# Paul Murray Live: The Farrer Pub Test

An episode of [Paul Murray Live](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/376966263), 6 May 2026, 1 h 39 min.

Audio: https://p.podderapp.com/2544644999/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/2fb3740d-3436-44af-8cc0-a91900716aa5/be3abd48-25e5-45a6-aede-ac2a00524a12/da4d5273-0e14-4c86-bd69-b442000d362a/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=95971714-8fe6-4855-b1fe-ac2a00524a12

In a special broadcast, four by-election candidates face a pub audience in Albury, for an evening of questions on the issues that matter most to voters in Farrer. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:00] Speaker 1: Why from the seat of Pharah. This is the Paul
[0:03] Speaker 1: Murray Club Test.
[0:07] Speaker 2: Thank you, Jerry can I Australia, Canay, Aubrey. How are
[0:09] Speaker 2: we tonight? We're going all right, good stuff, just four
[0:13] Speaker 2: days away from the.
[0:14] Speaker 3: Pharaoh by election and our world famous wear massive in
[0:18] Speaker 3: Spain when it comes.
[0:19] Speaker 2: To the pub test. Of course, an opportunity for the
[0:21] Speaker 2: people who'd like to.
[0:22] Speaker 3: Represent this part of Australia in the Federal Parliament being
[0:26] Speaker 3: able to be asked questions by people of the area
[0:29] Speaker 3: and you will be able to see them in real time,
[0:32] Speaker 3: including an opportunity for them to be able to take
[0:34] Speaker 3: each other on. So it'll be a fun night ahead.
[0:38] Speaker 3: This electorate is fascinating for a whole collection of reasons.
[0:41] Speaker 3: But really interesting to me is that so few people
[0:45] Speaker 3: have actually already voted. As I told you last night,
[0:48] Speaker 3: about forty two thousand people of the one hundred and
[0:50] Speaker 3: twenty four thousand that are enrolled to vote have well
[0:54] Speaker 3: that's who voted early in the last federal election literally
[0:57] Speaker 3: twelve months ago. Now it's about twenty five thousand give
[1:01] Speaker 3: or take that have already voted now, so yes, that
[1:03] Speaker 3: number will of course go up in the next few days,
[1:06] Speaker 3: but the majority of people will be voting on Saturday.
[1:10] Speaker 3: A very significant number will be watching us on Free
[1:12] Speaker 3: to Wear Telly right now, as well as the Sky
[1:14] Speaker 3: News app and on Foxtelle. So tonight really matters because
[1:18] Speaker 3: no matter what the polls say, no matter what the
[1:19] Speaker 3: BOOKI say, nothing is inevitable. Plenty of people have an
[1:22] Speaker 3: opportunity to either be one over or to change their mind,
[1:25] Speaker 3: and there's no better way to do that than to
[1:27] Speaker 3: hear from them. We'll get to all of that in
[1:29] Speaker 3: a moment or two's time, but first, as always, every
[1:32] Speaker 3: couple of weeks before we go hyper local, let's go
[1:35] Speaker 3: national and our fortnightly check only on the Nation, otherwise
[1:39] Speaker 3: known as the sky News Pulse and Opinion poll put
[1:41] Speaker 3: together every couple of weeks from the people of YouGov.
[1:44] Speaker 2: Let's make it official with a fancy time you agree.
[1:54] Speaker 3: It wouldn't be fancy without the title, right, It's the
[1:58] Speaker 3: extra touches that we like here. So all right, a
[2:00] Speaker 3: few things to tell you, including of course the primary vote. Now,
[2:03] Speaker 3: the sky News polls put together by you gov is
[2:06] Speaker 3: starting to show a slight change over the past couple
[2:09] Speaker 3: of weeks that has been replicated.
[2:11] Speaker 2: In other polls.
[2:12] Speaker 3: It now shows that, believe it or not, after the
[2:15] Speaker 3: past couple of weeks, the Labour Party's vote is up
[2:17] Speaker 3: by three points now to a primary of thirty percent.
[2:21] Speaker 3: It is below whether we're at the federal election. But
[2:23] Speaker 3: whatever's happened in the past couple of weeks, there's been
[2:25] Speaker 3: a change. As you can see, one nation down by three,
[2:28] Speaker 3: the Libs and Mats have gone up by one, the
[2:31] Speaker 3: Independent and other is down by one. But hang on, Paul,
[2:34] Speaker 3: it all doesn't add up to the numbers here. There's
[2:36] Speaker 3: a significant number that is always in this poll that
[2:39] Speaker 3: is don't know or undecided, so those numbers get rounded out.
[2:44] Speaker 3: As for the actual attributes of the leaders, that of
[2:48] Speaker 3: course being the Prime Minister and the alternative Prime Minister.
[2:50] Speaker 3: A big week ahead for them when it comes to
[2:52] Speaker 3: the budget. The two party preferred well, it is getting
[2:56] Speaker 3: better for the Labor Party fifty four percent to the
[2:59] Speaker 3: Liberal now coalition at forty six. That is slightly better
[3:03] Speaker 3: for the coalition than it was at the last federal election.
[3:06] Speaker 3: Now in terms of two party preferred, if one nation
[3:09] Speaker 3: was able to get in front of the coalition, it
[3:11] Speaker 3: was then that would end up as the opposition, Well,
[3:14] Speaker 3: fifty four to forty six in favor of Labour turns
[3:16] Speaker 3: into fifty seven forty three in favor of the Labor Party.
[3:21] Speaker 2: In terms of the individual ratings.
[3:24] Speaker 3: Of the leaders, Paul and Hanson's numbers not included in
[3:26] Speaker 3: this for obvious reasons, because she's in the upper houses
[3:29] Speaker 3: their leader. So the two people who at this stage
[3:32] Speaker 3: would be the most obvious to be either the retaining
[3:35] Speaker 3: or the next Prime Minister. Well, in terms of satisfaction,
[3:38] Speaker 3: the Prime Minister's rating has gone up in the past
[3:41] Speaker 3: couple of weeks. I can feel the vibe in this
[3:43] Speaker 3: room and they're loving hearing this information. But still it
[3:46] Speaker 3: is Anthony Abernezi up by two points to forty percent.
[3:51] Speaker 3: Angus Taylor at thirty eight percent, still the most significant
[3:55] Speaker 3: number in and around Angus Taylor is a very significant
[3:58] Speaker 3: number of people, about a third who haven't made their
[4:00] Speaker 3: mind up one way or the other, which is why
[4:02] Speaker 3: I keep talking about the budget. In reply next Thursday
[4:05] Speaker 3: will be highly important. That's thirty minutes uninterrupted nationwide where
[4:09] Speaker 3: he's able not just to point out the problems but
[4:11] Speaker 3: perhaps offer up a few solutions. In terms of the
[4:15] Speaker 3: dissatisfied number, the majority of Australians are dissatisfied with the
[4:18] Speaker 3: Prime Minister's performance. That number is slightly better, but still
[4:22] Speaker 3: even as a who doesn't know his mats, fifty four
[4:25] Speaker 3: percent is still the majority of the country who have
[4:27] Speaker 3: a disapproving view of the Prime minister forty two percent
[4:30] Speaker 3: when it comes to Angus Taylor. Again, these are the
[4:33] Speaker 3: numbers coming out in the sky News Pulse. There'll be
[4:36] Speaker 3: deeper dives into this information tomorrow morning at skynews dot
[4:39] Speaker 3: com dot Au and with all of our team in
[4:41] Speaker 3: first edition. Now, there's a couple of interesting issues outside
[4:46] Speaker 3: of the horse race that we have been polling and
[4:48] Speaker 3: it is particularly to do with people's financial circumstances. So
[4:53] Speaker 3: in the past three months have things got better or
[4:55] Speaker 3: worse for people? Forty seven percent of people say that
[4:58] Speaker 3: in the past three months their financial situation has got worse.
[5:02] Speaker 3: Forty three percent of people say that it has got
[5:05] Speaker 3: no different and seven percent of people who are the
[5:07] Speaker 3: federal politicians with another pay rise probably who they say
[5:12] Speaker 3: that things have got better in the past three months.
[5:14] Speaker 2: As for the budget, remember.
[5:15] Speaker 3: We are one week away from the BSFs that is
[5:18] Speaker 3: the budget and we'll have the full coverage all the
[5:20] Speaker 3: way through from the speech at seven point thirty, the
[5:22] Speaker 3: analysis at eight o'clock, and a special ninety minute edition
[5:26] Speaker 3: of Paul Murray Live on Budget Night, where we'll pull
[5:29] Speaker 3: it all apart and I have great fun doing it,
[5:31] Speaker 3: telling you the numbers that they don't want you to see,
[5:33] Speaker 3: and we'll cut through the spin. All of that, of course,
[5:35] Speaker 3: is next Tuesday night, so big few nights ahead as
[5:39] Speaker 3: well as the results here on Saturday night from six
[5:41] Speaker 3: pm here in Farah, about what the government should be
[5:46] Speaker 3: doing when it comes to the budget.
[5:47] Speaker 2: Well, basically the country a.
[5:49] Speaker 3: Third to third to third right, thirty six percent of
[5:51] Speaker 3: people say the government should be putting the focus on
[5:53] Speaker 3: paying off the trending dollars worth a debt and dealing
[5:56] Speaker 3: with inflation thanks again to the inflation situation and another
[6:00] Speaker 3: increase of course in interest rates today, more household assistance
[6:04] Speaker 3: thirty three percent of people would like that. That's basically
[6:07] Speaker 3: the direct handouts frankly that have often been put in
[6:12] Speaker 3: place in the budget, particularly with things like say energy bills,
[6:15] Speaker 3: we're spending on social services twenty percent and people who
[6:18] Speaker 3: want even more income tax cuts that is eleven percent
[6:22] Speaker 3: of people. Last question in terms of the Pulse, before
[6:24] Speaker 3: we get into the reason we are here in this
[6:27] Speaker 3: election season here in Farah, the ndis yes, we pold
[6:32] Speaker 3: this question to see how Australians truly felt about. Yes,
[6:35] Speaker 3: a very important scheme, but one that we know is
[6:38] Speaker 3: in an awful lot of trouble when it comes to money.
[6:40] Speaker 3: So what to best describes the ndis eight percent of
[6:44] Speaker 3: people say it is affordable and it's money well spent.
[6:47] Speaker 3: Thirty four percent of people say that it's a lot
[6:49] Speaker 3: of money but it is an important scheme. Twenty five
[6:51] Speaker 3: percent of people say that it's a lot of money
[6:53] Speaker 3: and we need to find some savings.
[6:55] Speaker 2: Thirty three percent of people say.
[6:57] Speaker 3: Too much money. We need to find the major savings.
[7:01] Speaker 3: All of that is, of course the Sky News Pulse.
[7:04] Speaker 3: More details tomorrow morning at sky News.
[7:06] Speaker 2: Dot com dot Au.
[7:15] Speaker 3: All right, let's get back into the reason we are
[7:17] Speaker 3: here and in Aubrey tonight, which is of course the
[7:19] Speaker 3: pub test, an opportunity for the people of Parah to
[7:21] Speaker 3: be able to ask the people who would like to
[7:22] Speaker 3: represent them in the Federal Parliament any question they would
[7:25] Speaker 3: particularly like to the Great Tom Connell, the man who
[7:28] Speaker 3: will be looking into all of the Birds all of
[7:29] Speaker 3: the numbers. On Saturday night he previews the contest.
[7:32] Speaker 2: And just how damn big this electorate is.
[7:36] Speaker 4: Farah is the eighth largest seat in Australia. It spans
[7:39] Speaker 4: one hundred and twenty six thousand square kilometers in the
[7:42] Speaker 4: southwest New South Wales, the biggest town by far being
[7:45] Speaker 4: Aubrey in the southeast of the electorate. It's been well politically,
[7:49] Speaker 4: pretty boring, pretty stable, only four members since nineteen forty nine,
[7:53] Speaker 4: all Coalition and Susan Lee holding it for some twenty
[7:56] Speaker 4: five years, but her grip on power loosened last time around,
[8:00] Speaker 4: so for two decades the margin between her and mainly
[8:03] Speaker 4: Labor opponents eleven to twenty percent. Last time around it
[8:07] Speaker 4: was down to six against an independent Michelle Milthorpe. And
[8:10] Speaker 4: as we've seen, crucial aspect here is preferences. So Milthorpe
[8:14] Speaker 4: only twenty percent primary vote, but benefited from largely from
[8:18] Speaker 4: these preferences, in particular from Labor and the Greens to
[8:21] Speaker 4: run Susan Lee a lot closer. What's happened since then,
[8:24] Speaker 4: We've seen a big dip obviously in federal polling, and
[8:27] Speaker 4: that's the Liberal Party and that's replicated in the biggest
[8:30] Speaker 4: poll we've seen so far of this actual seat. Now,
[8:33] Speaker 4: what does this poll tell us Well, a couple of things.
[8:35] Speaker 4: To note, Labour's not running, so that's why there's no
[8:38] Speaker 4: name there. But we do know from this poll one
[8:40] Speaker 4: nation would clearly make the final two given where it's at.
[8:43] Speaker 4: The question is Liberal verse independent with the theoretical Labor
[8:47] Speaker 4: vote and also Greens you're going to see at this stage,
[8:50] Speaker 4: Michelle Milthorpe, stay ahead at the Liberal Party and get
[8:53] Speaker 4: to the final two.
[8:54] Speaker 2: So that's the first question you asked with this sort
[8:56] Speaker 2: of element.
[8:57] Speaker 4: The second one is preference flow the Liberal the Nash
[9:00] Speaker 4: vote once it's knocked out, that would actually flow quite
[9:03] Speaker 4: strongly to one nation, and therefore this is our prediction
[9:06] Speaker 4: of preference flow from that particular pole. It would be
[9:08] Speaker 4: fifty two point seven to one nation. Now, given how
[9:11] Speaker 4: difficult seats are to pole, what that tells you is
[9:14] Speaker 4: it would be close. This is well and truly within
[9:17] Speaker 4: the margin of error in this particular seat, So it
[9:19] Speaker 4: just means it will be a fascinating contest to watch.
[9:22] Speaker 4: What about the electorate itself, we know it's reasonable, plenty
[9:25] Speaker 4: of farmers. What else do we know about this electorate
[9:28] Speaker 4: of Pharaoh. Well, this is the census data and we
[9:31] Speaker 4: can see here some interesting figures. Bachelor's degree are higher
[9:34] Speaker 4: fourteen percent in Parao, so half the New South Wales
[9:37] Speaker 4: average Australian born, much higher than New South Wales average
[9:41] Speaker 4: eighty to sixty five. What about petrol prices, seventy four
[9:44] Speaker 4: percent of people get to work in a car in
[9:47] Speaker 4: some way, much higher.
[9:48] Speaker 1: Than the state average.
[9:49] Speaker 4: But mortgage stress, perhaps it's less of an issue than
[9:52] Speaker 4: you would expect, only ten percent.
[9:54] Speaker 5: We're experiencing that in Pharah.
[9:58] Speaker 2: All right, let us get into it right now.
[10:00] Speaker 3: Let us meet the four people who are most likely
[10:02] Speaker 3: to be the next MP for the federal seat of Parah.
[10:04] Speaker 3: Put your hands together for all of our candidates, which
[10:06] Speaker 3: are with.
[10:06] Speaker 2: Us, proceeding on the left of David Farley from.
[10:10] Speaker 3: One Nation, but Kowski is from the Liberal Party, Brad
[10:15] Speaker 3: Robertson is from the Nationals, and Michelle Milthorpe is the
[10:18] Speaker 3: Independent one and all.
[10:19] Speaker 2: Hello, thank you for being here. I do appreciate it.
[10:21] Speaker 3: All right, So before we get into everything that's super serious,
[10:23] Speaker 3: can let's just go from David across very briefly, no CV,
[10:28] Speaker 3: no pitch you'll get.
[10:29] Speaker 5: To do that at the end.
[10:30] Speaker 3: Just simply tell us who are you and who were
[10:34] Speaker 3: you before you became potentially the next member for Parah.
[10:37] Speaker 2: David will start with you.
[10:38] Speaker 1: Thank you, David Farley, agriculturist, agribusinessman and a very very
[10:44] Speaker 1: proud father of three girls.
[10:46] Speaker 3: Excellent, perfectly done, perfectly done. All right, Rayaza your story
[10:53] Speaker 3: before we got here.
[10:55] Speaker 6: So yes, Raiser Bukowski, the Liberal candidate, I have been
[10:58] Speaker 6: a senior community lawyer. I'm an Aubrey City councilor and
[11:02] Speaker 6: also on the board of the Murray Darling Association.
[11:04] Speaker 2: Excellent, all right, Brad, tell us a bit about yourself.
[11:09] Speaker 7: Frad Robinson, father of three.
[11:12] Speaker 8: I was twenty nine and a half years in the
[11:14] Speaker 8: Army and I'm now on the board on the chair
[11:18] Speaker 8: of the Cancer Trust locally and a homeless veteran organization.
[11:22] Speaker 2: Good stuff, all right.
[11:22] Speaker 5: And Michelle, Hi am Michelle Milthorpe.
[11:26] Speaker 9: I am a mum of three girls, grew up in Koudamunjo,
[11:30] Speaker 9: being down here for twenty three years, and a teacher
[11:33] Speaker 9: and a sexual assault advocate.
