It's back to school for Sutton

Agriculture Minister Jim Sutton needs to do a course in basic economics if he thinks farmers want to ride on the back of taxpayers - nothing could be further from the truth says National's Agriculture spokesperson David Carter.

"The reality is quite the reverse, Government rides on the back of agriculture.

"Primary Production is the backbone of our economy contributing to 17% of GDP and a staggering 67% of exports.

"And now it is farmers that are paying for the Government's latest ideological flight of fancy - ratifying the Kyoto Protocol", says Mr Carter.

"The Government is confiscating over a billion dollars worth of carbon credits from farmers. And it now has the cheek to tax farmers for their emissions when they already pay for them with their forest credits.

"Mr Sutton's comments are rich considering it is the strong performance of agriculture over the past four years that has masked the incompetence of this Government's economic management.

"Mr Sutton's ill-informed comments make it clear - it's well and truly time he did an economics refresher course", says Mr Carter.

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