The Abbott Government is undertaking an unprecedented attack on Australia's agriculture chemicals regulator and three key agriculture research corporations.
The Agriculture Minister is threatening forced relocations and driving savings in critical areas of agriculture's; productivity and competitiveness.
The Abbott Government has already cut funding to many of agriculture's research institutions and failed to deliver promised additional Research & Development funding.
The reality is both the Australian Pesticides Veterinary Medicines Authority and our Research & Development Corporations will lose vital experienced and highly qualified professionals if forced to re-locate. Worse, Barnaby Joyce is going to force these agencies to meet the costs, including that of the inevitable redundancies.
And in the wake of his decision to re-locate his ministerial office to Armidale, Barnaby Joyce wants the APVMA to re-locate to his electorate too. Barnaby Joyce is calling it "decentralisation' but it looks more like "pork-barrelling".
We all support the idea of creating economic activity and jobs in the regions, but in the past forced decentralisations have met with limited success. Decentralisation has the best chance when it is accompanied by a vision, consultation and a strategic plan.
But it appears Barnaby Joyce simply woke up one morning with an idea without thinking it through.
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