Lismore MP Janelle Saffin has come out swinging at conservative National Party representatives who have chosen not to support restoring local milk producer NORCOs contract to supply North Coast hospitals and health services.
The contract that NORCO held to supply local hospitals with milk was once again cancelled and HealthShare NSW awarded its state-wide milk supply contract to international supplier Dairy Farmers.
Ms Saffin said she is disappointed that three NSW Nationals MPs are not lending their support to a single e-petition to Parliament to restore NORCO’s contract.
‘Constituents have contacted me wondering why my fellow MPs Gurmesh Singh (Coffs Harbour), Richie Williamson (Clarence) and Michael Kemp (Oxley) are not backing in the e-petition launched last Frida,’ she said.
While Federal Member for Page Kevin Hogan released a statement blaming the NSW Labor government for the decision it was the National Party who first made the decision in to end the contract.
‘When the Nationals were in government and the same thing happened, we all backed in the then local member Thomas George and the Health Services Union ran a big campaign, fully supported by the community and after some time, people power changed the decision of the then bureaucracy,’ explained Ms Saffin.
‘It is people power we need this time as well to support our local NORCO employees and dairy farmer suppliers who are part and parcel of the NORCO dairy co-operative. We need 20,000 signatures to get this issue debated on the floor of Parliament and that is powerful. To have two separate petitions in circulation is already leading to confusion in the community and effectively weakens our chances of getting the required number of signatures.’
NORCO is Australia’s largest and oldest dairy co-operative and supports 190 local farms, buying their milk and creating premium products that are celebrated as ‘Australia’s best tasting milk’ at Dairy Australia’s, Grand Dairy Awards in 2023.
‘We’re talking about Australia’s last 100 per cent farmer owned dairy cooperative that provides an economic lifeline to hundreds of families in a region that has experienced the double whammy of floods and the cost-of-living crisis,’ said HSU (Health Services) secretary Gerard Hayes.
Ms Saffin as reiterated that, ‘It was the bureaucracy that made this recent decision to award the tender to a different supplier, but I, on behalf of the community, expect the Minister for Health and Regional Health (Ryan Park) to work out a way to fix it.’
‘That means NORCO getting its contract back as it was to deliver its products into the North Coast Hospitals and Health Services.’
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