morrison, who is overseeing the creation of the multidepartmental Australian Border Force, is causing tension in the Coalition by seeking control of parts of some fellow ministers’s portfolios, including Joyce’s biosecurity responsibilities.
But Joyce sought to hose down speculation of a rift, telling media outside the conference: “I’m always looking at ways, and every department is looking at ways, they can work seamlessly together. I’ll work seamlessly with [health] minister [Peter] Dutton, I’ll work seamlessly with minister Morrison,” he said.
“I’ll make absolutely certain that our biosecurity integrity is maintained in this nation because if someone brings in some drugs, I don’t know what they do, they hurt themselves. If they bring in foot and mouth [disease], they hurt our nation.”
Finlay told Guardian Australia a successful biosecurity system was a point of difference between Australian products and the rest of the world, but we had to be “vigilant”.
“There is no way it can go out of [the agriculture ministry], it has to stay there. We’re the people with the skin in the game. We’re the front line as farmers. When you mix up biosecurity’s plant diseases, animal diseases, with human trafficking, human movements, humans will always take priority and that’s what has happened in other countries.
“We have to maintain our own biosecurity systems.”
He said the industry has “come out hard” to say “this is the way it has to be.”
During the conference interview, Joyce spoke on various aspects and issues in developing the north of Australia, the subject of a proposed federal government white paper.
He pushed for increases in high-quality exports to Asia and the Middle East, saying there was “enough money in Asia to make expansion of northern Australian agriculture a reality” and spoke of rebuilding ties with Indonesia since the ban on live export cattle was lifted. Joyce flagged that a “substantial announcement” on the matter was forthcoming but would not be drawn on detail.
Joyce said work relating to 30 major water projects identified by a federal government green paper for potential investment was underway. It was clear the government was moving forward since he had been appointed chair of the committee for dams.
“The prime minister doesn’t start a dams committee unless he intends to build dams,” he said.
“And he certainly doesn’t make the minister for agriculture the chair of this committee, because agriculture likes to do things, likes to build things.
“If you didn’t want to build dams, you’d make the minister for the environment the chair, because that’s their job, to protect the environment.”