[11:36] Speaker 2: Good stuff all right.
[11:37] Speaker 3: Well, Well, my name is Paul Mccanserrian I like long
[11:41] Speaker 3: walks on the beach and I'm not an alcoholic. Let's
[11:45] Speaker 3: get into the questions right now, straight away, Ray, step forward.
[11:48] Speaker 3: Let's have a little question here. What is your question
[11:52] Speaker 3: and who would you like to ask it to? I
[11:54] Speaker 3: should sit by the way. It's not going to be
[11:56] Speaker 3: all four all the time. We'll move it around as
[11:58] Speaker 3: things as things go to to be, even when it
[12:00] Speaker 3: comes to time. All right, Ray, what do you want
[12:02] Speaker 3: to ask?
[12:04] Speaker 10: I have a question for Michelle Milthorpe if she supports
[12:06] Speaker 10: a child gender clinic at her New Greenfield hospital.
[12:11] Speaker 3: Not the question that you submitted, but okay, let's go
[12:13] Speaker 3: for it. No, no, you don't, okay, finding fair enough,
[12:16] Speaker 3: appreciate it. Let's get to our next question here, where
[12:19] Speaker 3: Luke is going to ask us a question.
[12:21] Speaker 2: Luke, what is your question? And hopefully the one you
[12:23] Speaker 2: actually submitted.
[12:25] Speaker 1: This one's to the panel.
[12:26] Speaker 11: The Australian way of life has always been accepting and
[12:29] Speaker 11: tolerant of any new ethnic groups that have contributed to
[12:31] Speaker 11: the country.
[12:32] Speaker 3: You know.
[12:32] Speaker 11: Today, however, how are people expected to accept and endorse
[12:37] Speaker 11: the recent decline in Australia social fabric and social cohesion.
[12:40] Speaker 3: I am going to go all four on this so
[12:42] Speaker 3: let's start again. We'll go left to right. David, your response,
[12:45] Speaker 3: thank you.
[12:47] Speaker 1: We're a great, great nation. We're el chronic and we're algatarian.
[12:52] Speaker 1: We live in the pastor of the success of our forefathers.
[12:54] Speaker 1: We live in the presence, working hard for our children
[12:57] Speaker 1: into the future. And the reality is we're going to
[13:00] Speaker 1: start taking accountability and responsibility for our nation with the
[13:06] Speaker 1: present that we want to deliver into the future. So
[13:09] Speaker 1: we've got some big issues to address. We're big issues
[13:12] Speaker 1: around immigration to address. We've got big issues around housing
[13:15] Speaker 1: to address, health and ultimately how we finance this nation.
[13:20] Speaker 1: And it's about making sure we hold our governments to
[13:23] Speaker 1: be accountable and responsible for the sovereignty of the nation.
[13:27] Speaker 6: Down migrants helped build this country. My own family is
[13:36] Speaker 6: testament to that. Ultimately, when it comes to migration, we
[13:40] Speaker 6: absolutely recognize the need for skilled migrants, particularly in health
[13:43] Speaker 6: care and age care and picking and packing out in
[13:46] Speaker 6: the agricultural sector. But we also do need to recognize
[13:51] Speaker 6: that there are some people who do want to come
[13:53] Speaker 6: to this country who don't want to share the same
[13:55] Speaker 6: culture and values that we as Australians have. That's really
[13:59] Speaker 6: important and that certainly needs to be taken into consideration.
[14:03] Speaker 6: Also where people are going to live. Migration has impacts
[14:07] Speaker 6: on local services, whether that's healthcare, whether that's housing, whether
[14:11] Speaker 6: it's schooling, So all of that needs to be taken
[14:13] Speaker 6: into consideration. And again what's skilled what skills are they bringing?
[14:18] Speaker 8: Right look when it comes to migration and current immigrant
[14:27] Speaker 8: communities here, I think what we're lacking at the moment
[14:29] Speaker 8: is leadership from our government. Labor Party has failed the
[14:34] Speaker 8: Australian people. They failed the migrants actually in ensuring that
[14:38] Speaker 8: they feel comfortable in our country, but also that they
[14:41] Speaker 8: have parameters and buffers to ensure that we get the
[14:44] Speaker 8: right people into this country.
[14:46] Speaker 7: We haven't had that.
[14:47] Speaker 8: We are allowing whoever into this country and as a result,
[14:51] Speaker 8: we've had a decline in what I would suggest is
[14:54] Speaker 8: our standards and as a result, we've seen some declining
[14:58] Speaker 8: decline in the wa which people are presenting in terms
[15:02] Speaker 8: of their behaviors, and especially when you look back at
[15:05] Speaker 8: what happened in Bondo. We actually need to have a
[15:08] Speaker 8: close look at what's going on in our country. But
[15:10] Speaker 8: it takes leadership and honestly, Labor Party has not shown
[15:14] Speaker 8: any leadership around this.
[15:16] Speaker 4: Sure there's no doubt.
[15:20] Speaker 9: There's no doubt that we don't have infrastructure right now
[15:22] Speaker 9: to support the people that are here, particularly around housing
[15:25] Speaker 9: and healthcare.
[15:27] Speaker 5: In Parah.
[15:28] Speaker 9: We've got great examples of immigration done well. We look
[15:31] Speaker 9: at it Griffith. It's the most multicultural city.
[15:34] Speaker 5: Outside of Sydney and Melbourne in Australia.
[15:38] Speaker 9: They have twenty four percent of the people in Griffith
[15:42] Speaker 9: speaking language other than English at home.
[15:44] Speaker 5: They have a.
[15:45] Speaker 9: Multiple cultural events that celebrate the different cultures there. They
[15:50] Speaker 9: have a two point one percent I think it is
[15:52] Speaker 9: at the moment unemployment rate. So everyone works there, but
[15:55] Speaker 9: we know that there's people that live there in squalid conditions.
[15:59] Speaker 9: They live in house that have way too many people
[16:01] Speaker 9: in them, and we don't have a federal input in
[16:06] Speaker 9: that community to help with that community, to support the
[16:09] Speaker 9: workers and the employers who are employing these people. So
[16:12] Speaker 9: we're relying on volunteers to do the job that the
[16:15] Speaker 9: government should be doing and that's not good enough.
[16:18] Speaker 2: Thank you appreciate the question.
[16:19] Speaker 3: All right, before I get to Stephen again, I don't
[16:23] Speaker 3: want every question for all four of you, but one
[16:26] Speaker 3: is desperately important for me to ask right now, and
[16:28] Speaker 3: it is the local issue in and around health, in
[16:30] Speaker 3: and around hospitals, in and around all four of you
[16:33] Speaker 3: saying that there's a different need either for completely new
[16:37] Speaker 3: or certainly great improvements in healthcare that's in the region. Brad,
[16:42] Speaker 3: I'm going to start with you. All of you want it,
[16:46] Speaker 3: but how will you fight for it? How would you
[16:49] Speaker 3: advocate for it if you're the bloke who ends up
[16:52] Speaker 3: in Canberra.
[16:54] Speaker 8: So two days after I was selected as the candidate,
[16:57] Speaker 8: I was in Canberra. I was actually fortunate to be
[16:59] Speaker 8: the day that Matt Canavan was selected to be the
[17:02] Speaker 8: leader of the National Party.
[17:03] Speaker 7: I was able to have an hour with him.
[17:05] Speaker 8: I sat down and I presented what I thought was
[17:08] Speaker 8: the most important issue for this area around health, and
[17:11] Speaker 8: that was a new hospital.
[17:13] Speaker 7: What he took away from that was my brief.
[17:15] Speaker 8: He went back to the cabinet, so shut a cabinet
[17:18] Speaker 8: for the National Party and then the Coalition Party, and
[17:21] Speaker 8: we came back with a two hundred million dollar program
[17:26] Speaker 8: which was to start the process towards partly the process
[17:31] Speaker 8: towards Greenfield site. It has other aspects because it takes
[17:35] Speaker 8: time and we're in opposition, so we need to ensure
[17:39] Speaker 8: that we are ahead of this but ultimately that is
[17:43] Speaker 8: how you do it. You actually go to Canberra, you
[17:45] Speaker 8: sit down, you negotiate, you find a solution, and as
[17:49] Speaker 8: a party of seventy people which would be seventy one
[17:51] Speaker 8: if I was elected, I can actually produce something that
[17:55] Speaker 8: can put pressure on the Labor Party to start the
[17:59] Speaker 8: ball roll on getting something this community desperately needs.
[18:03] Speaker 3: Right, So the same question here, how would you be
[18:06] Speaker 3: able to achieve greater passion for it, greater advocacy for it,
[18:12] Speaker 3: because the reality is is that all four of you
[18:13] Speaker 3: will not be joining a government should you be elected
[18:16] Speaker 3: on Saturday.
[18:17] Speaker 6: So very similar to Brad when I was pre selected
[18:21] Speaker 6: the very next aerment with Angus and again sat down
[18:23] Speaker 6: and told him what I felt our region's healthcare needs were.
[18:29] Speaker 6: So five and a half weeks later we made the
[18:33] Speaker 6: announcement the two hundred million dollar health care package, recognizing
[18:37] Speaker 6: that one hundred and eighty five million dollars of that
[18:40] Speaker 6: is to finish the current redevelopment. So meeting our communities
[18:45] Speaker 6: needs now and that looks like, you know, ensuring that
[18:48] Speaker 6: we've got a helipad with direct access to and ICEE,
[18:51] Speaker 6: you fitting out pediatrics and surgical awards, greater renal dialysis chairs,
[18:56] Speaker 6: also accessibility in terms of parking, which is a really
[18:58] Speaker 6: significant issue, but also looking at purchasing an acquisition of
[19:05] Speaker 6: a site which is going to future proof our region
[19:09] Speaker 6: according to our needs. And that is was also funded
[19:12] Speaker 6: for the initial infrastructure of water, sewer, electricity, road access,
[19:17] Speaker 6: and then the fifteen million dollar package for mental health,
[19:19] Speaker 6: which I was very clear with Angus that we need
[19:22] Speaker 6: to look after our farmers.
[19:23] Speaker 12: So the Medicare Mental.
[19:25] Speaker 6: Health facility will have a specialist farmer mental health clinician
[19:31] Speaker 6: which is really important, and also a dedicated mental health
[19:34] Speaker 6: headspace out in Deniloquent for.
[19:37] Speaker 2: The use.
[19:39] Speaker 6: Ultimately, we've already it's already gone through shadow cabinets. So
[19:42] Speaker 6: should we be elected come twenty twenty eight as a coalition,
[19:46] Speaker 6: we're not starting from zero. We're hitting the ground running
[19:49] Speaker 6: and that's not the only policy that we have already
[19:51] Speaker 6: committed to funding as a coalition.
[19:53] Speaker 3: Good stuff, all right, Michelle, let's get it up before
[19:56] Speaker 3: we move on your response, how would you fight for it?
[20:00] Speaker 9: Look at the we've had a health minister here from
[20:02] Speaker 9: the coalition and we still are in the state that
[20:04] Speaker 9: we are. So the reality is that we've got clinicians,
[20:08] Speaker 9: We've got the AMA, We've got rural.
[20:12] Speaker 5: Doctors saying that what we are being proposed is not
[20:15] Speaker 5: what we need.
[20:16] Speaker 9: So we have the only cross border service in the
[20:18] Speaker 9: whole country here in Aubury. And we need to make
[20:21] Speaker 9: sure that we are keeping our states accountable. So the
[20:24] Speaker 9: very first thing is that we need three levels of.
[20:26] Speaker 5: Government to be involved in this. We've got an.
[20:28] Speaker 9: Alliance of eleven councils regional councils who want to be
[20:32] Speaker 9: part of this progress process that are all advocating for
[20:37] Speaker 9: a new hospital and a new site. So we've got
[20:39] Speaker 9: the local government. We need the state governments to be
[20:42] Speaker 9: accountable to ask for.
[20:44] Speaker 5: What we need here in our region.
[20:47] Speaker 9: And you know, as an independent I can knock on doors,
[20:50] Speaker 9: I can see people across aisles.
[20:52] Speaker 5: We have seen examples that we don't have.
[20:55] Speaker 9: The coalition have not been interested in this until this,
[20:58] Speaker 9: Until right now we're seeing is two hundred million dollars
[21:02] Speaker 9: in case they get elected.
[21:05] Speaker 5: There were ninety five beds short at that hospital. Today
[21:08] Speaker 5: the refirm.
[21:09] Speaker 9: Doesn't even have a pediatric in it. So you know,
[21:12] Speaker 9: this is just untenable to think that this is to
[21:18] Speaker 9: continue with the proposed bround Field development is the way
[21:22] Speaker 9: to go. We need a new hospital and a new site.
[21:24] Speaker 9: And my job, we'll be making sure that I'm advocating
[21:26] Speaker 9: and making sure that the states are held accountable for.
[21:29] Speaker 5: Their role in this as well.
[21:30] Speaker 2: And David, how would you get it done with immediacy?
[21:34] Speaker 1: The first thing is you're going to be able to
[21:36] Speaker 1: have the two states bring the federal government a business
[21:38] Speaker 1: plan and what they're going to do. So they've got
[21:40] Speaker 1: a lot of work to do. We've got to be
[21:42] Speaker 1: realistic with ourselves. The timeline and new hospital, we circle
[21:46] Speaker 1: ten to twelve or more years. Where does the state?
[21:50] Speaker 1: Where does the federal government play its biggest role. We'll
[21:52] Speaker 1: be in financing it, making sure it's right. How would
[21:55] Speaker 1: we finance it? We'd finance it quite simply. We'd take
[21:57] Speaker 1: the money. We'd be scrapping that zero and applying that
[22:00] Speaker 1: money to projects like this. But be assured that it's
[22:03] Speaker 1: just not Aubrey with a problem. Go to Pounecarey, go
[22:07] Speaker 1: to Goal Goal, go to Beal Reynald and work up
[22:09] Speaker 1: and down the river system. We've had twenty five years
[22:12] Speaker 1: in neglect of regional health in Parah. That's the price
[22:16] Speaker 1: of a safe seat. We have been neglected.
[22:19] Speaker 2: All right, thank you guys, get freak out it all right.
[22:22] Speaker 2: So even put a questioning about business, So fix some
[22:25] Speaker 2: pople in general. Who do you want to ask it of?
[22:28] Speaker 4: Probably Brad, What measures would you put in place to
[22:30] Speaker 4: support local business.
[22:31] Speaker 2: With the current state of the economy.
[22:34] Speaker 8: Yeah, good question, because I think small business generally that's
[22:38] Speaker 8: inclusive of farmers and small business people.
[22:41] Speaker 7: There's a lot of red tape.
[22:43] Speaker 8: We need to actually have a good look at the
[22:45] Speaker 8: tax system.
[22:46] Speaker 7: The tax system for regional.
[22:47] Speaker 8: Areas is the same for everywhere else, but it's not
[22:49] Speaker 8: attracting people out to here, so we don't have the
[22:52] Speaker 8: workforce we need to have a growing economy in our region,
[22:57] Speaker 8: so it's actually incentivizing that. So there are measures we
[23:01] Speaker 8: could do around tax to support small businesses in rural areas.
[23:07] Speaker 8: The problem for us is there's an overlap of what
[23:10] Speaker 8: the state governments are doing around payroll and those sorts
[23:13] Speaker 8: of things. So it's about influencing that. But really there
[23:16] Speaker 8: hasn't been the investment in regional areas to actually incentivize
[23:19] Speaker 8: people to move here or businesses to move here. And
[23:22] Speaker 8: you need an ecosystem to actually grow small businesses so
[23:26] Speaker 8: they actually have clients.
[23:27] Speaker 7: And you also need farms to be profitable.
[23:30] Speaker 8: Because farmers are actually the ones who are the reason
[23:33] Speaker 8: we have our regional centers.
[23:35] Speaker 7: So it's all those incumbers.
[23:36] Speaker 8: So it's not just about the tax settings, but it's
[23:40] Speaker 8: actually about the social aspects and the infrastructure aspects around
[23:43] Speaker 8: our communities to ensure that we actually have a growing population,
[23:47] Speaker 8: a growing economy, and that we are actually focused on
[23:50] Speaker 8: growing our regional centers.
[23:52] Speaker 3: Nochell, what would you do when it comes to small business?
[23:54] Speaker 9: Look, I think one of the biggest things that I'm
[23:56] Speaker 9: hearing from business people, particularly small business people, is the
[24:00] Speaker 9: burdens that they have are very.
[24:01] Speaker 5: Similar to that of large businesses.
[24:03] Speaker 9: So having frameworks for them, particularly around HR you know,
[24:08] Speaker 9: they're talking about the industry relation laws and you know,
[24:14] Speaker 9: workers compensation and things like that being similar for them
[24:17] Speaker 9: as they are for big business and it's.
[24:20] Speaker 5: Costing them a lot. It's costing them in time as well.
[24:23] Speaker 9: So making sure that we have mechanisms in place for
[24:27] Speaker 9: our small business owners that can access support in those
[24:31] Speaker 9: areas is crucially important. And it sort of comes down
[24:34] Speaker 9: to that red tape as well. You know, why is
[24:36] Speaker 9: it that we have a one size fits.
[24:37] Speaker 5: All for businesses, particularly regionally. One of the other things that's.
