February 10, 2020
The State Opposition has again called for the State Government to review its decision to award a Queensland Health dairy supply contract to Lactalis.
This follows the announcement last week the French-owned company is closing its Rockhampton factory.
LNP Shadow Agriculture Minister and Member for Gympie Tony Perrett said the decision to close the factory was “a disgrace”.
“The Palaszczuk Labor Government should never have awarded the contract in the first place to Lactalis over the 100 per cent Queensland-owned and operated Maleny Dairies,” Mr Perrett said.
“Labor’s ‘Buy Queensland’ policy is meant to give preference to local businesses in the regions when government contracts are awarded.
“Why wasn’t due diligence undertaken to ensure Lactalis would not close its Rockhampton milk factory and sack its 47 workers only three weeks after it pocketed the lucrative government contract?
“The closure of the Rockhampton factory is a massive blow to Queensland’s dairy industry and means more milk and dairy products from other States and overseas will be sold in our State.
“To make matters worse, Labor has repeatedly refused to overturn its flawed decision to award the contract to Lactalis.”
However, the Queensland Dairyfarmers Organisation has described the closure of the Rockhampton factory as “inevitable”.
“Queensland’s declining milk production over the last decade meant the closure of the Rockhampton plant was inevitable,” QDO president and Lactalis supplier Brian Tessmann said in a statement.
“While this certainly will be a devastating blow to those employed at the Rockhampton plant, the closure should not affect the dairy farmers currently supplying to Lactalis.
“Production into the Rockhampton factory has been sporadic for a while now.
“Milk produced in the Central Queensland region for Lactalis will simply be transported down and processed in either the Nambour or South Brisbane factories.
“Only farms around Biggenden and to the north have had their milk going regularly to Rocky.”
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