Decade of sales at Muchea

To celebrate the historic milestone Farm Weekly has taken a trip down memory lane - delving into the archives, speaking to livestock agents, commercial operators and politicians who have been involved in some way in the industry and the process of moving from the old Midland Saleyards to the new location at 5 Muchea East Road, Muchea.

In April 27, 2010, the historic Midland Saleyards held its final auction after servicing the State's sheep, cattle and pig industries for 100 years, since 1910.

During that time, the Midland Saleyards not only facilitated the buying and selling of livestock but had been a vibrant meeting place for the rural community, including producers, stock agents, truck drivers, processors and exporters.

Attending the weekly saleyards was akin to a family outing and in some ways it still is.

As time passed the Midland site had served its purpose, it had become dilapidated while urban build-up had made saleyard operations more difficult.

With the growth and development occurring in the city it meant it was time to move to a new location for the betterment of the industry and the welfare of the livestock.

The then Liberal-National government led by premier Colin Barnett announced that it would fund the new yards in 2008, as one of its first acts "to clear uncertainty in the meat and livestock industries" that had existed under the previous Labor government.

There had been more than a decade of discussions and planning that led to that announcement.

The agriculture minister at the time was The Nationals WA Member for Warren Blackwood, Terry Redman, who said former Labor agriculture minister Kim Chance sat down with him in a briefing after the change of government (which he said was very rare) in order to ensure he was up to speed with the issues and progress of selling the Midland yards at the time.

"Kim Chance gave me a briefing which was unusual," Mr Redman said.

"It was a hand over and one of the issues was the Midland Saleyards."

Mr Redman said they had had a range of offers to consider but they settled on the best offer of $70 million.

"We just had to pull the trigger and do it," he said.

"It was my first cabinet submission as a minister.

"The first $54.5m sealed the deal for the MLC."

The final cost of the MLC was $58m.

Atlex Stockyards was awarded the contract to design the MLC yards while the building contractor came from interstate.

Atlex Stockyards' Ian Crafter said it "didn't take long to complete the design stage" but then they had to wait for funding to be signed off before building could start.

"Safety was the key to the design," Mr Crafter said.

"There's unloading on one end, drafting pens, sale pens and on the other end loading facilities.

"We try to minimise sheep and cattle walking, to reduce stress.

"It's all to do with the safety of the livestock and for the workers drafting and the buyers and auctioneer walkways."

Mr Crafter said the design team in place consisted of livestock and rural transporters, producer representatives, the State government as well as WAMIA staff.

"We focussed on it being user-friendly and with the highest possible animal welfare standards as a priority," Mr Crafter said.

"It is not easy doing projects with so many people involved but we kept the end in mind and got the best outcome considering the constraints.

"It has served the industry well."

The Midland Saleyards needed to be sold in order to pay for the new yards at Muchea.

It eventually sold and as part of the State Saleyards Strategy covered the cost of the Muchea centre, as well as the Katanning Sheep Regional Saleyards and upgrades to Mt Barker Saleyards.

Mr Redman said while $70m was the sale price some of the funds had to be spent on rehabilitation work as the Midland site was prepared for redevelopment.

He said $2.5m was leftover from all the infrastructure upgrades, which was allocated to sourcing support for the upgrade of the Boyanup Saleyards, but after two terms in government they were unable to achieve the outcome they were looking for.

He said it has been a "point of angst for south west producers" ever since and with the current lease to the WA Livestock Salesmen's Association expiring in 2022 he hoped it could be resolved once and for all.

The State government is expected to make an announcement on the upgrades to Boyanup in the next few weeks or months.

While there has been some discussion about the location of the MLC, whether it should have been on the hill or down on the flat, which people say would have saved a lot of money on earthworks, the original vision of the government included a precinct similar to what was at Midland, with agents and transporters and other businesses located in the vicinity.

With the NorthLink highway completed and other businesses set to be established in the area that vision could become a reality in the future if it is supported by the industry.

The MLC was built to accommodate sales of up to 3400 cattle and 28,000 sheep at one time and is the largest undercover multi species livestock selling centre in Australia with an annual capacity of 120,000 cattle and one million sheep.

This capacity figure was roughly what the Midland Saleyards had been achieving as numbers of sheep and lambs dropped from 1.5 million head in 1996 to 1m in 2004.

Cattle numbers had been roughly the same, while pig throughput had declined significantly from 64,000 head in 1995 to just 13,000 in 2010.

The government decided not to continue with pig auctions in the State and didn't include the option at the MLC.

At the time this was the cause of concern to small pig producers - many of whom have since left the industry or worked out arrangements to supply local butchers or processors directly.

Removing pigs from the auction system was seen as a good animal welfare move as well as a huge improvement to biosecurity.

Not everyone agreed that it was the best move for the pork industry.