[24:41] Speaker 9: Come up time and time again across the electorate is
[24:45] Speaker 9: postal services and not having access to that. So anyone
[24:48] Speaker 9: that's wanting to do a business that requires postal is
[24:53] Speaker 9: finding that they're really constrained in the ways that they
[24:55] Speaker 9: can access support in that area. So looking that we've
[24:58] Speaker 9: got Australia posts withdrawing from many regional communities, we're seeing
[25:03] Speaker 9: that particularly one now at the moment is in Collyamberly.
[25:06] Speaker 9: We've had that service remove. So these are things that
[25:09] Speaker 9: are taken advantage of or taking for.
[25:11] Speaker 5: Granted in city areas that are really crucial to our
[25:14] Speaker 5: some more businesses here.
[25:15] Speaker 13: All right, Mark, you've got a question for us tonight,
[25:18] Speaker 13: Nick nick I apologize, thanks for coming down to Farr
[25:21] Speaker 13: and Paul. I need to know from every candidate, what
[25:23] Speaker 13: is your position with aspect to Australia developing a nuclear
[25:27] Speaker 13: energy program for electricity generation and should that be successful,
[25:31] Speaker 13: what would you do to kickstart the states and the
[25:33] Speaker 13: relative relevant government departments and getting on with it.
[25:37] Speaker 2: David, you go first.
[25:38] Speaker 1: I thought the first big stomach blockers we're going to
[25:41] Speaker 1: remove the moratorium on nuclear energy, and we're going to
[25:44] Speaker 1: start there imediately. Secondly, we supply uranium to circle four
[25:53] Speaker 1: hundred odd plants around the world. We're going to go
[25:55] Speaker 1: and find the best copy the best do and do better,
[26:00] Speaker 1: start arranging an investment model to be able to bring
[26:04] Speaker 1: nuclear energy into our mix.
[26:06] Speaker 2: Michelle, nuclear energy.
[26:10] Speaker 5: I think obviously we need to get rid of the moratorium.
[26:13] Speaker 9: But the other thing too is that you know, we
[26:16] Speaker 9: need to lower energy costs right now, and we know
[26:18] Speaker 9: that nuclear energy is something that's going to take time
[26:21] Speaker 9: and is well into the future if we have a
[26:23] Speaker 9: look at other models from around the world. So whilst
[26:26] Speaker 9: it's great in terms of it's it's clean and green
[26:29] Speaker 9: and good energy and that that way, realistically the economics
[26:34] Speaker 9: of it and at the time frame and not what
[26:37] Speaker 9: we need to lower costs right now. So it's about
[26:40] Speaker 9: looking at what we have and how we can balance that.
[26:42] Speaker 3: All right, You got to follow up one, Okay, would
[26:45] Speaker 3: you vote no?
[26:46] Speaker 13: So would you vote to repeal those provisions and our
[26:49] Speaker 13: PENZA and the Environment Act that say it's illegal to
[26:52] Speaker 13: use uranium for generation.
[26:54] Speaker 9: I would certainly need more information to be able to
[26:57] Speaker 9: make an informed vote on that.
[26:59] Speaker 3: But she said that she would vote against you would
[27:01] Speaker 3: vote for lifting the moratorium.
[27:03] Speaker 2: Did you say that?
[27:03] Speaker 9: Well, yeah, if it's something that's a viable option and
[27:06] Speaker 9: we can look at it, then you know, again, I
[27:08] Speaker 9: don't have enough information right now to you know, to
[27:11] Speaker 9: be able to answer that correctly.
[27:13] Speaker 2: Yeah, all right, good on you, Nick, Thank you. I
[27:14] Speaker 2: do appreciate it. All right.
[27:16] Speaker 3: Now, we're going to take a break right now, give
[27:17] Speaker 3: everyone a little break. And I will tell you this
[27:19] Speaker 3: straight after the break, when the candidates start to ask
[27:22] Speaker 3: each other some questions, and if they missed the obvious,
[27:25] Speaker 3: I will gladly ask on your behalf more in a.
[27:27] Speaker 2: Secon here I bought murray light from Wawbrey. Here in
[27:30] Speaker 2: the alected of Pharaoh, we're having a pub test tonight,
[27:33] Speaker 2: hope you I thing's going at home watching.
[27:40] Speaker 3: All the idea for the pub tult in the inepedible
[27:42] Speaker 3: feet of Pharah, we have before us the four people
[27:44] Speaker 3: who by Saturday may well be the next federal members
[27:47] Speaker 3: for the seat of Pharah.
[27:50] Speaker 2: I'm sure you're all very tired.
[27:51] Speaker 3: I'm sure you will want to thank your families, and
[27:52] Speaker 3: I'm sure you will want to thank your supporters. But
[27:54] Speaker 3: here's the bit where some of the people who might
[27:56] Speaker 3: be sitting back and haven't quite heard what they wanted
[27:59] Speaker 3: to thus far out of our discussion, get to hear it. Well,
[28:02] Speaker 3: each of you asking each other questions. All right, so
[28:06] Speaker 3: randomly selected in my head, David, what is your question?
[28:09] Speaker 3: Who would you like to ask it of.
[28:13] Speaker 1: Yourself? Raise it? The cost of energy is killing Australia.
[28:18] Speaker 1: We're one nation, We've got a policy in the program
[28:21] Speaker 1: to scrap net zero, you get right out of net zero?
[28:24] Speaker 1: Where do you stand on net zero? And would you
[28:27] Speaker 1: be prepared to pull out of the Paris agreement?
[28:29] Speaker 12: Okay, I.
[28:35] Speaker 6: Again coming back to the nuclear argument. If people are people,
[28:40] Speaker 6: I mean the current labor to green government, if they
[28:44] Speaker 6: are legitimately serious about affordable, reliable, net zero energy, nuclear
[28:50] Speaker 6: absolutely needs to be on the table and we need
[28:52] Speaker 6: to be having discussions around that, robust discussions.
[28:57] Speaker 12: Ultimately.
[28:58] Speaker 6: It's yeah, I mean, the position is the position you'd
[29:03] Speaker 6: come out of Paris? Well, it would be something that
[29:06] Speaker 6: I would have to you know, it would be a
[29:08] Speaker 6: party room discussion.
[29:09] Speaker 12: Absolutely.
[29:10] Speaker 2: All right. Michelle, your question, who are you going to
[29:13] Speaker 2: ask it of?
[29:15] Speaker 5: I'm going to ask it of David.
[29:17] Speaker 9: Just around the hospital and the idea that of a
[29:21] Speaker 9: public private partnership that you put forward, can you sort
[29:26] Speaker 9: of tell us what that would look like.
[29:30] Speaker 1: What I put forward in my discussions traveling the hospital journey,
[29:33] Speaker 1: understanding what it was, how to operate it was looked
[29:36] Speaker 1: at international models and domestic models in that and considered
[29:41] Speaker 1: all options. The reality is that we've got to build
[29:45] Speaker 1: a new hospital. It's got to be an Australian hospital.
[29:48] Speaker 1: It's going to take us time, it's going to definitely
[29:51] Speaker 1: take us finance, and it needs to be able to
[29:53] Speaker 1: service the region. But the first thing we've got to
[29:55] Speaker 1: be able to do is put an agreement together between
[29:57] Speaker 1: two states, Victoria and New Southway. And that's not all
[30:01] Speaker 1: that hard because we've done it in Queensland recently on
[30:03] Speaker 1: the on the River's the Twin Rivers Hospital on the
[30:06] Speaker 1: Gold Coaster and the Tweed Rivers Hospital itself. So what
[30:11] Speaker 1: we've got to do first of all is bring bring
[30:14] Speaker 1: our community together, all the councils, bring our states together,
[30:17] Speaker 1: get a business plan, get it in front of the
[30:19] Speaker 1: federal government and then start advancing it. And that's going
[30:22] Speaker 1: to happen now, not in the future, but at the
[30:24] Speaker 1: same time the five hundred and fifty million dollars. We're
[30:27] Speaker 1: going into the Brownfield state. We need to ensure we
[30:30] Speaker 1: can complete that project. We don't want to end up
[30:33] Speaker 1: with a descavator of the operating room and not being
[30:35] Speaker 1: able to operate. So it's imperative that we don't want
[30:38] Speaker 1: to open vulnerability to Aubrey or the Aubrey region at all.
[30:42] Speaker 2: So we must complete it. Thanks all right, Brad, who's
[30:45] Speaker 2: your question.
[30:45] Speaker 7: Of what is it to Michelle?
[30:48] Speaker 8: So today when we were at polling birth so you
[30:52] Speaker 8: must yourself. Myself and race Or were there and we're
[30:57] Speaker 8: chased by some media and they wanted to know a
[30:59] Speaker 8: bit about trans parents said they couldn't find David, but
[31:02] Speaker 8: they wanted to have a chat with us. They were
[31:05] Speaker 8: asking us about transparency in a range of things. And
[31:09] Speaker 8: one of the things that I really want to answer
[31:11] Speaker 8: from you is about the Climate two hundred. And now
[31:17] Speaker 8: I've got an email that your office sent to Climate
[31:21] Speaker 8: two hundred back on the fifth of March asking for
[31:24] Speaker 8: support financial support, and then on the sixth of March,
[31:29] Speaker 8: Climate two hundred sent it out to all of their
[31:32] Speaker 8: recipients again Climate two hundred asking for more money to
[31:35] Speaker 8: support your campaign.
[31:37] Speaker 7: Noting that Climate two hundred doesn't.
[31:39] Speaker 8: Support candidates that don't have a net zero sorry, a
[31:44] Speaker 8: climate change agenda.
[31:47] Speaker 7: How do you respond to that?
[31:49] Speaker 9: Yeah, so i'n I've already answered, and I've been very
[31:54] Speaker 9: transparent about taking money from Climate two hundred, and I
[31:58] Speaker 9: did get twenty thousand is at the start of my
[32:01] Speaker 9: campaign this time to support that, and I've had lots
[32:06] Speaker 9: of donations.
[32:06] Speaker 5: From across the country since then. So I've been open
[32:09] Speaker 5: and honest about that.
[32:11] Speaker 9: I don't have any difficulty in saying that as an independent,
[32:14] Speaker 9: I'm the only person that you will ever know where
[32:16] Speaker 9: my money came from.
[32:19] Speaker 5: Last election.
[32:20] Speaker 9: We know that if we have reached out the Liberal
[32:22] Speaker 9: Party donations, it was one point three million dollars across
[32:25] Speaker 9: for every electorate across the country. So you know, my
[32:29] Speaker 9: donations were very transparent at the time. So in terms
[32:34] Speaker 9: of climate agenda, my positions have been informed by the
[32:38] Speaker 9: people that I've spoken to across the electorate.
[32:40] Speaker 5: And what we need here.
[32:41] Speaker 9: So my position on water has been clear for the
[32:44] Speaker 9: last two years is that we need to stop water
[32:46] Speaker 9: buybacks right now, and that's in you know, that's what
[32:49] Speaker 9: we need here right now.
[32:51] Speaker 5: We need transparency and accountability around water. Those are the
[32:55] Speaker 5: things that are needed in our electorates.
[32:57] Speaker 9: So though I might be funded by Climate in part
[33:01] Speaker 9: there is no reciprocation in terms of me having to
[33:05] Speaker 9: follow an agenda that they don't have policies for.
[33:08] Speaker 8: But they're actually on their website supporting you, and they
[33:13] Speaker 8: say they do not support candidates that don't support the
[33:17] Speaker 8: climate change agenda.
[33:19] Speaker 5: Yes, so again they've supported me.
[33:23] Speaker 9: They're very familiar with my positions, which again have been
[33:26] Speaker 9: unchanged for the last two years and have been set by.
[33:28] Speaker 5: The people of this electorate.
[33:30] Speaker 2: Right, Razor David, thank you return serve. I love this.
[33:39] Speaker 6: So you sought pre selection with the Labor Party at
[33:43] Speaker 6: the twenty twenty two Pharah election. You last year supported
[33:49] Speaker 6: the Teal Independent and you have donated to both Labor
[33:54] Speaker 6: and Teal campaigns. Why did it take them media releasing
[34:00] Speaker 6: that story for that information to come to light.
[34:04] Speaker 1: Well, I think the media can answer that. The journey
[34:08] Speaker 1: I've traveled was out of frustration twenty five years of
[34:14] Speaker 1: neglect in Parar. I've returned to Parar. I tried to
[34:18] Speaker 1: engage politically in Farar, especially across the critical issues of
[34:21] Speaker 1: water in particular, and had no success at all. I
[34:24] Speaker 1: investigated all options. I investigated the option of running as
[34:29] Speaker 1: an independent like Michelle's doing, and had Michelle twice in
[34:32] Speaker 1: my office. Wasn't it Michelle going through and understanding a
[34:35] Speaker 1: capabilities of what she could do. I went right through
[34:38] Speaker 1: it all with the Nationals and we had paren Davia,
[34:41] Speaker 1: Senator for New South Wales from the Nationals who was
[34:43] Speaker 1: a shadow water Minister and water minister at one time.
[34:46] Speaker 1: We had Susan Lee as the Environmental Minister, so I
[34:52] Speaker 1: saw capability there. Then I went to the Labor Party
[34:55] Speaker 1: and tried to understand to get in the door there.
[34:57] Speaker 1: I had to talk to Transport Workers Union, I've talked
[35:01] Speaker 1: to the to do the Meatpackers Union, I've talked to
[35:04] Speaker 1: the AWU. What can they do? And there's no interest
[35:08] Speaker 1: in Pharah. There's no interest in Para at allus. Plus
[35:11] Speaker 1: I had a little bit of a conversation about Julia
[35:13] Speaker 1: gillode once that upset them. But there is no interest
[35:18] Speaker 1: from the Labor Party in there. So the reality is
[35:21] Speaker 1: culturally I didn't fit for them and they don't fit
[35:24] Speaker 1: for Parah. It's as simple as that they are not
[35:26] Speaker 1: aligned for Para of what we are We're an agricultural powerhouse,
[35:31] Speaker 1: agribusiness powerhouse with great community services. They're not here on
[35:35] Speaker 1: the platform today, they're not in the campaign. They're not
[35:37] Speaker 1: interested in Pharaoh. Simple as that you applied.
[35:40] Speaker 7: You applied for pre selection with the Labor Party. It
[35:44] Speaker 7: wasn't that you disagreed.
[35:45] Speaker 8: You were sixty, right, and you applied for pre selection
[35:49] Speaker 8: for the Labor Party. And the Labor Party is anti farmers.
[35:53] Speaker 7: So how did you do that? You applied for pre selection.
[35:56] Speaker 1: I put my hand, I put my hand up with
[35:58] Speaker 1: the National Party for try and get pre selection.
[36:00] Speaker 3: There is great, you know, but the reality they're very
[36:02] Speaker 3: fundamentally different.
[36:03] Speaker 1: Mate, they are different. But you weren't doing the job
[36:06] Speaker 1: for Parah.
[36:06] Speaker 2: That was they weren't doing the job.
[36:10] Speaker 7: I was in the army at the time that you
[36:12] Speaker 7: were played mat All.
[36:12] Speaker 3: Right, host privilege to step in now, host privilege to
[36:16] Speaker 3: step in, although there is part of me that just
[36:17] Speaker 3: wants to let it go for another jib yeah bug,
[36:20] Speaker 3: all right, what were you about to say?
[36:22] Speaker 6: I was just about to say, recognizing everything the spiel
[36:25] Speaker 6: that you've just given to everybody, You've only released that
[36:31] Speaker 6: information after the media made it public, Like, why did
[36:34] Speaker 6: you not go to the voters because ultimately this this
[36:38] Speaker 6: this election, people want transparency and accountability, Like why did
[36:41] Speaker 6: you not go to the voters first? Why did the
[36:43] Speaker 6: media have to bring this to everybody's attention.
[36:45] Speaker 1: You know, I've been on this campaign trail now for
[36:48] Speaker 1: I'm quite sure how any eastwards, pushing into probably two months.
[36:52] Speaker 1: Everywhere I've gone, I've explained to the audiences I've had
[36:56] Speaker 1: my journey and what I've had to go through, and
[36:58] Speaker 1: the words I've used to diet there the same words
[37:01] Speaker 1: I've used right across the electorate. You know, whether I'm
[37:03] Speaker 1: in Pouncry or down at goal Go or in Bale Roynald,
[37:06] Speaker 1: or up at Helston or down at Hay is the
[37:08] Speaker 1: reality is? I said, here's my journey to get here today.
[37:12] Speaker 1: More importantly, here's my capability. Here's my understanding of Pharaoh.
[37:15] Speaker 1: I understand the subject matter. Here's what I've done across
[37:18] Speaker 1: the political parties to work out where it is. It's
[37:20] Speaker 1: been no secret on the journey I've traveled.
[37:23] Speaker 3: All right, Now, let us get back to some of
[37:26] Speaker 3: the other people asking their questions. I loved every second
[37:29] Speaker 3: of that, I really did, all right, So mark your question,
[37:32] Speaker 3: which sort of leads into part of where we've just been.
[37:34] Speaker 2: But your question to these.
[37:35] Speaker 14: Candidates, Yeah, thanks Paul, and good evening candidates. So, as
[37:39] Speaker 14: we've already mentioned, preference preferences are likely to play a
[37:43] Speaker 14: really key role in the outcome of this by election.
[37:46] Speaker 14: So to help inform voters, can the candidates please share
[37:49] Speaker 14: who they are preferencing?
