Senator WOODLEY(3.06 p.m.) —I move:

That the Senate take note of the answer given by the Minister for Resources and Energy (Senator Parer), to a question without notice asked by Senator Woodley today, relating to the importation of cooked chicken meat.

I wonder if we may not have to rename some of these chicken diseases because they seem to be infecting the government. Perhaps it is mad chook disease, and that is where the problem lies.

I want to underline the fact that the government is confused about this issue, although I ought not perhaps be too hard on Senator Parer because he is trying to give answers for a minister who himself is confused so it must be very difficult to do that. The problem is that the minister seems to be having a bob not just two ways but every way possible.   In the Australian yesterday, despite the fact that the minister has instigated two inquiries himself—we have had the NAIRN inquiry and also a Senate inquiry—the minister seems to be pre-empting those inquiries, that is, if the Australian is correct. Perhaps the minister, or someone on the government side, might like to tell us whether or not the Australian has reported the minister correctly. Yesterday the Australian said:

The Government recently agreed to allow imports of cooked chicken meat in to Australia, and also faces pressure—

I wonder whether the Tasmanian senators are listening to this—

to allow imports of apples and fresh salmon as part of the move to freer international trade . . . Mr Anderson said a more accommodating approach to imports did not mean a relaxation of quarantine standards . . .

I wish the minister had been at the various Senate hearings we have had where I have become totally convinced that we certainly will be putting not only our chicken meat industry at risk but also significant numbers and species of our Australian native birds at risk. It is quite clear that the assessment done by AQIS is based on wrong suppositions and bad science and in fact misinterprets the results of the only tests done, which were done in Great Britain, in its own study.

It is quite clear that our own industry is at great risk from these imports both from an environmental point of view and from an economic point of view. That is why it is essential that the minister does authorise an environmental impact study before any decision is made. But, if the minister representing the minister for primary industries is confused, I understand that because the minister for primary industries seems himself to be very confused. One day he is supporting an inquiry; the next day he is telling us he has already made the decision. So somewhere along the line somebody had better either correct the minister or correct the Australian newspaper so that the rest of us actually know what is going on.

Just to put the record straight: in a letter dated 28 August 1996 from the minister to Mrs Marven of the Australian Chicken Meat Federation, the minister quite clearly indicates that he will not be proceeding with an EIS. More confusion, more problems for our own industry and more decisions that seem to be taken in a vacuum. I trust that, in my taking note of this answer, the Senate will also note the problems in this area and the confusion of the government and will press for the minister to do what he actually promised during the election campaign to do.