Media Releases

Shadow Minister for Agriculture and Deputy Leader of The Nationals Peter Walsh has called on the Brumby Government to take immediate action to extend the hours of its locust hotline.
Mr Walsh said a Mildura resident who had discovered up to 100 hoppers on his property on Saturday morning had today reported that the hotline was not manned on weekends.
“Unfortunately locusts don’t just work during business hours,” Mr Walsh said.
“If the Brumby Government is spending more than $40 million on its locust war, surely it can staff its locust hotline for farming hours, not Spring Street business hours.”
Mr Walsh said the Brumby Government must extend the operating hours of the hotline so farmers could reach someone first thing in the morning, and later in evening, seven days a week.
“To be effective, the hotline needs to be open at least between the hours of 6am and 10pm,” Mr Walsh said.
“It is an absolute waste of taxpayer dollars to heavily advertise a hotline that isn’t answering calls from Victoria’s farmers.
“Landholders who received a letter from John Brumby instructing them to maintain a constant vigil for locusts have every right to be cynical, because come 5pm it is the government who is walking off the job.
Mr Walsh said with hatchings expected any day, John Brumby had again demonstrated he was completely out of touch with the realities of farming life.
“Farmers typically work long days, leaving the house early in the morning and returning late in the evening. They are not always in range of a mobile phone tower on their properties,” Mr Walsh said.
“For all the spin about a war on locusts, a hotline which operates business hours only serves to reinforce that John Brumby has lost touch with the realities of living in rural Victoria,” Mr Walsh said.