[37:51] Speaker 3: All right, Michelle, I'll start with you after your number one,
[37:54] Speaker 3: what's two and three?
[37:55] Speaker 9: And look, as an independent, I don't think I should
[37:58] Speaker 9: be telling people how to think.
[38:00] Speaker 5: So I've asked that people number one, Michelle Milthorpe, and
[38:03] Speaker 5: then number of every box from there.
[38:06] Speaker 3: Are you issuing how to vote card? That has ranked
[38:10] Speaker 3: I've got.
[38:10] Speaker 9: It how to vote card, and it has me in
[38:13] Speaker 9: the second position with number one, and then it's just
[38:16] Speaker 9: got the boxes with.
[38:18] Speaker 5: No names but numbers in it.
[38:20] Speaker 2: Okay, Brad.
[38:22] Speaker 7: So I've said this a number of times.
[38:24] Speaker 8: We are preferencing conservative parties first and then the rest
[38:29] Speaker 8: after that. I hope that any of those conservative parties
[38:32] Speaker 8: won't become labor parties people, But you never know, right.
[38:37] Speaker 2: David how what's what's your list?
[38:41] Speaker 9: You know?
[38:41] Speaker 2: Pharaoh?
[38:42] Speaker 1: To understand Pharaoh, is that Parah works under conservative governments.
[38:46] Speaker 1: Our first preference believed, and it was to Brad. I
[38:49] Speaker 1: can't ask myself why tone and our second and our
[38:53] Speaker 1: second preferences to the Liberal Party. But the reality is it's,
[38:56] Speaker 1: you know, for agriculture, agribusiness, conservative governments work and more importantly,
[39:01] Speaker 1: if they're challenged, they should work better and racer.
[39:05] Speaker 6: Yes, So obviously in a coalition with Brad, so here
[39:08] Speaker 6: is our number two, we chose to preference the Green
[39:12] Speaker 6: and the Teal. Independents are further down at the bottom
[39:15] Speaker 6: simply because they're policies. They are the complete antithesis to
[39:18] Speaker 6: Liberal Party policies.
[39:20] Speaker 2: All right, So I'll go there.
[39:22] Speaker 3: The reference to Teal has been made a couple of times, Michelle,
[39:24] Speaker 3: I've seen in other interviews.
[39:26] Speaker 2: It's a label that you don't choose to wear.
[39:30] Speaker 3: Instead, there's a fight over orange here about who is
[39:33] Speaker 3: more orange, whether it's one nation or yourself. Let's again
[39:37] Speaker 3: deal with the head on that question of just how
[39:41] Speaker 3: teely or not teely are you.
[39:43] Speaker 9: Well. You know, as I've said to these guys before,
[39:46] Speaker 9: they've clearly not read my positions or David has, because
[39:50] Speaker 9: our policies are quite similar but they have not read
[39:55] Speaker 9: my positions, because if you read my positions, you say
[39:58] Speaker 9: that they are informed by the people of our As
[40:00] Speaker 9: I said no more water buybacks. We have seen City
[40:04] Speaker 9: Independence vote against vote for water buybacks and the Restoring
[40:09] Speaker 9: Our River Act, and my policies simply just don't show
[40:15] Speaker 9: alignment in those things.
[40:16] Speaker 5: So you know, I grew up in Cudemundra. My mum
[40:20] Speaker 5: thinks it's.
[40:21] Speaker 9: Laughable that I get called that, And you know, my
[40:25] Speaker 9: reality is that my positions are informed by the people
[40:28] Speaker 9: of this electorate.
[40:29] Speaker 5: I was endorsed by a community group.
[40:33] Speaker 9: I wear orange because Kathy McGowan started that as a
[40:36] Speaker 9: regionally independent over the River. There was certainly not a
[40:39] Speaker 9: lot of orange on their polling beasts other than Michelle
[40:41] Speaker 9: Miltop last year. So you know, my reality is that
[40:45] Speaker 9: I want to be a regional representative and that's who
[40:49] Speaker 9: I am.
[40:50] Speaker 3: David, if I don't ask a follow up question here
[40:52] Speaker 3: as well, and this is sort of the obvious question,
[40:56] Speaker 3: which is when you've talked about your own journey, and
[40:59] Speaker 3: there are people that I've talked to in the electorate
[41:01] Speaker 3: who wonder whether if you're elected on Saturday as a
[41:05] Speaker 3: one nation MP, would you be still a one nation
[41:08] Speaker 3: MP at the federal election in twenty twenty eight. What
[41:11] Speaker 3: commitment can you give to people who will vote for
[41:14] Speaker 3: you to be a one nation MP that you will
[41:16] Speaker 3: stay a one nation MP.
[41:19] Speaker 1: I've got three clear jobs to do. One is win
[41:22] Speaker 1: on the ninth, which I want to do. Two, I
[41:25] Speaker 1: want to build a foundation to change and bring product,
[41:28] Speaker 1: pedity and capacity back to Pharah. Three I'm going to
[41:32] Speaker 1: contest the twenty eight election and at the same time
[41:35] Speaker 1: I'm going to help Pauline Hanson and the team build
[41:38] Speaker 1: one hell of a political party to be of prominence
[41:41] Speaker 1: and relevance in the Australian democracy. I'm there absolutely for
[41:46] Speaker 1: the long day.
[41:47] Speaker 2: Thank you, David, appreciating all right? Cleeven up, one down?
[41:51] Speaker 2: All right, Stephen? What have you got here for us? Mate?
[41:52] Speaker 2: What's your question?
[41:53] Speaker 15: More questions for David and Michelle, which is, how do
[41:57] Speaker 15: you plan to convince the constituents in Pharaoh that watering
[41:59] Speaker 15: down the major parties even further will benefit the constituency.
[42:03] Speaker 5: Michelle, So watering down the major parties?
[42:06] Speaker 2: Explain what does that mean to you?
[42:08] Speaker 15: Well, we've got we've currently got an independent across the
[42:13] Speaker 15: border who votes forty eight percent with the government forty
[42:16] Speaker 15: eight percent against the government. If you want to have
[42:19] Speaker 15: fifty cents each way, I'm not really convinced that that's
[42:22] Speaker 15: the way to go. I think you need to pick
[42:24] Speaker 15: a side and go with it.
[42:26] Speaker 9: Look, I would argue that we've we've picked aside for
[42:29] Speaker 9: a really long time.
[42:30] Speaker 5: We've got nothing done here for a really long time.
[42:33] Speaker 5: So I'm a disaffected Liberal National voter. My family has been.
[42:38] Speaker 9: I've been brought up in that way, and I was certainly,
[42:42] Speaker 9: you know, looking when I was running as an independent,
[42:46] Speaker 9: it was because I was just not seeing representation here.
[42:48] Speaker 9: So I think, and I've explained it very well to
[42:53] Speaker 9: my Paul Murray watching mum, is that until the major
[42:58] Speaker 9: parties get a shake and understand that we don't see
[43:03] Speaker 9: them representing our values anymore, they're going to keep doing
[43:06] Speaker 9: the same thing they are and right now, that's not
[43:08] Speaker 9: representing the people who chose to put them into power.
[43:12] Speaker 9: So we've got a lot of people sitting in Parliament
[43:14] Speaker 9: that are too busy fighting one another and fighting themselves
[43:18] Speaker 9: for a career instead of representing us, which is what their.
[43:20] Speaker 5: Job was meant to be.
[43:22] Speaker 3: David's same question about not being part of the major
[43:26] Speaker 3: party of government or opposition at this stage, how that
[43:29] Speaker 3: actually helps Fara.
[43:32] Speaker 1: The reality is Fara has been failed, it's been left behind,
[43:35] Speaker 1: has been neglected. We bring to the constituents our policies,
[43:40] Speaker 1: our energy, our courage and our tenacity. But it's the
[43:43] Speaker 1: constituents out here in Pharaoh who are going to make
[43:45] Speaker 1: a decision on the ninth of what they think of
[43:48] Speaker 1: the major parties.
[43:49] Speaker 2: It's not up to us ours is.
[43:50] Speaker 1: We've got policy, we've got programs, and we've got teams
[43:53] Speaker 1: to go, and the decision will be made by everyone
[43:57] Speaker 1: here and out in the broader Pharaoh.
[44:00] Speaker 2: Good stuff, Thank you very much to appreciate it. Well.
[44:02] Speaker 3: I've asked a couple of tough questions of both the
[44:04] Speaker 3: Independent and of the One Nation candidate. The Libs and
[44:08] Speaker 3: Nats will cop one next?
[44:09] Speaker 2: All right?
[44:09] Speaker 3: Quick after the break here Paul Murray live and the
[44:11] Speaker 3: pub test, we're more questions from the good people of Parah,
[44:14] Speaker 3: who will keep one of these four people to be
[44:15] Speaker 3: their next federal MP. Welcome back to the pop test
[44:24] Speaker 3: here in Farah, in beautiful Aubrey.
[44:26] Speaker 2: Thank you very much for joining us.
[44:28] Speaker 3: Of course, all of our lovely it couldn't say contestants,
[44:33] Speaker 3: but no candidates.
[44:34] Speaker 2: Of course, it's the official term in politics, isn't it.
[44:36] Speaker 3: Here we're all involved in a great example of Australian democracy,
[44:40] Speaker 3: which is normal people get to ask normal questions. Suzanne
[44:43] Speaker 3: is about to do, so who would you like to
[44:45] Speaker 3: ask it of?
[44:46] Speaker 2: My friend?
[44:47] Speaker 12: Maybe Raiser?
[44:47] Speaker 2: Okay, let's go.
[44:49] Speaker 10: So I'm a farmer from Blighty and about approximately eighteen
[44:53] Speaker 10: weeks ago we didn't know whether we were going to
[44:56] Speaker 10: get diesel to be able to plan a crop and
[44:58] Speaker 10: do My question to you is that what would you
[45:01] Speaker 10: do to give us food security?
[45:04] Speaker 12: Food or fuel?
[45:06] Speaker 5: Food security?
[45:07] Speaker 10: Because if you can't plant the crop, you don't get
[45:09] Speaker 10: any food.
[45:12] Speaker 6: So it is an obligation of the government of the
[45:15] Speaker 6: day to ensure that there is enough fuel supply and
[45:18] Speaker 6: that that fuel gets to where it needs to get to.
[45:20] Speaker 6: I have spoken with many farmers who were making the
[45:23] Speaker 6: heartbreaking decision as to whether, you know, they may have
[45:26] Speaker 6: enough fuel to put seed in the ground, but they
[45:28] Speaker 6: may not actually have enough fuel for harvest. And that's
[45:31] Speaker 6: not just a one season issue. It can turn into
[45:34] Speaker 6: a multiple season issue for farmers. Ultimately, you know, the
[45:39] Speaker 6: Liberal Party's policy is very clear, we need to be
[45:41] Speaker 6: digging and drilling and ensuring our own sovereign capability in
[45:45] Speaker 6: terms of fuel because that's how our machinery works, right.
[45:49] Speaker 6: So I think that we need to have a strong
[45:52] Speaker 6: representative voice and as my friend Tony Abbitt said yesterday
[45:57] Speaker 6: that we actually need a voice of faring Cambra, not
[46:01] Speaker 6: a Canberra's voice too Fara. So it's really important because
[46:06] Speaker 6: I do recognize that farmers feel left behind. They are
[46:10] Speaker 6: the lifeblood of our communities and they are the major
[46:14] Speaker 6: food well of our communities as well. So ultimately the
[46:19] Speaker 6: Liberal government have proven we were very strong with our
[46:22] Speaker 6: harving of the fuel excise.
[46:24] Speaker 12: Initially the Prime Minister.
[46:25] Speaker 6: Was not keen on doing that, but the advocacy of
[46:28] Speaker 6: the Liberal Party was strong and we managed to get
[46:31] Speaker 6: the Prime Minister to agree to that. So I think
[46:33] Speaker 6: that level of strong advocacy is necessary and it's something
[46:36] Speaker 6: that I will continue to commit to to advocating for
[46:39] Speaker 6: our farmers, in our irrigators, in the agricultural community.
[46:42] Speaker 3: Okay, all right, thank you Susan, appreciate it. Just you
[46:46] Speaker 3: mentioned Tony Abbott before. Obviously you know I like to
[46:49] Speaker 3: ride the elephant in the room as we have noticed
[46:51] Speaker 3: this evening. Susan Lee has not seemingly played any public role.
[46:55] Speaker 3: Has she played a private role in your campaign? Has
[46:59] Speaker 3: she told you which public school to go to on
[47:01] Speaker 3: what particular day? Because it is a fairly obvious absence
[47:05] Speaker 3: of an MP who represented the area for as long
[47:08] Speaker 3: as she did.
[47:09] Speaker 6: Yeah, So I would like to just give Susan a
[47:11] Speaker 6: shout out. She did give our country twenty five years
[47:13] Speaker 6: of service and it's a wonderful achievement. And she was
[47:17] Speaker 6: very strong as well, and I personally got to thank
[47:20] Speaker 6: her for that. She has provided me with some relief, age,
[47:23] Speaker 6: wisdom and advice. I was very thankful for that as well.
[47:28] Speaker 6: We need to recognize that Susan is now a private candidate, candidate, citizen, sorry,
[47:34] Speaker 6: and she is just enjoying a well deserved break.
[47:39] Speaker 2: Does it disappoint you that she's not out and about.
[47:42] Speaker 12: No, not really. I think it's not Susan's name on
[47:45] Speaker 12: the ballad, it's.
[47:45] Speaker 2: Mine, okay, Brad.
[47:48] Speaker 3: Obviously is the situation with the National Party that is
[47:53] Speaker 3: clearly been challenged right now by One Nation, and one
[47:55] Speaker 3: of the claims of One Nation is that the National
[47:57] Speaker 3: Party has had its time to make its case how
[48:00] Speaker 3: to be able to reform the system from within again,
[48:05] Speaker 3: how is it not going to end up being more
[48:06] Speaker 3: of the same that eventually it is the head of
[48:09] Speaker 3: the Liberal Party that will decide whether or not the
[48:12] Speaker 3: tale of the National Party gets what it wants.
[48:15] Speaker 8: I think you just have to look at all the
[48:17] Speaker 8: national seats around the country and what happened at the
[48:19] Speaker 8: last election.
[48:20] Speaker 7: They didn't go backwards.
[48:21] Speaker 8: The reason they didn't go backwards is that they represent
[48:24] Speaker 8: their electorates and they've done that for one hundred and
[48:26] Speaker 8: eight years. And the fact is both these people who
[48:30] Speaker 8: have been slagging the coalition can't go back further than
[48:33] Speaker 8: twenty five years because when you do that, you start
[48:36] Speaker 8: to get into Tim Fisher's period. And no one wants
[48:39] Speaker 8: to say that period. Why because Nationals represent and fight
[48:42] Speaker 8: for their regions. So as a result, they'll want to
[48:46] Speaker 8: contain your view to twenty five years and not think
[48:49] Speaker 8: about that period when the Nationals were here and the
[48:52] Speaker 8: Nationals represented, and the Nationals put in all that infrastructure
[48:56] Speaker 8: and supported the people of Parah. But of course try
[49:00] Speaker 8: to pretend that didn't exist because it goes with what
[49:03] Speaker 8: they're trying to do here, which is wedge us Honestly,
[49:07] Speaker 8: Nationals have always fought for the regions. They only fight
[49:10] Speaker 8: for the regions and they're the best party to represent
[49:12] Speaker 8: the regions.
[49:13] Speaker 3: All Right, The issue of water is massive in the electorate.
[49:21] Speaker 3: It is complicated, and I understand that it takes longer
[49:24] Speaker 3: than an answer on a television show, but let's give
[49:26] Speaker 3: it a crack, right again, all four of you here,
[49:28] Speaker 3: same type of question that I asked about the hospital
[49:31] Speaker 3: and health, which is about how you would get a
[49:34] Speaker 3: better result for the electorate, Michelle, when it comes to water,
[49:39] Speaker 3: how would you be able to achieve that?
[49:41] Speaker 9: Well, we've seen successive governments failing this. So I think
[49:46] Speaker 9: the topic and the subject of water is so complex,
[49:50] Speaker 9: and we know that the Murray Daling Basin Review is
[49:53] Speaker 9: happening right now, so understanding and looking at the submissions
[49:57] Speaker 9: of that is really important.
[49:58] Speaker 5: We have siloed water. We have said that we have
[50:02] Speaker 5: environmental water and we have human water, and we cannot
[50:05] Speaker 5: do that. The consumptive pool needs to be bigger. We've
[50:08] Speaker 5: got seventy two percent.
[50:09] Speaker 9: Of our water right now belongs to the environment, which
[50:13] Speaker 9: you know, it's absurd. We've got we've got wetland environments
[50:17] Speaker 9: on farmland and we're not recognizing that in the way
[50:20] Speaker 9: that the government is legislating around this. So the first
[50:24] Speaker 9: thing that needs to happen is that we need to
[50:26] Speaker 9: look at transparency around how we got to this.
[50:29] Speaker 5: So I'm calling for a Royal Commission into water.
