Animal Welfare Bill update

[kc]

Animal Welfare Bill - Update

The Senate committee has recommended that this Bill not proceed.

The Greens and the Democrats on the committee dissented.


Please recall that is Bill is introduced by Qld Democrat Senator Bartlett. Its called Animal Welfare but its actually and animal rights bill. (animal rights gives animal the same rights as humans. – it’s the extreme vegan / PETA viewpoint)

A very similar Bill was introduced in 2003. So this is now their first attempt.

In several sections the current Bill would limit fishing and fishing tournaments. The most dangerous provision is in the fine print - way down the back under definitions it defines that if an act would cause physical or psychological pain to a human - it also does so to an animal As Fish are defined and animals; and a hook would hurt my mouth, then all fishing would be banned by this Bill.

This key point was completely missed in the Recfish Submission. However the Committee did in their summary of submissions state:

· fear that the bill, if passed, would result in a permanent ban on recreational fishing and hunting.


As expected the committee stated:

Recommendation
The committee recommends that the bill should not proceed.


In their dissenting opinion the Greens and Democrats Senators ( working together) stated that Fishing was not meant to be included.

Some submissions also expressed concern that the legislation may lead to severe
restrictions or banning of recreational or other fishing. These concerns seem to have
been fed by an incorrect and misleading media release issued by former Fisheries
Minister, Senator Ian MacDonald.3 The legislation does not mention fishing, nor does
the Second Reading Speech. The suggestion that it would inherently lead to
restrictions on fishing is a long bow to draw, however to remove doubt and the
potential for further misleading claims to be made, it would be advisable to amend the
legislation to put this beyond dispute.





BOTTOM LINE:

This Bill was well written and made it all the way to the Senate. This is the second attempt and will not be the last.

Here is a thought that will have you losing sleep: what if the Fishing Party, with our tiny 30,000 votes had not given Howard the balance of power in the Senate? What deals would he have done with the Democrats and the Greens to get them to pass the IR Legislation he wanted so badly? Would he have passed this bill? Maybe, especially as the ban on fishing is hidden in the fine print and was missed by both The Fisheries Minister and by Recfish.

Its not too long a bow to draw that we were 30,000 votes away from losing fishing. all of it forever.

All it would take is some Green Barristers tested the law and had an angler charged – just like happened in Germany)


KC

[choppa]

totally agree dc,, and yes,, it does make you wonder!!!!!!

Sunfish reported an interesting report earlier ths year that i'm sure you would be up to speed on re the overall $ intake that rec fishing provides the govt,, and from memory this went along the lines of the ""average"" angler spending 500-1000 annually on tackle/bait/fundamentals etc,, this does not include the more serious anglers that spend tens of thousands each year including boats,,,

with gst,,, the govt receives 10%,, and then of course you have the employment issue to next bring up that caters for all these anglers,,,

Sunfish i believe was heavily involved in the 1993 meeting that looked at the then goss govt,, that wanted to start a SGIRF headed by tom burns

ROFA's/Smart Areas were discussed in detail, and received strong support, which led to the govt implementing a $12 levy on boat rego, to assist in commercial buy backs associated with ROFA's

millions more $ have been received from this levy to date,,,

bribie island was the first ROFA off the starting block,, but since then??????????

i belive from memory,,, NSW since then has established over 30,,, and have also stopped beach netting of tailor

WE,, on the other hand have been continually restricted were we can fish,,,including offshore and inshore locations,,, (30%,, alone adjacent the GBR)

because of this,, is it fair to say that the latest research showed that the number of anglers QLD has dropped from 880,000 to around 740,000,,,

frank payne summed up this report beautifully by asking when the govt is going to stop the trend, and give back support for the future of rec fishing,,,,,,,i wonder sometimes too

the old,,, don't forget to read the fineprint trick eh,,,,,,makes me ask just how many did read it

[gif]

Choppa

What you say about revenue is rational logical and sorry to say completely wrong.

All politicians care about is votes. That is the curse of democracy. Its nothing to do with doing the right thing or being logical or scientific.

Its the green vote that is being chased - By the Greens The Democrats Labor and Liberals. So every major party is running away from fishing to chase the green vote.

Have a read of Dave Donald’s column in QFM out today - page 49. he explains it well.