In his 2010 press statement Mr Redman said the MLC facility was "state-of-the-art in terms of animal handling, occupational health and safety and environmental considerations".

The MLC was officially opened by Mr Barnett and Mr Redman on May 3, 2010, followed by its inaugural auction.

Mr Redman said he couldn't believe 10 years had passed since the opening.

"How time flies," he said.

Mr Redman said building the MLC was a "fairly significant step in animal welfare and paved the way for the livestock sector in the State".

"It is a massive site and well suited to transporters with a wash down bay for biosecurity and animal welfare," he said.

"There's been a few lessons learnt after it opened which was to be expected.

"The focus was on animal welfare because the Midland Saleyards didn't meet the standards and community expectations."

He said after the 2011 live export cattle ban to Indonesia the MLC proved its worth to the State as more cattle were sent south for auction and processing.

Mr Redman said in a way it was good timing to have built the facility not long before - as Midland wouldn't have coped with the additional numbers.

The Western Australian Meat Industry Authority (WAMIA) was the overseeing government authority of the Midland Saleyards and then the MLC, with its chairman being Kerry McAuliffe in 2010.

Mr Redman said that Mr McAuliffe had led WAMIA during a period of great change for the livestock industry, overseeing the closure of the Midland saleyards, construction, opening and operation of the MLC and the development and implementation of the State Saleyard Strategy.

Mr McAuliffe and the board should be "proud of their achievements" and contribution to the industry, Mr Redman said.

The then chief executive officer Renata Paliskis said at the time that the new facility sent a "clear message to consumers and markets that world class standards in occupational health and safety, animal welfare and environmental sustainability are compatible with increased productivity and throughput".

"Automated drafts and state of the art ramps will eliminate bottlenecks which in turn will result in livestock smoothly running in one end and out the other," Ms Paliskis said.

Two years later Mr Redman appointed David Lock as chairman in March 2012, replacing Mr McAuliffe who stepped down after 13 years in the position.

Mr Lock served as chairman of WAMIA until the end of July 2019 when he stood down and was replaced by Irwin cattle and sheep producer Sally O'Brien on August 1, 2019.

In his 2013/14 chairman's Report Mr Lock said one of the highlights of the MLC during the year (ending June 30, 2014) was the record number of sheep processed.

"MLC processed 785,505 sheep during the year, compared to 463,500 last year (2012/13)," Mr Lock said.

"This included a single sale record of 35,767 sheep in July 2013.

"2013/2014 saw the MLC complete its fourth full year of operations with sale throughput increasing to record the highest throughput since the first year of operation in 2010/2011."

In the 2015/16 annual report Mr Lock said the MLC processed a record number of cattle during the year (108,000 head) as well as more than half a million sheep.

In his 2018/2019 annual Report he said the five-year average of sheep throughput was 656,316 head and the five-year average of cattle throughput was 99,718 head.

In his 2015/16 report Mr Lock said "much of the board's time was focussed on restructuring the operations of MLC".

"This involved agreeing on a plan with livestock agents and other users to dissolve the joint venture operation known as Livestock Logistics Western Australia (LLWA)," he said.

"Negotiations with the joint venture partners and other key stakeholders were lengthy, however the outcome was a position which the joint venture partners in LLWA and other key stakeholders supported."

The agreement saw WAMIA take full responsibility for the operations at MLC from July 1, 2016, which avoided some of the previous uncertainty as to roles and responsibilities between LLWA, WAMIA and livestock agents.

WAMIA's board and management were confident that users and other stakeholders would continue to see improved outcomes at MLC.

During the 2017/18 year, WAMIA's deputy chairman Warren Robinson retired after 24 years of service.

In August 2019 the chief executive officer Andrew Williams left after three years in the role (February 2015-August 2018) to pursue other ambitions and WAMIA welcomed Greg Lott, firstly on an interim basis and then into the permanent position.

The turnover of staff at the MLC in its 10-year history has been a hot topic within the industry, though people would rather not speak on the record about it.

Most people said that stability and continuity in management were important to running the centre so that everyone knew the procedures and processes and understood their roles and responsibilities.

Last year there were some issues as WAMIA sought to reduce its costs by $500,000, by shifting the sale days so its employees didn't have to work on weekends and claim government penalty rates.

That was met with opposition from agents and producers, especially smaller producers that worked during the week and didn't have the time to transport and deliver livestock to the centre in the proposed times.

WAMIA quickly reversed its decision to keep the cattle sale day on a Monday and the sheep sale on a Tuesday, however it made arrangements that agents would be responsible for drafting and presenting their own clients' livestock.

Agents were happy with that arrangement as they had basically been doing that anyway - while paying WAMIA for the service - which they were not always satisfied with.

Mr Lock said those changes "have led to significant ongoing cost savings for WAMIA".