[50:32] Speaker 9: I did that on the very first day that I
[50:34] Speaker 9: announced that I was coming running again, and that goes
[50:38] Speaker 9: alongside of what Helen Dalton has been doing from a
[50:40] Speaker 9: state level. We need transparency around that. We need to
[50:43] Speaker 9: compel evidence. There are too many things that are happening
[50:46] Speaker 9: in this space that don't make sense. We can't put
[50:50] Speaker 9: the toothpaste back into the tube. So we know that
[50:53] Speaker 9: restoring water rights to land is something that's not going
[50:56] Speaker 9: to be able to happen. Why is it that Canadian
[50:58] Speaker 9: super Fund's own so much of our water here in
[51:01] Speaker 9: Australia when we've got farmers on their knees or people
[51:03] Speaker 9: paying five hundred and fifty dollars a meg for water, We've.
[51:07] Speaker 5: Got farmers choosing not to plan.
[51:09] Speaker 9: So you know the first thing is that no more
[51:12] Speaker 9: water buybacks. We need to stop the water buybacks. We
[51:14] Speaker 9: need to be able to have farmers and communities, regional communities,
[51:20] Speaker 9: people having a say over how this goes forward. We
[51:23] Speaker 9: need people with experience and lived experience to be part
[51:26] Speaker 9: of the questioning the decision making going forward. We've got
[51:30] Speaker 9: people with really great ideas and knowledge that are being
[51:33] Speaker 9: overlooked by people in Canberra who are sitting in an
[51:36] Speaker 9: office with no idea about what's happening out here. So
[51:39] Speaker 9: they're the things that I would be advocating for. Is
[51:41] Speaker 9: you know, we need a Royal Commission because we need
[51:43] Speaker 9: to compel evidence. We need transparency and accountability.
[51:46] Speaker 5: We need to stop the.
[51:48] Speaker 9: Water buybacks now, and we need to make sure that
[51:51] Speaker 9: we're looking at foreign ownership and getting our water back
[51:54] Speaker 9: into a strained hands.
[51:55] Speaker 2: We're coming up to the top of the hour.
[51:56] Speaker 3: For those that are watching at home, kindly, the late
[51:58] Speaker 3: debate is going to lend us a few minutes of
[52:00] Speaker 3: their time. They will be on this evening, but we'll
[52:03] Speaker 3: continue on in our conversation here and then after the
[52:06] Speaker 3: break we'll have an opportunity for the final pictures from everyone.
[52:09] Speaker 3: But David again, the quick pitch here when it comes
[52:11] Speaker 3: to how you're going to deal with the water issue, Well, the.
[52:14] Speaker 1: First and most important thing is water is a sovereign asset.
[52:17] Speaker 1: Of the nation. It's just not an environmental asset. It
[52:20] Speaker 1: drives our food chain, it drives our regional security, it
[52:25] Speaker 1: drives our food affordability, and ultimately it drives our national security.
[52:29] Speaker 1: So what we're going to do is take the lens off,
[52:31] Speaker 1: keep the lens on the environment for what we need
[52:33] Speaker 1: to achieve, but then start looking at what we've got
[52:36] Speaker 1: to achieve, and that is how do we secure a
[52:38] Speaker 1: nation with our water across a host of areas and
[52:42] Speaker 1: it will. Instead of operating an extraction model and taking
[52:44] Speaker 1: away water from our food production, we need to have
[52:47] Speaker 1: an investment model determining how much we need, where do
[52:50] Speaker 1: we need to invest and bring productivity and capacity back
[52:53] Speaker 1: into Australia. Because it's no longer a problem in the bush.
[52:56] Speaker 1: It's not a Pharaoh issue anymore. It's a supermarket issue
[52:59] Speaker 1: right across Australia. The Murray Darling Basin is costing every
[53:03] Speaker 1: Australian more for their food today. We want to have
[53:07] Speaker 1: a royal commission immediately. We want to understand why are
[53:10] Speaker 1: we involved in international agreements that are interfering with our
[53:14] Speaker 1: water management capacity. Is that good for Australia or is
[53:17] Speaker 1: it not a royal Commission and inquiry. Some would say
[53:22] Speaker 1: some would say, we can't do that because the Labor
[53:24] Speaker 1: Party will put the terms of condition. Be honest, you,
[53:26] Speaker 1: we don't fear the Labor Party on that because we're
[53:29] Speaker 1: representing our approach with you to represent all Australians to
[53:32] Speaker 1: get the cost of food down and the best way
[53:35] Speaker 1: to get it down is to produce it here in
[53:37] Speaker 1: the nation. Well, I'm just going to push.
[53:39] Speaker 2: Our scheduled next commercial break by nineteen seconds to get
[53:42] Speaker 2: a respond from that NATS and lips.
[53:45] Speaker 8: Yeah, so he may not fear Labor, but Labor has
[53:50] Speaker 8: control of both the Lower House and with the Greens
[53:53] Speaker 8: the Upper House. You call for a Royal commission and
[53:57] Speaker 8: the result of that will be they'll set the terms
[53:59] Speaker 8: of cane. It's not about fear, it's about the results
[54:02] Speaker 8: for farmers. So we want a Commission of Inquiry to
[54:05] Speaker 8: actually look at the common Wealth environmental water holder, why
[54:09] Speaker 8: they've got so much water, how it's being monitored and managed.
[54:12] Speaker 8: The fact is they can't release any of that water
[54:14] Speaker 8: at the moment. The legislation prohibits them releasing the water.
[54:18] Speaker 8: That's the only tap immediately the government could turn on
[54:21] Speaker 8: to reduce the costs of farming at the moment, but
[54:24] Speaker 8: they can't do it because legislation's not there. That's what
[54:27] Speaker 8: we would push, or that's what I would push, is
[54:29] Speaker 8: get that legislation changed, allow the com wealth environmental water
[54:33] Speaker 8: holder to release some water, reduce the.
[54:36] Speaker 1: Cost of water.
[54:37] Speaker 7: You can't change the feel, you can't change the.
[54:41] Speaker 8: Fertilizer at the moment, but you can at least do
[54:44] Speaker 8: that and that'll at least take some pressure of farmers.
[54:47] Speaker 7: So that's what I would first and foremost.
[54:49] Speaker 3: Do I know that there's again a point of contention
[54:51] Speaker 3: from David, but to raise I just quickly get something
[54:54] Speaker 3: from you, and then I do have to take a break.
[54:55] Speaker 10: Yep.
[54:56] Speaker 6: We would ban buybacks and I'm not in favor of
[54:59] Speaker 6: a role mission. It can take years upon years and
[55:02] Speaker 6: costs hundreds upon hundreds of millions.
[55:03] Speaker 12: Of dollars of tax payer dollars that could be.
[55:06] Speaker 6: Better spent investing in upgrading infrastructure and also ensuring that
[55:10] Speaker 6: every leader of water gets to where it needs to
[55:12] Speaker 6: get to. And again, the recommendations aren't binding, but in
[55:15] Speaker 6: the alternate, should they be drafted by a green's labor government,
[55:18] Speaker 6: it could be disastrous for our farming communities, which is
[55:21] Speaker 6: why the Coalition table that Commission of Inquiry into the
[55:24] Speaker 6: Commonwealth Environmental Water Holder. It is the only way that
[55:28] Speaker 6: our communities are going to get the transparency and insight
[55:31] Speaker 6: that they need.
[55:31] Speaker 5: Now.
[55:33] Speaker 12: The reason why this is important is because should we not.
[55:36] Speaker 6: Have any rain along the Murray water allocations are zero
[55:40] Speaker 6: next year, which is going.
[55:42] Speaker 12: To devastate our farming communities.
[55:44] Speaker 6: And that's even more important because again as alluded to previously,
[55:48] Speaker 6: the Commonwealth Environmental Water Holder holds two thirds of all.
[55:51] Speaker 12: Of our water.
[55:51] Speaker 6: There are giga leaders upon giga leaders upon giga leaders
[55:54] Speaker 6: of water that is sitting somewhere not being utilized, and
[55:57] Speaker 6: there is no legislative lever for that to be really
[56:00] Speaker 6: please back into productive communities and that absolutely needs to change.
[56:03] Speaker 3: All right again, I know it's complicated. I know we
[56:05] Speaker 3: go all night on it, but Alas will take a
[56:07] Speaker 3: quick break and then we're into overtime on poor Murray.
[56:09] Speaker 2: Live here here on the Club Furst in Parah, the
[56:11] Speaker 2: final pictures from the candidates. Remember Lake debate is coming
[56:14] Speaker 2: up next week's time. Much we're at Commercial Club in Aubree.
[56:24] Speaker 2: It is great to be here for the pub test.
[56:27] Speaker 3: Now this is an opportunity to ask one last question.
[56:31] Speaker 3: But Maria, I've got an idea of which way you're
[56:33] Speaker 3: going to go, and I may take it from there.
[56:36] Speaker 16: Okay, So why do you believe you are the best
[56:39] Speaker 16: person to represent Farah after the May ninth by election
[56:43] Speaker 16: and what differs you to the other candidates?
[56:46] Speaker 3: All right, now, I'm going to start with you, Brad.
[56:47] Speaker 3: Each candidate is going to get two minutes. There is
[56:50] Speaker 3: somebody who will be timing back in the studio, So
[56:53] Speaker 3: you got two minutes from now, make that final pitch.
[56:56] Speaker 7: Look, everyone, my name's Brandon.
[56:58] Speaker 8: I have served this kind for twenty nine and a
[57:01] Speaker 8: half years.
[57:02] Speaker 7: I love serving.
[57:03] Speaker 8: I've served because that is what I truly believe is
[57:07] Speaker 8: important for a person in our country.
[57:10] Speaker 7: You should have a sense of service.
[57:13] Speaker 8: I have looked at this opportunity to serve my community now,
[57:17] Speaker 8: to serve you and fight for you. I've been engaged
[57:20] Speaker 8: in things that I've been passionate about, the hospital, homeless veterans.
[57:24] Speaker 8: I've been doing that and I've just got this absolute
[57:29] Speaker 8: intense want to keep serving.
[57:31] Speaker 7: And that's what I'll do for you.
[57:33] Speaker 8: I will serve you because you are the ones who
[57:36] Speaker 8: deserve to be served properly by someone who is not
[57:38] Speaker 8: self interested.
[57:40] Speaker 7: I'm there for you and I will fight for you.
[57:42] Speaker 2: Thanks, looks up.
[57:45] Speaker 3: Nice to see all right, Michelle, what is your final pitch?
[57:49] Speaker 3: You have two minutes. Use as much or as little
[57:51] Speaker 3: as you wish.
[57:52] Speaker 5: Thank you.
[57:53] Speaker 9: So I started this journey two years ago when I
[57:57] Speaker 9: felt like we weren't being represented well read that we
[58:01] Speaker 9: had parties who were mainly represented by people who only
[58:04] Speaker 9: knew a city context.
[58:06] Speaker 5: So you know, my my plan was to make.
[58:10] Speaker 9: Sure that we had people outside of here who understood
[58:13] Speaker 9: what was happening for us regionally.
[58:15] Speaker 5: I grew up in regional Australia.
[58:17] Speaker 9: You know, I watched services being stripped from the community
[58:20] Speaker 9: that my parents were in in Kodamundra. We saw doctors
[58:24] Speaker 9: leaving town, We saw telehealth replacing doctors you know in
[58:29] Speaker 9: that town.
[58:30] Speaker 5: And you know, there were banks leaving and.
[58:32] Speaker 9: There were services that were readily available you know, years ago,
[58:37] Speaker 9: being removed from there. And I was watching elderly people
[58:40] Speaker 9: really struggle with that, and that's happening across Farah.
[58:44] Speaker 5: I understand the regional context.
[58:46] Speaker 9: I have a history of being able to advocate and
[58:49] Speaker 9: to knock on doors and to be really persistent and
[58:52] Speaker 9: to get what's needed. I don't have the loudest in
[58:55] Speaker 9: the room, loudest voice in the room all the time,
[58:58] Speaker 9: but I certainly have the persistence to make change happen.
[59:01] Speaker 9: And you know we've seen you if you read my story.
[59:04] Speaker 9: We've made a change in New South Wales. We've seen
[59:07] Speaker 9: sixty four point three million dollars go across for all
[59:11] Speaker 9: regional children to access a program for them to participate
[59:14] Speaker 9: equitably in a legal system.
[59:16] Speaker 5: And I did that because my representatives weren't doing that
[59:19] Speaker 5: for me.
[59:20] Speaker 9: It's really important that you have somebody who can listen
[59:23] Speaker 9: to your stories, understand them, and take them so other
[59:26] Speaker 9: people can understand them as well.
[59:28] Speaker 5: And you know that's why I consider myself.
[59:31] Speaker 9: I'm certainly not an expert in everything, but I have
[59:33] Speaker 9: a great capacity to learn and a really good capacity
[59:35] Speaker 9: to share story and make people care. And that's what
[59:38] Speaker 9: we need people to do for us, because they've forgot
[59:40] Speaker 9: who we are. They've got looking at it, forgot to
[59:43] Speaker 9: see us. And I won't stop looking. So that's why
[59:46] Speaker 9: I'm the best person for this job.
[59:49] Speaker 2: Four seconds to spare. We'll played. We'll played, all right, David,
[59:52] Speaker 2: you'll pitch two minutes. Your two minutes starts now.
[59:55] Speaker 1: Thanks. I understand the economic suffer I understand the end
[1:00:00] Speaker 1: room of Farah, and I understand the communities of Para.
[1:00:03] Speaker 1: I also clearly understand we've been collected for twenty five
[1:00:06] Speaker 1: years and we've got a lot of catching up to do.
[1:00:09] Speaker 1: I've had a career across agriculture in Australia and internationally.
[1:00:14] Speaker 1: I've been engaged in policy development both in water land, title,
[1:00:17] Speaker 1: international trade, biosecurity. I feel comfortable that I understand the
[1:00:22] Speaker 1: job description of Parah, and more importantly, I feel comfortable
[1:00:25] Speaker 1: that I've got the skills, capability, courage and tenacity to
[1:00:28] Speaker 1: do it. I feel also that I'm aligned with the
[1:00:30] Speaker 1: right time of people with again political courage and political
[1:00:34] Speaker 1: tenacity that's been there forever that will be able to
[1:00:36] Speaker 1: deliver a result for Para. So in summary, if you
[1:00:41] Speaker 1: don't understand the engine room, and if you don't understand
[1:00:43] Speaker 1: the job, you can't put the right skills to it.
[1:00:46] Speaker 1: And I feel comfortable that I've got the skills and
[1:00:48] Speaker 1: the party that I've aligned myself has got the courage
[1:00:51] Speaker 1: and tenacity to represent Fara into twenty eight and beyond
[1:00:55] Speaker 1: twenty eight election.
[1:00:57] Speaker 2: Thank you all right, get stuck and lucky last, make
[1:01:03] Speaker 2: the pitch, go for it.
[1:01:05] Speaker 12: So I was born and raised in Farah.
[1:01:07] Speaker 6: It is where I've had the immense privilege of serving
[1:01:10] Speaker 6: my community both as a senior community lawyer and as
[1:01:13] Speaker 6: a counselor at Aubreo City and also I sit on
[1:01:16] Speaker 6: the board of the Maray Dealing Association. As a senior
[1:01:19] Speaker 6: community lawyer, I was an outreach lawyer, so I wasn't
[1:01:22] Speaker 6: sitting behind a desk. I was out in the regions
[1:01:24] Speaker 6: assisting individuals and families and farmers and small businesses quite
[1:01:29] Speaker 6: often at the most difficult times of their life. Essentially
[1:01:36] Speaker 6: these people who were disproportionately impacted by a bad government policy.
[1:01:41] Speaker 6: In terms of my role at Aubroo City Council, I
[1:01:45] Speaker 6: have formed and made decisions around budgets and infrastructure, and
[1:01:50] Speaker 6: on the board of the Maray Dealing Association, I have
[1:01:52] Speaker 6: advocated for better water management across the Murray Daring I'm
[1:01:57] Speaker 6: not up here making promises I know that I can't keep.
[1:02:00] Speaker 6: I will only commit to things that I know that
[1:02:02] Speaker 6: I can deliver. There are candidates here on the stage who,
[1:02:07] Speaker 6: no matter how well intentioned their advocacy is they will
[1:02:11] Speaker 6: because they can't form a party of government. They will
[1:02:13] Speaker 6: be nothing more than a complaint's desking camera. And that
[1:02:16] Speaker 6: is just the very reality of not being a coalition
[1:02:19] Speaker 6: or forming party of government.
[1:02:22] Speaker 12: Ultimately, I think.
[1:02:23] Speaker 6: That I'm the best representative voice for Farah because of
[1:02:27] Speaker 6: my lived experience on the ground. I don't just understand
[1:02:30] Speaker 6: communities from policy papers. I have the lived experience already
[1:02:35] Speaker 6: being an advocate as a community lawyer.
[1:02:37] Speaker 12: And yeah, that's me.
[1:02:39] Speaker 2: Thanks, good stuff, excellent that all right.
[1:02:44] Speaker 3: So I'm not going to ask who, because that's between
[1:02:47] Speaker 3: you and the pencil on Saturday. But hands up, who's
[1:02:50] Speaker 3: made their mind about what they're going to do on Saturday?
[1:02:54] Speaker 2: All right? Hands up?
[1:02:55] Speaker 3: Who's still undecided? You've just spent an hour with these people?
[1:02:59] Speaker 3: All right, thank you very much. I do appreciate it.
[1:03:01] Speaker 2: To all of you. Good luck on Saturday.
