Paskeville Field Days

Mr ELLIS (Narungga) (15:37): I rise today to inform the house that the famous Paskeville Field Days are underway as I speak at the field days site in Paskeville. I would like to start by thanking the member for Frome for pairing me out yesterday so that I could take the opportunity to attend but one day of this major biennial event, the largest such event in the Narungga electorate. It was a very much appreciated pair and, as I said, it allowed me to attend this significant community event.

The field days are acknowledged as the oldest in Australia and are held every two years. A wide range of community groups contribute to the running of the field days, and I would like to thank all the ag bureaus—Boor's Plains, Bute, Cunliffe, Arthurton, Paskeville, Petersville and Moonta, many of which have served for over 30 years to stage this event—along with various Lions clubs, Apex clubs, sporting and other service clubs that have contributed to the food, marshalling and other aspects of the show. Thank you for all you do to make sure that this event continues to run smoothly.

Mr Deputy Speaker, as you well know, the event has a major focus on agricultural machinery and equipment, with dealers and retailers coming from far and wide to show their wares. There is also an assortment of stalls showing quality crafts, general interest products and other assorted knick-knacks. With approximately 700 stallholders in total, it is a large event and a massive show.

Congratulations should go to new president, Bruce Philbey, and his fellow committee members Geoff Lamshed, past president Nick Correll, Dulcie Barker, Martin Kenny, Paul Browning, Rosalie Pearce, Luke Graham, Brenton Drewett, Malve Haynes, Michael Barker and Adrian Mason. An incredible amount of hard work goes into organising a show of the magnitude of the YP Field Days and the only way it is possible is with a well-populated committee and everyone pulling their weight. In this instance, it is plain to see for all those who attend that the committee has done an outstanding job.

The job of organising a show like the field days is difficult under normal circumstances, but this time around it was made all the more difficult by the ordinary office building that housed all the records, papers and procedures burning down in a fire in the lead-up to the field days. The office building has yet to be rebuilt, but the show must go on, and what a wonderful show it is. It was wonderful to be there yesterday. Congratulations and best of luck to the committee, all the service clubs and everyone playing a part in the organisation and running of the field days for the remainder of today and tomorrow.

If there is anyone out there listening to the live stream of this speech who is intending to visit the field days this afternoon or tomorrow, then, please, stop by the Cyclone Pavilion, site 15, and visit the Narungga electorate office, which has been transplanted into the pavilion for the duration of the field days. It was a pleasure to be there with them yesterday interacting with constituents, particularly on the Port Wakefield solution, the plans of which we have proudly displayed at the front of the stall.

There was significant interest in that plan and the benefits that it will provide to the local community and the opportunity that it presented the community to solidify the future of their town and the opportunities that would come along with it. There has been a litany of other inquiries, and it has been a pleasure to host the stall with the member for Grey, Rowan Ramsey, with visits from Senators David Fawcett and Alex Antic over the past couple days. Thank you very much to those three gentlemen for coming down. I took the opportunity to chat with a wide number of farmers, machinery dealers, agronomists and farm-related industry representatives, and I visited the GPSA tent yesterday.

Mr Deputy Speaker, as you would well know, there is a great deal of excitement around the lifting of the moratorium on genetically modified crops and the benefits that would flow to both the farmers and the consumers. Support for the lifting of the moratorium was widespread if not unanimous, and the relief that the independent review showed exactly what everyone thought it would was plain to see.

I would caution those opposite about standing in the way and trying to frustrate the implementation of the result of that independent review. Those opposite need to take politics out of the equation, read the report and finally offer some support to the farming sector. It is a sector already riddled with red tape, and this, finally, is an opportunity to make things easier for our primary producers. They are excited about it, they are expecting it to be delivered and I urge those opposite to help deliver it.

While I have a little bit of time left, it was great to see the Hon. Frank Pangallo at the field days yesterday, although I do note that he spent more time in Norway than Narungga in the first 18 months of this term. Nonetheless, it was pleasing to see him there listening to the concerns of the farmers regarding mining. I hope that while he was there he, too, picked up the sentiment of the public, of the farming community, about the lifting of the GM moratorium and the benefits that it would provide, and ensures that SA-Best get in behind it and support the lifting of the moratorium.