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15 Oct 2013 Justin Law A resolution on the resumption of hunting in state forests is expected to be passed through NSW parliament today (Wednesday) with the Upper House voting on the Game and Feral Animal Control Amendment Bill. The Bill, which would see the abolition of the Game Council of NSW and control of state forest hunting brought under the auspice of the Department of Primary Industries, was yesterday passed through the Lower House. It will go to the Upper House today where it is expected to come under pressure from Greens senators who will want to put further restrictions on hunting on public land before it is voted on. The amendments in the Bill follow the recommendations of the Dunn report into the governance of the NSW Game Council, which found that there was conflicts of interest and called for its abolition. However, while the amendments would see the Game Council become a game advisory unit within the DPI, it would mean that hunting in state forests would resume and continue in much the same fashion as it had previously. While this is hard to swallow for the Shooters and Fishers Party, which was also dudded on the hunting in national parks issue, it does see the 35,000 R-licenced hunters able to return the state forests. The fear is that The Greens will successfully impose ridiculous conditions and further amendments on the Bill or that the Bill won’t get up at all and hunting in state forests will remain in limbo until the issue is further resolved. Meanwhile, trial hunting in NSW national parks (the starting date is expected to be announced shortly) has been labelled as a waste of time. Shooters and Fishers Party MLCs Robert Brown and Robert Borsak both slammed the heavily regulated model that is a shadow of the deal done with the NSW government in return for supporting the sale of the state’s power stations. The trial model is expected to see hunters: Undertake an expensive two-day training seminar; Chaperoned by National Parks and Wildlife Service staff; Unable to take meat or trophies from their kills; and Restricted to areas that may not support good hunting. These conditions are expected to make the trial so unpopular with hunters that it will fail outright and give the government grounds to review hunting in state forests. “I can’t see how hunters would want to be part of a system that’s designed to fail,” Mr Brown said. “Why would experienced and skilled hunters spend money and time on pointless training and then agree to be supervised by people who clean the toilets?” |