[1:03:03] Speaker 3: Congratulations on your campaign, and thank you for standing up
[1:03:06] Speaker 3: and getting involved.
[1:03:07] Speaker 2: In with the political process.
[1:03:08] Speaker 3: The results will be Saturday night, six am and all
[1:03:12] Speaker 3: night long on Sky News. Aubrey, it's been fun to
[1:03:14] Speaker 3: hang out. I'll see you again on Saturday. This is
[1:03:17] Speaker 3: all my real live country. We'll see you tomorrow night.
[1:03:20] Speaker 3: Here's the late debate. Welcome back too, or will we
[1:03:30] Speaker 3: do for the pub wills and.
[1:03:31] Speaker 2: The tedile feat of Pharah?
[1:03:33] Speaker 3: We have before us the four people who by Saturday
[1:03:35] Speaker 3: may well be the next federal members for the seat
[1:03:38] Speaker 3: of Parah.
[1:03:39] Speaker 2: I'm sure you're all very tired.
[1:03:40] Speaker 3: I'm sure you will want to thank your families, and
[1:03:42] Speaker 3: I'm sure you will want to thank your supporters. But
[1:03:44] Speaker 3: here's the bit where some of the people who might
[1:03:46] Speaker 3: be sitting back and haven't quite heard what they wanted
[1:03:49] Speaker 3: to thus far out of our discussion, get to hear
[1:03:51] Speaker 3: it well, each of you asking each other questions. All right,
[1:03:55] Speaker 3: so randomly selected in my head, David, what is your question?
[1:03:59] Speaker 3: Who would you like to ask.
[1:04:02] Speaker 1: Of yourself? Raise it? The cost of energy is killing Australia.
[1:04:08] Speaker 1: We're one nation. We've got a policy of the program
[1:04:11] Speaker 1: to scrap net zero. You get right out of net zero.
[1:04:14] Speaker 1: Where do you stand on net zero? And would you
[1:04:16] Speaker 1: be prepared to pull out of the Paris Agreement?
[1:04:19] Speaker 12: Okay, I again coming back to the nuclear argument.
[1:04:27] Speaker 6: If people are people, I mean the current labor to
[1:04:32] Speaker 6: green government, if they are legitimately serious about affordable, reliable,
[1:04:38] Speaker 6: net zero energy, nuclear absolutely needs to be on the
[1:04:41] Speaker 6: table and we need to be having discussions around that,
[1:04:45] Speaker 6: robust discussions.
[1:04:46] Speaker 12: Ultimately, it's yeah, I mean the position is the position
[1:04:53] Speaker 12: you'd come out of Paris.
[1:04:54] Speaker 6: Well, it would be something that I would have to
[1:04:56] Speaker 6: you know, it would be a party room discussion absolutely.
[1:05:00] Speaker 3: All right, Michelle, your question who are you going to
[1:05:02] Speaker 3: ask it of?
[1:05:05] Speaker 5: I'm going to ask it of David.
[1:05:07] Speaker 9: Just around the hospital and the idea that of a
[1:05:11] Speaker 9: public private partnership that you put forward, can you sort
[1:05:16] Speaker 9: of tell us what that would look like?
[1:05:19] Speaker 1: What I put forward in my discussions traveling the hospital
[1:05:23] Speaker 1: journey understanding what it was, how to operate. It was
[1:05:26] Speaker 1: looked at international models and domestic models in that and
[1:05:30] Speaker 1: considered all options. The reality is that we've got to
[1:05:34] Speaker 1: build a new hospital. It's got to be an Australian hospital.
[1:05:38] Speaker 1: It's going to take us time, it's going to definitely
[1:05:40] Speaker 1: take us finance, and it needs to be able to
[1:05:43] Speaker 1: service the region. But the first thing we've got to
[1:05:45] Speaker 1: be able to do is put an agreement together between
[1:05:47] Speaker 1: two states, Victoria and New South Wales. And that's not
[1:05:50] Speaker 1: all that hard because we've done it in Queensland recently
[1:05:53] Speaker 1: on the Rivers, the Twin Rivers Hospital on the Gold Coaster,
[1:05:57] Speaker 1: and the Tweed Rivers Hospital itself. So what we've got
[1:06:01] Speaker 1: to do first of all is bring bring our community together,
[1:06:04] Speaker 1: all the councils, bring our states together, get a business plan,
[1:06:08] Speaker 1: get it in front of the federal government, and then
[1:06:10] Speaker 1: start advancing it. And that's going to happen now, not
[1:06:13] Speaker 1: in the future. But at the same time, the five
[1:06:15] Speaker 1: hundred and fifty million dollars we're going into the Brownfield State,
[1:06:18] Speaker 1: we need to ensure we can complete that project. We
[1:06:21] Speaker 1: don't want to end up with a descavator in the
[1:06:23] Speaker 1: operating room and not being able to operate. So it's
[1:06:26] Speaker 1: imperative that we don't want to open vulnerability to Aubrey
[1:06:30] Speaker 1: or the Aubrey region at all.
[1:06:31] Speaker 2: So we must complete it. Thanks all right, Brad, who's
[1:06:34] Speaker 2: your question.
[1:06:35] Speaker 7: Of what is it to Michelle?
[1:06:37] Speaker 8: So today when we were at polling booth, so you
[1:06:42] Speaker 8: must yourself. Myself and race Or were there and we
[1:06:46] Speaker 8: were chased by some media and they wanted to know
[1:06:49] Speaker 8: a bit about transparency.
[1:06:50] Speaker 7: They couldn't find David, but they wanted to have a
[1:06:52] Speaker 7: chat with us.
[1:06:55] Speaker 8: They were asking us about transparency in a range of things,
[1:06:59] Speaker 8: and one of the things that I really want to
[1:07:00] Speaker 8: answer from you is about the Climate two hundred and
[1:07:06] Speaker 8: now I've got an email that your office sent to
[1:07:10] Speaker 8: Climate two hundred back on the fifth of March asking
[1:07:14] Speaker 8: for support financial support, and then on the sixth of March,
[1:07:18] Speaker 8: Climate two hundred sent it out to all of their
[1:07:21] Speaker 8: recipients again, Climate two hundred asking for more money to
[1:07:25] Speaker 8: support your campaign, noting that Climate two hundred doesn't support
[1:07:30] Speaker 8: candidates that don't have a net zero sorry, a climate
[1:07:34] Speaker 8: change agenda.
[1:07:36] Speaker 7: How do you respond to that?
[1:07:39] Speaker 9: Yeah, so I've already answered, and I've been very transparent
[1:07:44] Speaker 9: about taking money from Climate two hundred, and I did
[1:07:48] Speaker 9: get twenty thousand dollars at the start of my campaign
[1:07:51] Speaker 9: this time to support that, and I've had lots of donations.
[1:07:56] Speaker 5: From across the country since then. So I've been open
[1:07:59] Speaker 5: and honest about that.
[1:08:01] Speaker 9: I don't have any difficulty in saying that as an independent,
[1:08:04] Speaker 9: I'm the only person that you will ever know where
[1:08:06] Speaker 9: my money came from.
[1:08:08] Speaker 5: Last election.
[1:08:09] Speaker 9: We know that if we have reached out the Liberal
[1:08:12] Speaker 9: Party donations, it was one point three million dollars across
[1:08:15] Speaker 9: for every electorate across the country. So you know, my
[1:08:18] Speaker 9: donations were very transparent at the time. So in terms
[1:08:23] Speaker 9: of climate agenda, my positions have been informed by the
[1:08:28] Speaker 9: people that I've spoken to across the electorate and what
[1:08:30] Speaker 9: we need here. So my position on water has been
[1:08:33] Speaker 9: clear for the last two years is that we need
[1:08:35] Speaker 9: to stop water buybacks right now and that's in you know,
[1:08:39] Speaker 9: that's what we need here right now.
[1:08:41] Speaker 5: We need transparency and accountability around water. Those are the
[1:08:45] Speaker 5: things that are needed in our electorates.
[1:08:47] Speaker 9: So though I might be funded by Climate two hundred
[1:08:50] Speaker 9: in part, there is no reciprocation in terms of me
[1:08:54] Speaker 9: having to follow an agenda that they don't have policies for.
[1:08:58] Speaker 8: But they're actually on their website supporting you, and they
[1:09:02] Speaker 8: say they do not support candidates that don't support the
[1:09:07] Speaker 8: climate change agenda.
[1:09:09] Speaker 5: Yes, so again they've supported me.
[1:09:12] Speaker 9: They're very familiar with my positions, which again have been
[1:09:15] Speaker 9: unchanged for the last years and have been set.
[1:09:18] Speaker 5: By the people of this electorate.
[1:09:20] Speaker 2: Right, Razor David, thank you return serve. I love this.
[1:09:28] Speaker 6: So you sought pre selection with the Labor Party of
[1:09:33] Speaker 6: the twenty twenty two Pharah election. You last year supported
[1:09:39] Speaker 6: the Teal Independent and you have donated to both labor
[1:09:44] Speaker 6: and teal campaigns. Why did it take the media releasing
[1:09:50] Speaker 6: that story for that information to come to light.
[1:09:54] Speaker 1: Well, I think the media can answer that. The journey
[1:09:58] Speaker 1: I've traveled was out of frustration twenty five years of
[1:10:04] Speaker 1: neglect in Parar. I've returned to Parar. I tried to
[1:10:08] Speaker 1: engage politically in Farar, especially across the critical issues of
[1:10:11] Speaker 1: water in particular, and had no success at all. I
[1:10:14] Speaker 1: investigated all options. I investigated the option of running as
[1:10:18] Speaker 1: an independent like Michelle's doing, and had Michelle twice in
[1:10:22] Speaker 1: my office. Wasn't it Michelle going through and understanding a
[1:10:25] Speaker 1: capabilities of what you could do. I've went right through
[1:10:28] Speaker 1: it all with the Nationals and we had Peren Davia,
[1:10:31] Speaker 1: a Senator for New South Wales from the Nationals who
[1:10:33] Speaker 1: was a shadow water Minister and water minister at one time.
[1:10:36] Speaker 1: We had Susan Lee as the Environmental Minister, so I
[1:10:42] Speaker 1: saw capability there. Then I went to the Labor Party
[1:10:45] Speaker 1: and tried to understand to get in the door there,
[1:10:47] Speaker 1: I had to talk to the Transport Workers' Union. I've
[1:10:51] Speaker 1: talked to the to do the meat Packers Union, I've
[1:10:54] Speaker 1: talked to the AWU. What can they do. And there's
[1:10:57] Speaker 1: no interest in Pharar. There's no interest in Pharaoh at all.
[1:11:00] Speaker 1: Plus plus I had a little bit of a conversation
[1:11:02] Speaker 1: about Julia Gillarde once that upset them. But there is
[1:11:07] Speaker 1: no interest from the Labor Party in there. So the
[1:11:10] Speaker 1: reality is culturally I didn't fit for them and they
[1:11:13] Speaker 1: don't fit for Para. It's as simple as that. They
[1:11:16] Speaker 1: are not aligned for Parar of what we are. We're
[1:11:18] Speaker 1: an agricultural powerhouse, agribusiness powerhouse with great community services. They're
[1:11:24] Speaker 1: not here on the platform today, they're not in the campaign.
[1:11:27] Speaker 1: They're not interested in Farah. Simple as that.
[1:11:29] Speaker 7: David, you applied. You applied for pre selection with the
[1:11:32] Speaker 7: Labor Party. It wasn't that you disagreed.
[1:11:35] Speaker 8: You were sixty right and you applied for pre selection
[1:11:38] Speaker 8: for the Labor Party and the Labor Party is anti farmers.
[1:11:43] Speaker 7: So how did you do that? You applied for pre selection.
[1:11:46] Speaker 1: I put my hand, I put my hand up with
[1:11:47] Speaker 1: the National Party for try and get pre selection.
[1:11:49] Speaker 3: There is quick, you know, but the reality they're very
[1:11:52] Speaker 3: fundamentally different.
[1:11:53] Speaker 1: Made they are different. But you weren't doing the job
[1:11:55] Speaker 1: for Parar.
[1:11:56] Speaker 2: That was they weren't doing the job.
[1:12:00] Speaker 7: I was in the army at the time that you
[1:12:01] Speaker 7: were played me.
[1:12:02] Speaker 2: All right, host privilege to step in?
[1:12:04] Speaker 3: Now, host privilege to step in, although there is part
[1:12:07] Speaker 3: of me that just wants to let it go for
[1:12:08] Speaker 3: another time.
[1:12:10] Speaker 2: Yeah, bug, all right? What were you about to say?
[1:12:11] Speaker 6: I was just about to say, recognizing everything the spiel
[1:12:15] Speaker 6: that you've just given to everybody, You've only released that
[1:12:20] Speaker 6: information after the media made it public, Like why did
[1:12:24] Speaker 6: you not go to the voters, because ultimately this election
[1:12:28] Speaker 6: people want transparency and accountability, Like, why did you not
[1:12:31] Speaker 6: go to the voters first? Why did the media have
[1:12:33] Speaker 6: to bring this to everybody's attention.
[1:12:35] Speaker 1: You know, I've been on this campaign trail now for
[1:12:38] Speaker 1: I'm quite sure how any exquents, pushing into probably two months.
[1:12:41] Speaker 1: Everywhere I've gone, I've explained to the audiences I've had
[1:12:46] Speaker 1: my journey and what I've had to go through. And
[1:12:48] Speaker 1: the words I've used tonight were the same words I've
[1:12:51] Speaker 1: used right across the electric You know, whether I'm in
[1:12:53] Speaker 1: poun Carey or down at Gould or in bal Rynold
[1:12:56] Speaker 1: or up at Helstone or down at hay is the
[1:12:58] Speaker 1: reality is? I said, here's my Joernie to get here today.
[1:13:02] Speaker 1: More importantly, here's my capability, here's my understanding of Pharaoh.
[1:13:05] Speaker 1: I understand the subject matter. Here's what I've done across
[1:13:08] Speaker 1: the political parties to work out where it is. It's
[1:13:10] Speaker 1: been no secret on the journey I've traveled.
[1:13:12] Speaker 3: All right, Now, let us get back to some of
[1:13:16] Speaker 3: the other people asking the questions.
[1:13:18] Speaker 2: I loved every second of it, I really did.
[1:13:19] Speaker 3: All right, So mark your question, which sort of leads
[1:13:22] Speaker 3: into part of where we've just been.
[1:13:23] Speaker 2: But your question to these.
[1:13:25] Speaker 14: Candidates, Yeah, thanks, Paul, and good evening candidates. So, as
[1:13:29] Speaker 14: we've already mentioned, preference preferences are likely to play a
[1:13:33] Speaker 14: really key role in the outcome of this by election.
[1:13:36] Speaker 14: So to help inform voters, can the candidates please share
[1:13:39] Speaker 14: who they are preferencing?
[1:13:40] Speaker 3: All right, Michelle, I'll start with you after your number one,
[1:13:44] Speaker 3: what's two and three?
[1:13:45] Speaker 9: And look, as an independent, I don't think I should
[1:13:48] Speaker 9: be telling people how to think. So I've asked that
[1:13:51] Speaker 9: people number one, Michelle Milthorpe, and then number of every
[1:13:54] Speaker 9: box from there.
[1:13:56] Speaker 2: Are you issuing how to vote? Card?
[1:13:58] Speaker 3: That has ranked I've got.
[1:14:00] Speaker 9: They're hard to vote card and it has me in
[1:14:03] Speaker 9: the second position with number one, and then it's just
[1:14:06] Speaker 9: got the boxers with no names but numbers in it.
[1:14:10] Speaker 7: Okay, Brad, So I've said this a number of times.
[1:14:14] Speaker 8: We are preferencing conservative parties first and then the rest
[1:14:19] Speaker 8: after that. I hope that any of those conservative parties
[1:14:22] Speaker 8: won't become labor parties people, but you never know, right.
[1:14:27] Speaker 2: David, how what's what's your list?
[1:14:31] Speaker 5: You know?
[1:14:31] Speaker 2: Pharaoh?
[1:14:32] Speaker 1: To understand Pharaoh is that Pharah works under conservative governments.
[1:14:36] Speaker 1: Our first preference, believed, and it was to Brad. I
[1:14:38] Speaker 1: can't ask myself why tone and our second and our
[1:14:43] Speaker 1: second preferences to the Liberal Party. But the reality is it's,
[1:14:46] Speaker 1: you know, for agriculture, agribusiness, conservative governments work, and more importantly,
[1:14:51] Speaker 1: if they're challenged, they should work better and racer.
[1:14:54] Speaker 6: Yes, So obviously, in a coalition with Brad, so here
[1:14:57] Speaker 6: is our number two, we chose to preference The Green
[1:15:01] Speaker 6: and the Teal Independence are further down at the bottom
[1:15:05] Speaker 6: simply because they're policies. They are the complete antithesis to
[1:15:08] Speaker 6: Liberal Party policies.
[1:15:09] Speaker 3: All right, So I'll go there. The reference to Teal
[1:15:13] Speaker 3: has been made a couple of times, Michelle. I've seen
[1:15:14] Speaker 3: in other interviews. It's a label that you don't choose
[1:15:19] Speaker 3: to wear. Instead, there's a fight over orange here about
[1:15:23] Speaker 3: who is more orange, whether it's one nation or yourself.
[1:15:26] Speaker 3: Let's again deal with the head on that question of
[1:15:31] Speaker 3: just how teely or not teely are you.
