Australia’s peak farming body is calling on the Federal Government to have a long hard look at the way it’s handling the compensation process for producers in the live cattle export class action.
Senate Estimates in Canberra last week revealed the Government had offered $215 million, a mere fraction of that being sought in compensation and interest.
National Farmers’ Federation President Fiona Simson said it was an insult to those producers whose livelihoods were shattered in 2011, when the ban was imposed, to be finally offered compensation that didn’t even come close.
“These cattle families have been put through the wringer time and time again. First with the ban, then through the legal process to fight it and now the government has finally come out with a figure so lowball it’s hurtful.
“Rubbing more salt in the wound was the deadline the Government gave producers to accept or reject the offer. Giving producers less than one month to respond when the government has taken more than a decade to provide an offer feels like bullying.”
