ASSISTANT Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry Anthony Chisholm has confirmed that the Federal Government has not abandoned its policy of partially recovering biosecurity costs from farmers, despite strong pushback from the industry.

The admission came as the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry revealed that the biosecurity section of its budget is already fully cost-recovered.

The Federal Government introduced the Agriculture (Biosecurity Protection) Charges Bill 2024 and Agriculture (Biosecurity Protection) Levies and Charges Collection Bill 2024 into the House of Representatives on February 28.

The bills moved to the Senate on March 27, but were never put forward for a vote after the Greens, independent senators and the Liberal National Party foreshadowed plans to block the legislation.

The legislation was expected to come into effect on July 1 with the levy to raise about $51.8 million, $12.5M of which would come from grain producers.

The bills remain before the parliament and are still listed on the Senate’s notice paper, that details the business before the body on any given sitting day.

During Rural and Regional Affairs and Transport Committee Senate Estimates this week, Mr Chisholm said the government was still committed to a cost-recovery strategy for biosecurity.

“I think those people, producers who are benefiting from a strong biosecurity system, would be expected to contribute to it; that’s what the government has been working towards,” Mr Chisholm said.

When asked if the government would continue to pursue the legislation he said, they were “still looking for a solution, working with the industry and stakeholders on that”.

Cost-recovery model

Since 2002, the Federal Government has adopted a cost-recovery policy, requiring all agencies to charge for services or goods delivered to a non-governmental individual or organisation.

The proposed Biosecurity Protection Levy, as well as existing fees charged to importers, such as the Full Import Declaration, are all designed as part of the strategy to cost-recover DAFF services.

When asked if the department’s biosecurity services were cost-recovered despite the new levy not coming into effect, DAFF secretary Adam Fennessy said it

would have “no impact on the department”.

“It doesn’t change the department’s financial position because that was more in a whole-of-government budget context how that money would be handled,” Mr Fennessy said.

DAFF chief financial officer Matthew Geyson said the biosecurity services were currently fully cost-recovered from the current fees and charges.

He said the BPL “would have been collected as an administered receipt and returned to consolidated revenue” rather than being attributed directly to the department’s accounts.

Nationals Senator for Queensland Matt Canavan questioned the need for the levy, given the department’s activities were “fully funded from cost recovery”.

“You’re already recovering your costs through fees, so why do we need the levy on top? It would just be a tax then,” Mr Canavan said.

Mr Geyson refused to comment further, and said the BPL was “part of a budget decision made by government”.

Biosecurity funding breakdown

Last week DAFF released the inaugural Biosecurity funding and expenditure report 2023‒24 which revealed the department received $379.1M in revenue from cost recovery sources for 2023-24.

This is expected to rise to $417.1M in 2024-25.

These totals are on par with government appropriations — $366.4M in 2023-24 and $366.6M in 2024-25 — accounting for roughly 47 percent of the total biosecurity budget.

In 2023-24, importers accounted for $365M of this amount, with Australia Post contributing $15.3M.

From 2024-25, the fees and charges to importers will be increased 4.1p, in line with indexation, alongside the introduction of a new charge on low-value imported goods expected to raise $27M.

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