[1:15:33] Speaker 9: Well. You know, as I've said to these guys before,
[1:15:36] Speaker 9: they've clearly not read my positions or David has because
[1:15:40] Speaker 9: our water policies.
[1:15:42] Speaker 5: Are quite similar.
[1:15:43] Speaker 9: But they have not read my positions because if you
[1:15:46] Speaker 9: read my positions, you say that they are informed by
[1:15:48] Speaker 9: the people of parah As I said no more water buybacks.
[1:15:52] Speaker 9: We have seen City Independence vote against vote for water
[1:15:58] Speaker 9: buyer backs, and they're restoring our river and my policies
[1:16:02] Speaker 9: simply just don't show alignment in those things.
[1:16:06] Speaker 5: So you know, I grew up in Cudemundra. My mum
[1:16:10] Speaker 5: thinks it's.
[1:16:10] Speaker 9: Laughable that I get called that, And you know, my
[1:16:14] Speaker 9: reality is that my positions are informed by the people
[1:16:17] Speaker 9: of this electorate. I was endorsed by a community group.
[1:16:22] Speaker 9: I wear orange because Kathy McGowan started that as a
[1:16:25] Speaker 9: regional independent over the river. There was certainly not a
[1:16:28] Speaker 9: lot of orange on their polling beasts other than Michelle
[1:16:31] Speaker 9: Miltop last year. So you know, my reality is that
[1:16:35] Speaker 9: I want to be a regional representative and that's who.
[1:16:38] Speaker 3: I am, David, if I don't ask a follow up
[1:16:41] Speaker 3: question here as well, and this is sort of the
[1:16:45] Speaker 3: obvious question, which is when you've talked about your own
[1:16:47] Speaker 3: journey and there are people that I've talked to in
[1:16:50] Speaker 3: the electorate who wonder whether if you're elected on Saturday
[1:16:55] Speaker 3: as a one nation MP, would you be still a
[1:16:57] Speaker 3: one nation MP at the federal election in twenty two eight.
[1:17:01] Speaker 3: What commitment can you give to people who will vote
[1:17:04] Speaker 3: for you to be a one nation MP that you
[1:17:06] Speaker 3: will stay a one nation MP.
[1:17:08] Speaker 1: I've got three clear jobs to do. One is when
[1:17:12] Speaker 1: on the ninth, which I want to do. Two, I
[1:17:15] Speaker 1: want to build a foundation to change and bring product,
[1:17:18] Speaker 1: pity and capacity back to Pharah. Three I'm going to
[1:17:22] Speaker 1: contest the twenty eight election and at the same time
[1:17:24] Speaker 1: I'm going to help Pauline Hanson and the team build
[1:17:27] Speaker 1: one hell of a political party to be of prominence
[1:17:31] Speaker 1: and relevance in the Australian democracy. I'm there absolutely for
[1:17:35] Speaker 1: the long door.
[1:17:37] Speaker 2: Thank you, David. The question all right, Steven up, one down?
[1:17:40] Speaker 2: All right, Stephen, what have you got here for us? Mate?
[1:17:42] Speaker 2: What's your question?
[1:17:43] Speaker 15: More questions for David and Michelle, which is, how do
[1:17:46] Speaker 15: you plan to convince the constituents in Pharaoh that watering
[1:17:49] Speaker 15: down the major parties even further will benefit the constituents.
[1:17:52] Speaker 5: Michelle, So watering down the major parties, explain what.
[1:17:57] Speaker 2: Does that mean to you?
[1:17:58] Speaker 15: Well, we've got we've currently got an independent across the
[1:18:02] Speaker 15: border who votes forty eight percent with the government, forty
[1:18:06] Speaker 15: eight against the government. If you want to have fifty
[1:18:09] Speaker 15: cents each way, I'm not really convinced that that's the
[1:18:12] Speaker 15: way to go. I think you need to pick a
[1:18:13] Speaker 15: side and go with it.
[1:18:16] Speaker 9: Look, I would argue that we've we've picked aside for
[1:18:18] Speaker 9: a really long time.
[1:18:19] Speaker 5: We've got nothing done here for a really long time.
[1:18:22] Speaker 5: So I'm a disaffected liberal national voter. My family has been.
[1:18:28] Speaker 9: I've been brought up in that way, and I was certainly,
[1:18:32] Speaker 9: you know, looking when I was running as an independent,
[1:18:35] Speaker 9: it was because I was just not seeing representation here.
[1:18:38] Speaker 9: So I think, and I've explained it very well to
[1:18:42] Speaker 9: my Paul Murray watching mum, is that until the major
[1:18:48] Speaker 9: parties get a shake up and understand that we don't
[1:18:52] Speaker 9: see them representing our values anymore. They're going to keep
[1:18:55] Speaker 9: doing the same thing they are and right now, that's
[1:18:57] Speaker 9: not representing the people who chose to put them into power.
[1:19:01] Speaker 9: So we've got a lot of people sitting in Parliament
[1:19:04] Speaker 9: that are too busy fighting one another and fighting themselves
[1:19:07] Speaker 9: for a career instead of representing us, which is what their.
[1:19:10] Speaker 5: Job was meant to be.
[1:19:11] Speaker 3: David's same question about not being part of the major
[1:19:16] Speaker 3: party of government or opposition at this stage, how that
[1:19:19] Speaker 3: actually helps Fara.
[1:19:21] Speaker 1: The reality is Fara has been failed, it's been left behind,
[1:19:25] Speaker 1: has been neglected. We bring to the constituents our policies,
[1:19:30] Speaker 1: our energy, our courage and our tenacity. But it's the
[1:19:33] Speaker 1: constituents out here in Pharaoh who are going to make
[1:19:35] Speaker 1: a decision on the ninth of what they think of
[1:19:37] Speaker 1: the major parties.
[1:19:39] Speaker 2: It's not up to us.
[1:19:40] Speaker 11: Ours is.
[1:19:40] Speaker 1: We've got policy, we've got programs, and we've got teams
[1:19:43] Speaker 1: to go and the decision will be made by everyone
[1:19:47] Speaker 1: here and out in the broader Pharaoh.
[1:19:49] Speaker 2: Good stuff, Thank you very much to appreciate it. Well.
[1:19:52] Speaker 2: I've asked a couple of tough.
[1:19:53] Speaker 3: Questions of both the Independent and of the one Nation candidate,
[1:19:57] Speaker 3: the Libs and Nats will cop one next the right
[1:19:59] Speaker 3: quick after the break Paul Murray Live and the pub test,
[1:20:02] Speaker 3: we're more questions.
[1:20:02] Speaker 2: From the good people of Parah. Who will one of
[1:20:04] Speaker 2: these four.
[1:20:05] Speaker 3: People to be their next federal MP. Welcome back to
[1:20:13] Speaker 3: the pop test here in Farah.
[1:20:15] Speaker 2: In beautiful Aubrey. Thank you very much for joining us.
[1:20:17] Speaker 3: Of course, all of our lovely So it's goldn't say
[1:20:22] Speaker 3: contestants but no candidates.
[1:20:23] Speaker 2: Of course, it's the official term in politics, isn't it.
[1:20:25] Speaker 3: Here We're all involved in a great example of Australian democracy,
[1:20:29] Speaker 3: which is normal people get to ask normal questions. Suzanne
[1:20:33] Speaker 3: is about to do so who would you like to
[1:20:35] Speaker 3: ask it of?
[1:20:36] Speaker 2: My friend?
[1:20:36] Speaker 5: Maybe Raiser, Okay, let's go.
[1:20:38] Speaker 10: So I'm a farmer from Blighty and about approximately eighteen
[1:20:43] Speaker 10: weeks ago we didn't know whether we were going to
[1:20:45] Speaker 10: get diesel to be able to plan a crop and
[1:20:48] Speaker 10: do My question to you is that what would you
[1:20:51] Speaker 10: do to give.
[1:20:51] Speaker 5: Us food security?
[1:20:54] Speaker 12: Food or fuel food security?
[1:20:57] Speaker 10: Because if you can't plant the crop, you don't get
[1:20:59] Speaker 10: any food.
[1:21:00] Speaker 6: Yeah, ye, So it is an obligation of the government
[1:21:05] Speaker 6: of the day to ensure that there is enough fuel
[1:21:06] Speaker 6: supply and that that fuel gets to where it needs
[1:21:09] Speaker 6: to get to. I have spoken with many farmers who
[1:21:12] Speaker 6: were making the heartbreaking decision as to whether, you know,
[1:21:15] Speaker 6: they may have enough fuel to put seed in the ground,
[1:21:17] Speaker 6: but they may not actually have enough fuel for harvest.
[1:21:20] Speaker 6: And that's not just a one season issue. It can
[1:21:23] Speaker 6: turn into a multiple season issue for farmers.
[1:21:27] Speaker 12: Ultimately. You know, the Liberal Party's policy is very clear.
[1:21:31] Speaker 6: We need to be digging and drilling and ensuring our
[1:21:33] Speaker 6: own sovereign capability in terms of a fuel because that's
[1:21:37] Speaker 6: how our machinery works, right. So I think that we
[1:21:41] Speaker 6: need to have a strong representative voice and as my
[1:21:44] Speaker 6: friend Tony Abbitt said yesterday, that we actually need a
[1:21:49] Speaker 6: voice of firing Canbra, not a Canberra's voice too Fara.
[1:21:53] Speaker 6: So it's really important because I do recognize that farmers
[1:21:57] Speaker 6: feel left behind. They are the lifeblood of our communities
[1:22:02] Speaker 6: and they are the major food well of our communities
[1:22:06] Speaker 6: as well. So ultimately, the Liberal government have proven we
[1:22:11] Speaker 6: were very strong with our harving of the fuel excise.
[1:22:13] Speaker 6: Initially the Prime Minister was not keen on doing that,
[1:22:17] Speaker 6: but the advocacy of the Liberal Party was strong and
[1:22:19] Speaker 6: we managed to get the Prime Minister to agree to that.
[1:22:23] Speaker 6: So I think that level of strong advocacy is necessary
[1:22:25] Speaker 6: and it's something that I will continue to commit to
[1:22:28] Speaker 6: to advocating for our farmers and our irrigators in the
[1:22:30] Speaker 6: agricultural community.
[1:22:32] Speaker 3: Okay, all right, thank you, Susan, appreciate it. Just you
[1:22:35] Speaker 3: mentioned Tony Abbott before. Obviously you know I like to
[1:22:39] Speaker 3: ride the elephant in the room. As we have noticed
[1:22:41] Speaker 3: this evening, Susan Lee has not seemingly played any public role.
[1:22:45] Speaker 3: Has she played a private role in your campaign? Has
[1:22:48] Speaker 3: she told you which public school to go to on
[1:22:51] Speaker 3: what particular day? Because it is a fairly obvious absence
[1:22:55] Speaker 3: of an MP who represented the area for as long
[1:22:58] Speaker 3: as she did.
[1:22:58] Speaker 10: Yeh.
[1:22:59] Speaker 12: So I would like to just give Susan a shout out.
[1:23:01] Speaker 6: She did give our country twenty five years of service
[1:23:03] Speaker 6: and it's a wonderful achievement. And she was very strong
[1:23:07] Speaker 6: as well, and I personally got to thank her for that.
[1:23:10] Speaker 6: She has provided me with some relief, age, wisdom and advice,
[1:23:14] Speaker 6: so is very thankful for that as well. We need
[1:23:18] Speaker 6: to recognize that Susan is now a private candidate, candidate, citizen, sorry,
[1:23:24] Speaker 6: and she is just enjoying a well deserved break.
[1:23:28] Speaker 2: Does it disappoint you that she's not out and about?
[1:23:32] Speaker 12: No, not really. I think it's not Susan's name on
[1:23:34] Speaker 12: the ballad.
[1:23:35] Speaker 2: It's mine, okay, Brad.
[1:23:37] Speaker 3: Obviously is the situation with the National Party that is
[1:23:42] Speaker 3: clearly being challenged right now by One Nation. And one
[1:23:45] Speaker 3: of the claims of One Nation is that the National
[1:23:47] Speaker 3: Party has had its time to make its case about
[1:23:49] Speaker 3: how to be able to reform the system from within again,
[1:23:54] Speaker 3: how is it not going to end up being more
[1:23:56] Speaker 3: of the same that eventually it is the head of
[1:23:59] Speaker 3: the Liberal Party that will decide whether or not the
[1:24:02] Speaker 3: tale of the National Party gets what it wants.
[1:24:05] Speaker 8: I think you just have to look at all the
[1:24:06] Speaker 8: national seats around the country and what happened at the
[1:24:08] Speaker 8: last election.
[1:24:09] Speaker 7: They didn't go backwards.
[1:24:11] Speaker 8: The reason they didn't go backwards is that they represent
[1:24:14] Speaker 8: their electorates and they've done that for one hundred and
[1:24:16] Speaker 8: eight years. And the fact is both these people who
[1:24:19] Speaker 8: have been slagging the coalition can't go back further than
[1:24:23] Speaker 8: twenty five years because when you do that, you start
[1:24:26] Speaker 8: to get into Tim Fisher's period, and no one wants
[1:24:28] Speaker 8: to say that period. Why because Nationals represent and fight
[1:24:32] Speaker 8: for their regions. So as a result, they'll want to
[1:24:36] Speaker 8: contain your view to twenty five years and not think
[1:24:39] Speaker 8: about that period when the Nationals were here and the
[1:24:42] Speaker 8: Nationals represented, and the Nationals put in all that infrastructure
[1:24:45] Speaker 8: and supported the people of Parah.
[1:24:48] Speaker 7: But of course let's try.
[1:24:49] Speaker 8: To pretend that didn't exist because it goes with what
[1:24:53] Speaker 8: they're trying to do here, which is where us Honestly,
[1:24:57] Speaker 8: Nationals have always fought for the regions. They only for
[1:25:00] Speaker 8: the regions, and they're the best party to represent the regions.
[1:25:03] Speaker 2: All right. The issue of water is massive in the electorate.
[1:25:10] Speaker 3: It is complicated, and I understand that it takes longer
[1:25:13] Speaker 3: than an answer on a television show, but let's give
[1:25:15] Speaker 3: it a crack, right again, all four of you here,
[1:25:18] Speaker 3: same type of question that I asked about the hospital
[1:25:21] Speaker 3: and health, which is about how you would get a
[1:25:24] Speaker 3: better result for the electorate, Michelle, when it comes to water,
[1:25:28] Speaker 3: how would you be able to achieve that?
[1:25:31] Speaker 9: Well, we've seen successive governments failing this. So I think
[1:25:36] Speaker 9: the topic and the subject of water is so complex,
[1:25:39] Speaker 9: and we know that the Murray Daling Basin Review is
[1:25:42] Speaker 9: happening right now, so understanding and looking at the submissions
[1:25:46] Speaker 9: of that is really important.
[1:25:48] Speaker 5: We have siloed water. We have said that we have
[1:25:51] Speaker 5: environmental water and we have human water, and we cannot
[1:25:54] Speaker 5: do that. The consumptive pool needs to be bigger. We've
[1:25:57] Speaker 5: got seventy two percent.
[1:25:58] Speaker 9: Of our water right now belongs to the environment, which
[1:26:03] Speaker 9: you know, it's absurd.
[1:26:04] Speaker 5: We've got we've got.
[1:26:05] Speaker 9: Wetland environments on farmland and we're not recognizing that in
[1:26:09] Speaker 9: the way that the government is legislating around this. So
[1:26:13] Speaker 9: the first thing that needs to happen is that we
[1:26:15] Speaker 9: need to look at transparency around how we got to this.
[1:26:19] Speaker 5: So I'm calling for a Royal Commission into water.
[1:26:22] Speaker 9: I did that on the very first day that I
[1:26:24] Speaker 9: announced that I was coming running again, and that goes
[1:26:28] Speaker 9: alongside of what Helen Dalton has been doing from a
[1:26:30] Speaker 9: state level. We need transparency around that. We need to
[1:26:33] Speaker 9: compel evidence. There are too many things that are happening
[1:26:36] Speaker 9: in this space that don't make sense. We can't put
[1:26:39] Speaker 9: the toothpaste back into the tube. So we know that
[1:26:42] Speaker 9: restoring water rights to land is something that's not going
[1:26:45] Speaker 9: to be able to happen. Why is it that Canadian
[1:26:48] Speaker 9: super funds own so much of our water here in
[1:26:51] Speaker 9: Australia when we've got farmers on their knees or people
[1:26:53] Speaker 9: paying five hundred and fifty dollars a meg for water, we've.
[1:26:57] Speaker 5: Got farmers choosing not to plant.
[1:26:59] Speaker 9: So you know, the first thing is that no more
[1:27:02] Speaker 9: water buybacks. We need to stop the water buybacks. We
[1:27:04] Speaker 9: need to be able to have farmers and communities, regional communities,
[1:27:10] Speaker 9: people having a say over how this goes forward. We
[1:27:13] Speaker 9: need people with experience and lived experience to be part
[1:27:15] Speaker 9: of the questioning the decision making going forward. We've got
[1:27:19] Speaker 9: people with really great ideas and knowledge that are being
[1:27:23] Speaker 9: overlooked by people in Canberra who are sitting in an
[1:27:25] Speaker 9: office with no idea about what's happening out here. So
[1:27:28] Speaker 9: they're the things that I would be advocating for. Is
[1:27:31] Speaker 9: you know, we need a Royal Commission because we need
[1:27:33] Speaker 9: to compel evidence. We need transparency and accountability.