[choppa]

gary,,,,,haven't read daves column yet,,, but i promise i will,,,,

all i'm saying is to ban rec fishing based on a bill that has fine print stating so,,, will need to be exceptionally well written and bias towards the reasons why other than the physical/phsycoligical aspects of pain to a human versus pain to an animal

tagging fish///////earpiercing
farming cattle,,poultry,,etc///////farming fish

etc etc etc

scientific evidence is what is needed,,,and thus in saying so may still not be enough,, but it has to be better than what is being offered to date,,

dont take me the wrong way,, i'm all for dc and your comments,,, i'm not a lib or green eye,,, i just believe in the monetary value, in rec fishing,,, the pro value in fishing,, and all associated revenue would leave a nice size hole in the budget that would need some fast talking on where or how it would be replaced

dc correctly gives germany as an example,,, but the population count on germany vs australia leaves this door open (in rec fishing numbers,,,,,,,,based on reports)

i also believe,,, that if enough of the """weekend warrior""" style rec fisho really cared about these issues they would be raising there hand a HELL of a lot more and doing something about it NOW

(oooohhh thats gunna create some response,,,,choopa's in trouble again)

but seriously,,,,how many posts here on ausfish do we read about something that is not to the general popularity liken,,,,,they all complain,,,,,,they all throw in there 20 cents worth,,,,and then ????????

maybe the fishing party should look at a more vocal and community based stand point and drive this home,,,, media hasn't worked,, those that aren't interested pay bugger all attention,, or rely upon others to fix it!!!!!!!!!!

vote me in,,,,i've only got sundays free at the moment,,, but open to offers

[Louis]

The scary thing is that this bill may one day be passed and become legislation.

Stranger things have happened in the past.

With the way things have been going in the last decade or so, who can predict what is going to happen in the future.

We live in strange and bizarre times.

Well done to the Fishing Party for standing up for our rights.



Louis

[choppa]

makes ya wonder who's a member????????

not meaning that in a sarcastic tone,,,,, but it does make you wonder

and yes louis i agree,,, good on them,,, i have no issues here or on the responses,,

but we all know what would/will happen if it does eventuate,,,

[PinHead]

choppa.as for your figues of 740000 rec fishos..I presume this is in Qld and average $1k each per annum spent...that is bugger all out of a budget...hardly worth worrying about...and I doubt too many pollies would as the Govt's share of this is a small portion of the total amount.

[PinHead]

Animal Welfare Bill - Update

The Senate committee has recommended that this Bill not proceed.

The Greens and the Democrats on the committee dissented.


Please recall that is Bill is introduced by Qld Democrat Senator Bartlett. Its called Animal Welfare but its actually and animal rights bill. (animal rights gives animal the same rights as humans. – it’s the extreme vegan / PETA viewpoint)

A very similar Bill was introduced in 2003. So this is now their first attempt.

In several sections the current Bill would limit fishing and fishing tournaments. The most dangerous provision is in the fine print - way down the back under definitions it defines that if an act would cause physical or psychological pain to a human - it also does so to an animal As Fish are defined and animals; and a hook would hurt my mouth, then all fishing would be banned by this Bill.

This key point was completely missed in the Recfish Submission. However the Committee did in their summary of submissions state:

· fear that the bill, if passed, would result in a permanent ban on recreational fishing and hunting.


As expected the committee stated:

Recommendation
The committee recommends that the bill should not proceed.


In their dissenting opinion the Greens and Democrats Senators ( working together) stated that Fishing was not meant to be included.

Some submissions also expressed concern that the legislation may lead to severe
restrictions or banning of recreational or other fishing. These concerns seem to have
been fed by an incorrect and misleading media release issued by former Fisheries
Minister, Senator Ian MacDonald.3 The legislation does not mention fishing, nor does
the Second Reading Speech. The suggestion that it would inherently lead to
restrictions on fishing is a long bow to draw, however to remove doubt and the
potential for further misleading claims to be made, it would be advisable to amend the
legislation to put this beyond dispute.





BOTTOM LINE:

This Bill was well written and made it all the way to the Senate. This is the second attempt and will not be the last.

Here is a thought that will have you losing sleep: what if the Fishing Party, with our tiny 30,000 votes had not given Howard the balance of power in the Senate? What deals would he have done with the Democrats and the Greens to get them to pass the IR Legislation he wanted so badly? Would he have passed this bill? Maybe, especially as the ban on fishing is hidden in the fine print and was missed by both The Fisheries Minister and by Recfish.

Its not too long a bow to draw that we were 30,000 votes away from losing fishing. all of it forever.

All it would take is some Green Barristers tested the law and had an angler charged – just like happened in Germany)


KC

Not trying to be pedantic KC...but that bill has not been presented to the House of Reps or the Senate..the Senate committess inspect a lot of proposed legislation to check for things like those that were in this one and also other items such as legalities etc...Furtunately this Bill got stopped in the earliest and there was no serious discussion on it in the House of Reps.

