Safe Food Victoria shows one size fits none

Australian Dairy Farmers (ADF) has called out “tokenistic” consultation behind today’s announcement to establish Safe Food Victoria – the organisation set to replace the specialist Dairy Food Safety Victoria (DFSV).

“The so-called ‘consultation’ felt like more of an ultimatum,” ADF president Ben Bennett said.

“You can’t consult when you don’t bring any genuine options to the table, you can only enforce your decision.

“This is a solution in search of a problem. Don’t dismantle a proven, specialist regulator and replace it with a one-size-fits-none bureaucracy. The stakes are too high for guesswork.”

ADF has been tracking these changes closely, not least because DFSV is seen as the leading organisation in food safety technical expertise across Australia’s dairy industry.

“More milk is produced in Victoria than in any other state in Australia, so it makes sense that the bulk of our knowledge in this field is developed in Victoria,” Mr Bennett said.

“Given we’ve not seen a business case for the transition to Food Safety Victoria, and nobody can outline any grounds for improvement at DFSV, we see this as a clear and blatant cash grab by the debt-stricken Victorian government.

“DFSV doesn’t cost taxpayers anything; it’s fully funded by farmers – in fact, as we understand it, the organisation has a multi-million-dollar bank balance which will probably be consumed by consolidated government expenditure.”

ADF has repeated its invitation for the Victorian Government to engage in good faith and reconsider how a cost-neutral organisation can continue to provide value to a vital industry.

“If the Allan government truly wants to cut red tape, fix the audits and harmonise rules across councils. Keep DFSV independent, risk-based and focused on dairy, rather than building a bigger bottleneck. You don’t bulldoze the house to replace a door.”