[1:27:36] Speaker 5: We need to stop the.
[1:27:37] Speaker 9: Water buybacks now, and we need to make sure that
[1:27:40] Speaker 9: we're looking at foreign ownership and getting our water back
[1:27:43] Speaker 9: into a strained hands.
[1:27:44] Speaker 3: We're coming up to the top of the hour. For
[1:27:46] Speaker 3: those that are watching at home, kindly. The late debate
[1:27:48] Speaker 3: is going to lend us a few minutes of their time.
[1:27:50] Speaker 3: They will be on this evening, but we'll continue on
[1:27:53] Speaker 3: in our conversation here and then after the break we'll
[1:27:56] Speaker 3: have an opportunity for final pictures from everyone. But David
[1:27:59] Speaker 3: again the quick pitch here when it comes to how
[1:28:01] Speaker 3: you're going to deal with the water issue, Well.
[1:28:03] Speaker 1: The first and most important thing is water is a
[1:28:06] Speaker 1: sovereign asset of the nation. It's just not an environmental asset.
[1:28:10] Speaker 1: It drives our food chain, it drives our regional security,
[1:28:14] Speaker 1: it drives our food affordability, and ultimately it drives our
[1:28:17] Speaker 1: national security. So what we're going to do is take
[1:28:20] Speaker 1: the lens off, keep the lens on the environment for
[1:28:22] Speaker 1: what we need to achieve, but then start looking at
[1:28:25] Speaker 1: what we've got to achieve, and that is how do
[1:28:27] Speaker 1: we secure a nation with our water across a host
[1:28:30] Speaker 1: of areas and it will Instead of operating an extraction
[1:28:33] Speaker 1: model and taking away water from our food production, we
[1:28:37] Speaker 1: need to have an investment model determining how much we need,
[1:28:40] Speaker 1: where do we need to invest and bring productivity and
[1:28:42] Speaker 1: capacity back into Australia because it's no longer a problem
[1:28:46] Speaker 1: in the bush. It's not a Pharaoh issue anymore. It's
[1:28:48] Speaker 1: a supermarket issue right across Australia. The Murray Darling Basin
[1:28:52] Speaker 1: is costing every Australian more for their food today. We
[1:28:57] Speaker 1: want to have a Royal commission immediately. We want to
[1:28:59] Speaker 1: understand and why are we involved in international agreements that
[1:29:02] Speaker 1: are interfering with our water management capacity? Is that good
[1:29:06] Speaker 1: for Australia or is it not a Royal commission of
[1:29:10] Speaker 1: inquiry some would say, some would say, we can't do
[1:29:13] Speaker 1: that because the Labor Party will put the terms of condition.
[1:29:15] Speaker 1: Be honest, you, we don't fear the Labor Party on
[1:29:17] Speaker 1: that because we're representing our approach with you to represent
[1:29:21] Speaker 1: all Australians to get the cost of food down and
[1:29:24] Speaker 1: the best way to get it down is to produce
[1:29:26] Speaker 1: it here in the nation. Well, I'm just going to push.
[1:29:29] Speaker 2: Our scheduled next commercial break by nineteen seconds to get
[1:29:32] Speaker 2: a respond from that. NATS and Lip. Yeah.
[1:29:35] Speaker 7: So he may not fear Labor, but Labor has control of.
[1:29:41] Speaker 8: Both the Lower House and with the Greens the Upper House.
[1:29:44] Speaker 8: You call for a Royal commission and the result of
[1:29:47] Speaker 8: that will be they'll set the terms of conditions.
[1:29:49] Speaker 7: Not about fear, it's about the results for farmers.
[1:29:53] Speaker 8: So we want a Commission of inquiry to actually look
[1:29:56] Speaker 8: at the Commonwealth Environmental Water Holder, why they've got so
[1:29:59] Speaker 8: much water, how it's being.
[1:30:01] Speaker 7: Monitored and managed.
[1:30:02] Speaker 8: The fact is they can't release any of that water
[1:30:04] Speaker 8: at the moment. The legislation prohibits them releasing the water.
[1:30:07] Speaker 8: That's the only tap immediately the government could turn on
[1:30:11] Speaker 8: to reduce the costs of farming at the moment, but
[1:30:14] Speaker 8: they can't do.
[1:30:14] Speaker 7: It because legislation's not there.
[1:30:16] Speaker 8: That's what we would push, or that's what I would push,
[1:30:19] Speaker 8: is get that legislation changed, allow the Commonwealth Environmental Waterholder
[1:30:23] Speaker 8: to release some water reduce the cost of water.
[1:30:26] Speaker 7: You can't change the feel you can't change the.
[1:30:30] Speaker 8: Fertilizer at the moment, but you can at least do
[1:30:33] Speaker 8: that and that'll at least take some pressure of farmers.
[1:30:36] Speaker 7: So that's what I would first and foremost.
[1:30:39] Speaker 3: Do I know that there's again a point of contention
[1:30:41] Speaker 3: from David, but to raise I can just quickly get
[1:30:43] Speaker 3: something from you and then I do have to take
[1:30:44] Speaker 3: a break.
[1:30:45] Speaker 6: Yep, we would ban buybacks and I'm not in favor
[1:30:49] Speaker 6: of a Royal Commission. It can take years upon yous
[1:30:51] Speaker 6: and costs hundreds upon hundreds of millions.
[1:30:53] Speaker 12: Of dollars of tax paid dollars that could be.
[1:30:55] Speaker 6: Better spent investing in upgrading infrastructure and also ensuring that
[1:31:00] Speaker 6: every leader of water gets to where it needs to
[1:31:01] Speaker 6: get to. And again, the recommendations aren't binding, but in
[1:31:05] Speaker 6: the alternate, should they be drafted by a green's labor government,
[1:31:08] Speaker 6: it could be disastrous for our farming communities, which is
[1:31:11] Speaker 6: why the Coalition table that Commission of Inquiry into the
[1:31:14] Speaker 6: Commonwealth Environmental Water Holder. It is the only way that
[1:31:18] Speaker 6: our communities are going to get the transparency and insight
[1:31:20] Speaker 6: that they need.
[1:31:21] Speaker 5: Now.
[1:31:23] Speaker 12: The reason why this is important is because should we not.
[1:31:26] Speaker 6: Have any rain along the Murray, water allocations are zero
[1:31:30] Speaker 6: next year, which is going.
[1:31:32] Speaker 12: To devastate our farming communities.
[1:31:33] Speaker 6: And that's even more important because again as alluded to previously,
[1:31:37] Speaker 6: the Commonwealth Environmental Water Holder holds two thirds of all
[1:31:40] Speaker 6: of our water. There are giga leaders upon giga leaders
[1:31:43] Speaker 6: upon giga leaders of water that is sitting somewhere, not
[1:31:46] Speaker 6: being utilized, and there is no legislative lever for that
[1:31:49] Speaker 6: to be released back into productive communities and that absolutely
[1:31:52] Speaker 6: needs to change again.
[1:31:53] Speaker 3: I know it's complicated, I know we go all not
[1:31:55] Speaker 3: on it, but Alas, we'll take a quick break and
[1:31:57] Speaker 3: then we're into overtime on PALMORI live the club fist
[1:32:00] Speaker 3: in Farah in final pictures from the candidates. Remember Lake
[1:32:03] Speaker 3: debate is coming up next week's time.
[1:32:04] Speaker 2: Much we'ret a commercial club in Aubrey. It is great
[1:32:15] Speaker 2: to be here for the pub test.
[1:32:16] Speaker 3: Now this is an opportunity to ask one last question.
[1:32:21] Speaker 3: But Maria, I've got an idea of which way you're
[1:32:23] Speaker 3: going to go and I may take it from there.
[1:32:26] Speaker 16: Okay, So why do you believe you are the best
[1:32:29] Speaker 16: person to represent Farah after the May ninth by election
[1:32:33] Speaker 16: and what differs you to the other candidates.
[1:32:35] Speaker 3: All right, now, I'm going to start with you, Brad.
[1:32:37] Speaker 3: Each candidate is going to get two minutes. There is
[1:32:39] Speaker 3: somebody who will be timing back in the studio, So
[1:32:43] Speaker 3: you got two minutes from now make that final pitch.
[1:32:46] Speaker 7: Look, everyone, my name's Braden. I have served this country
[1:32:50] Speaker 7: for twenty nine and a half years. I love serving.
[1:32:53] Speaker 8: I've served because that is what I truly believe is
[1:32:56] Speaker 8: important for a person in our country.
[1:33:00] Speaker 7: Should have a sense of service.
[1:33:02] Speaker 8: I have looked at this opportunity to serve my community now,
[1:33:07] Speaker 8: to serve you and fight for you. I've been engaged
[1:33:10] Speaker 8: in things that I've been passionate about, the hospital, homeless veterans,
[1:33:14] Speaker 8: I've been doing that and I've just got this absolute
[1:33:18] Speaker 8: intense want to keep serving.
[1:33:21] Speaker 7: And that's what I'll do for you.
[1:33:23] Speaker 8: I will serve you because you are the ones who
[1:33:25] Speaker 8: deserve to be served properly by someone who is not
[1:33:28] Speaker 8: self interested.
[1:33:29] Speaker 7: I'm there for you, and i will fight for you.
[1:33:32] Speaker 5: Thanks.
[1:33:34] Speaker 2: Looks up nice a great.
[1:33:36] Speaker 3: All right, Michelle, what is your final pitch? You have
[1:33:39] Speaker 3: two minutes. Use as much or as little as you wish.
[1:33:42] Speaker 5: Thank you.
[1:33:43] Speaker 9: So I started this journey two years ago when I
[1:33:46] Speaker 9: felt like we weren't being represented well regionally, that we
[1:33:50] Speaker 9: had parties who were mainly represented by people who only
[1:33:54] Speaker 9: knew a city contact. So, you know, my plan was
[1:33:58] Speaker 9: to make sure that we had people outside of here
[1:34:02] Speaker 9: who understood what was.
[1:34:03] Speaker 5: Happening for us regionally. I grew up in regional Australia.
[1:34:07] Speaker 9: You know, I watched services being stripped from the community
[1:34:10] Speaker 9: that my parents were in in Kudamundra. We saw doctors
[1:34:14] Speaker 9: leaving town. We saw telehealth replacing doctors, you know, in
[1:34:19] Speaker 9: that town. And you know, there were banks leaving and
[1:34:22] Speaker 9: there were services that were readily available, you know, years ago,
[1:34:27] Speaker 9: being removed from there. And I was watching elderly people
[1:34:30] Speaker 9: really struggle with that, and that's happening across Farah.
[1:34:34] Speaker 5: I understand the regional context.
[1:34:36] Speaker 9: I have a history of being able to advocate and
[1:34:39] Speaker 9: to knock on doors and to be really persistent and
[1:34:42] Speaker 9: to get what's needed. I don't have the loudest in
[1:34:44] Speaker 9: the loudest voice in the room all the time, but
[1:34:47] Speaker 9: I certainly have the persistence to make change happen. And
[1:34:51] Speaker 9: you know, we've seen you if you read my story,
[1:34:54] Speaker 9: We've made a change in New South Wales.
[1:34:56] Speaker 5: We've seen sixty four point.
[1:34:57] Speaker 9: Three million dollars go across for all regional children to
[1:35:01] Speaker 9: access a program for them to participate equitably in a
[1:35:04] Speaker 9: legal system.
[1:35:06] Speaker 5: And I did that because my representatives weren't doing that
[1:35:08] Speaker 5: for me.
[1:35:10] Speaker 9: It's really important that you have somebody who can listen
[1:35:13] Speaker 9: to your stories, understand them, and take them so other
[1:35:15] Speaker 9: people can understand them as well.
[1:35:18] Speaker 5: And you know that's why I consider myself.
[1:35:20] Speaker 9: I'm certainly not an expert in everything, but I have
[1:35:22] Speaker 9: a great capacity to learn and a really good capacity
[1:35:25] Speaker 9: to share story and make people care. And that's what
[1:35:28] Speaker 9: we need people to do for us, because they've forgot
[1:35:30] Speaker 9: who we are. They've got looking at it, forgot to
[1:35:32] Speaker 9: see us. And I won't stop looking. So that's why
[1:35:36] Speaker 9: I'm the best person for this job.
[1:35:38] Speaker 3: Four seconds to spare, well played, Well played, All right, David.
[1:35:42] Speaker 2: You'll pitch two minutes. Your two minute starts now.
[1:35:45] Speaker 1: Thanks. I understand the economics of Ferror, I understand the
[1:35:49] Speaker 1: engine room of Farr, and I understand the communities of Farr.
[1:35:53] Speaker 1: I also clearly understand we've been collected for twenty five
[1:35:56] Speaker 1: years and we've got a lot of catching up to do.
[1:35:58] Speaker 1: I've had a across agriculture in Australia and internationally. I've
[1:36:03] Speaker 1: been engaged in policy development, both in water land, title,
[1:36:07] Speaker 1: international trade, biosecurity. I feel comfortable that I understand the
[1:36:11] Speaker 1: job description of Parah, and more importantly, I feel comfortable
[1:36:14] Speaker 1: that I've got the skills, capability, courage and tenacity to
[1:36:17] Speaker 1: do it. I feel also that I'm aligned with the
[1:36:20] Speaker 1: right time of people with again political courage and political tenacity.
[1:36:24] Speaker 1: That's been there forever that will be able to deliver
[1:36:27] Speaker 1: a result for Para. So in summary, if you don't
[1:36:31] Speaker 1: understand the engine room and if you don't understand the job,
[1:36:34] Speaker 1: you can't put the right skills to it. And I
[1:36:36] Speaker 1: feel comfortable that I've got the skills and the party
[1:36:38] Speaker 1: that I've aligned myself has got the courage and tenacity
[1:36:41] Speaker 1: to represent Fara into twenty eight and beyond twenty eight election.
[1:36:47] Speaker 2: Thank you all right, good stuck and luck you last
[1:36:52] Speaker 2: make the pitch, go for it.
[1:36:54] Speaker 12: So I was born and raised in Farah.
[1:36:57] Speaker 6: It is where I've had the immense privilege of serving
[1:37:00] Speaker 6: my community both as a senior community lawyer and as
[1:37:03] Speaker 6: a counselor at Aubrey City and also I sit on
[1:37:06] Speaker 6: the board of the Maray Dealing Association. As a senior
[1:37:09] Speaker 6: community lawyer, I was an outreach lawyer, so I wasn't
[1:37:12] Speaker 6: sitting behind a desk. I was out in the regions
[1:37:14] Speaker 6: assisting individuals and families and farmers and small businesses quite
[1:37:19] Speaker 6: often at the most difficult times of their life. Essentially
[1:37:25] Speaker 6: these people who were disproportionately impacted by bad government policy.
[1:37:31] Speaker 6: In terms of my role at Aubroo City Council, I
[1:37:34] Speaker 6: have formed and made decisions around budgets and infrastructure, and
[1:37:40] Speaker 6: on the board of the Maray Dealing Association, I have
[1:37:42] Speaker 6: advocated for better water management across the Murray Daling I'm
[1:37:46] Speaker 6: not up here making promises I know that I can't keep.
[1:37:49] Speaker 6: I will only commit to things that I know that
[1:37:52] Speaker 6: I can deliver. There are candidates here on the stage who,
[1:37:57] Speaker 6: no matter how well intentioned their advocacy is, they will
[1:38:01] Speaker 6: because they can't form a party of government. They will
[1:38:03] Speaker 6: be nothing more than a complaint's desking camera. And that
[1:38:05] Speaker 6: is just the very reality of not being a coalition
[1:38:09] Speaker 6: or forming party of government. Ultimately, I think that I'm
[1:38:13] Speaker 6: the best representative voice for Farah because of my lived
[1:38:17] Speaker 6: experience on the ground. I don't just understand communities from
[1:38:20] Speaker 6: policy papers. I have the lived experience already being an
[1:38:24] Speaker 6: advocate as a community lawyer.
[1:38:27] Speaker 12: And yeah, that's me.
[1:38:28] Speaker 2: Thanks, good stuff, excellent. All right.
[1:38:33] Speaker 3: So I'm not going to ask who, because that's between
[1:38:36] Speaker 3: you and the pencil on Saturday. But hands up, who's
[1:38:39] Speaker 3: made their mind about what they're going to do on Saturday?
[1:38:43] Speaker 2: All right?
[1:38:44] Speaker 3: Hands up, who's still undecided? You've just spent an hour
[1:38:48] Speaker 3: with these people, all right.
[1:38:49] Speaker 1: Thank you very much.
[1:38:50] Speaker 2: I do appreciate it. To all of you.
[1:38:51] Speaker 3: Good luck on Saturday. Congratulations on your campaign.
[1:38:55] Speaker 2: Thank you for standing up and getting involved in the
[1:38:57] Speaker 2: political process. The results will.
[1:38:59] Speaker 3: Be Monday night, six m and all night long on
[1:39:02] Speaker 3: Sky News.
[1:39:03] Speaker 2: Aubrey, it's been fun to hang out. I'll see you
[1:39:05] Speaker 2: again on Saturday. This is all my Real Live Country.
[1:39:08] Speaker 2: We'll see you tomorrow night. Here's the late debate

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