[choppa]

choppa.as for your figues of 740000 rec fishos..I presume this is in Qld and average $1k each per annum spent...that is bugger all out of a budget...hardly worth worrying about...and I doubt too many pollies would as the Govt's share of this is a small portion of the total amount.

to true mate,,,,,,and yet can we just pin this up on the wall with another revenue source depleted,, and raise taxes once more to replace????????

FRDC/DPI&F estimate the total revenue in qld from all sources of fisheries leaves the govt a small billion per ANNUM,,,
(this i would suspect $ from everything associated with fish and fishing general)

but when i think more about it,,, i reckon thats conservative,,, but then again not knowing what licensining agreements/kickbacks are in place makes it a bit cloudy,,,,,,

PETA have been (as we all are aware) waving there arms around for some time,,, and have had success overseas with some of there views and reccommendations,,,,,,,if they keep knocking,,, somethings gotta give

[whykickacatalong]

This bill was never going to get passed. Currently it is a vegans dream and that is all. Saying that dreams do sometimes come true and in time the issues raised in the bill may be taken seriously to be made law but currently there was little to worry about. I looked into this bill fairly closely and read right through it (what a boring couple of hours) and checked with those in the know and the feedback I recieved 8-9 months ago said that it would go nowhere.

It does not hurt to be aware of these things though and I commend any fisho's who took an intrest and found out what was going on.

[kc]

Greg & Alistar are both right. This Bill was never going to get past square 1 BUT has been brought up just to show the level of ability and energy being expended by the ultra green lobby in its quest to move towards a more "German" model for recreational fishing....to whit...make it so complex, so hard and just so down right difficult that we just give up and fishing becomes the socilally unacceptable pastime of an ecentric few!

Don't know if you are following the press lately but by way of an example a big issue is the "criminalisation" of recreational fishing offences in marine parks.

If you are breached in a marine park and convicted in court YOU WILL HAVE A CRIMINAL RECORD FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIVES. This will effect you if you intend to travel overseas, want to hold a real estate or liquor license, car dealers license and is a permanent stain on ones chartacter.

TFPQ is working through its contacts in Government to have this issue adressed but at present over 400 people, who in most cases made a simple error in judgement or were ignorant of zoning boundries ARE NOW OFFICIALLY CRIMINALS.............many of whom have now given up fishing!!

Following is a letter to the editor in an NQ paper published last week and relates to a story about 2 young guys using hand spears, at night, in a yellow zone and being heavily fined and given criminal records while in another section of the paper a series of court reports relating to variuos offences carried small fines and no criminal convictions being recorded.

Crime & Punishment

It is disturbing to read that on one hand a person can steal and crash golf buggies & steal DVD players and ultimately have no criminal conviction recorded against one’s name but god forbid you should fail to read a dotted pink line around a yellow zone when trying to catch a feed of fish and end up with a criminal record. While I do not condone breaches of marine park zonings, even if they are stupid, how is it that such a simple act can permanently stain a persons character. The GBRMPA operations director Mick Bishop demonstrates the typical ignorance of authority officers with his remark that the zoning of Long Island sound as a “public appreciation zone” is “so the public can appreciate it without conflicting activities”. The only activity undertaken in Long Island Sound is fishing and most certainly not tourism activities. Magistrate Ron Muirhead may also be at at odds with his peers. While agreeing with him that the maps might be confusing he may be wrong in saying, as a commonwealth issue, “a conviction must be recorded”. In the Cairns magistrates court on 10 May a case was heard with a person pleading guilty to fishing in a green zone and catching 7 coral trout.
Presiding magistrate T J Black, in his judgement, found the breach proven but described the issue as “trivial” and ordered a good behaviour bond lodged and no conviction be recorded. Every day we read stories of the lax criminal justice system, the lack of penalties imposed and convictions not being recorded for what the general public considers are “real” crimes. How does spearing a feed of fish in a yellow zone, which anywhere else is legal, constitute such a heinous act that a person now is branded a “criminal” and has to carry this stigma for the rest of their lives. The law is an ass.

Kevin Collins
Chairman
The Fishing Party (Qld)

[baldyhead]

AND DON'T FORGET FELLAS THAT IF YOU ARE AN ABORIGINAL / INDIGENOUS PERSON THAT THESE RULES DONT APPLY !!!!!!!

[dayxday]

Its about time some one asks the greeny mob ,since they claim to
have all the answers re the eviroment.
When did they get rid of the cane toad and feral cat population
It must have been a recent event that I missed???

dayxday

[banshee]

Just read through the original post back on pg 7 dated 23-11-05 and had to laugh at some of the outrageous claims, ah well it is good to see that the sky was not falling and it is now indeed safe to come out of the cave.....damn that Chicken Little.