SAFETY concerns about genetically modified foods have become a state election issue with an anti-GM campaigner announcing she will challenge Food and Agriculture Minister Terry Redman in the Warren-Blackwood electorate.
Julie Newman, who has a farm near Margaret River and was a member of a parliamentary advisory committee under former Labor Food and Agriculture Minister Kim Chance, has said she will stand as an independent candidate against Mr Redman next year.
A letter by Mr Redman on GM foods, in the Mail last week, was the catalyst for Ms Newman deciding to challenge him.
Mr Redman’s letter generated a flood of responses from people across Australia, including one from Ms Newman, and two more from local people (see Letters, pages 6 and 7) challenging claims GM technology is safe and adequately regulated.
“I decided to run (for State Parliament) after being contacted by so many people encouraging me to represent their concerns,” Ms Newman said late last week. “They want someone representing them who is not afraid to stand up to the corporate sector.”
Ms Newman is a campaigner against GM crops, and has held past agripolitical positions including on the Grains Council of Australia’s policy and seed council and as vice president of WAFarmers grains council.
Now living in Darling Downs on the southern outskirts of Perth while she studies politics at Notre Dame University, Ms Newman was involved in business and farming in Newdegate and said she is considering moving closer to her farm near Margaret River when she finishes her degree.
“If I am elected I will work with whoever is in government to ensure the viability of local industry, while ensuring that the natural assets and attractions of this truly beautiful and diverse electorate are protected, valued and preserved for the future,” she said.
Ms Newman said her key issue was the “current lack of risk management” to protect the electorate from adverse impacts caused by big business.
Concerns include GM crops, fracking for oil and gas and corporate farming.
She said she believed genuine concerns of people in the South West region are being ignored by Mr Redman.
“It is not good governance to ignore risks and risk management,” she said. “I am concerned about the strong influence on our State’s agricultural and food policies by large multinational companies whose primary concerns are corporate profits, not the future of our rural communities.
“Terry Redman has literally asked the GM companies to control our plant breeding and seed industry, and as a result Monsanto and the Department of Agriculture and Food now share the same South Perth address.
“Terry Redman’s GM policies are dividing our community and causing huge concern locally, and in our export markets. We cannot afford the disastrous risks associated with the proposed GM wheat, wine, potatoes, fruit, vegetables, dairy pasture and trees.”
As previously reported, electoral boundary changes which come into effect at the next election are expected to weaken Mr Redman’s hold on Warren Blackwood.
The new boundaries will see him lose his Nationals powerbase in the east, while picking up predominantly Liberal, Labor and Greens voters from Vasse at the Margaret River and Witchcliffe booths and from the Donnybrook-Balingup Shire in the north.
