How some tricky activists are using a review of the Victorian Wildlife Act to attack your hunting access (and what you can do about it)

As we reported back in May last year, the Victorian Government is conducting a “once in a generation” review of the Victorian Wildlife Act.

To assist with that review, an advisory panel is currently calling for submissions from interested members of the public.

The ADA and many other stakeholders have had direct consultation sessions with the panel and we will be making a detailed submission to this process.

Providing the overarching framework for the hunting of game is one of the seven key functions of the Wildlife Act.

One of the questions the panel is considering is whether or not game management should be regulated under its own act.

There are pros and cons to this and, as with all change, the devil would be in the detail.

Much of the effort of, what are, on the face of it, environmental protection organisations, is being directed into an attempt misuse this review to widen divisions between public land users and to undermine recreational game hunting in Victoria.

Much of what these groups are pushing is explicitly out of scope for this review.

Perversely these groups claim to have no ideological problem with hunting and to be “purists” in their environmentalism…they go on with that flannel whilst simultaneously talking about us in pejorative terms and (either dishonestly or through ignorance) misrepresenting our activities, our impact and our motivations.

They engage in this semantic sophistry because they don’t like what we do and because they don’t like it, they don’t think that we should be allowed to do it.

They also know that they can’t just come straight out and say that.

These groups are now arguing that wild deer should not be a game animal because, in their view, game status affords them too much protection and that wild ducks and quail should not be game animals because, in their view, game status affords them no protection.

Both of those arguments cannot be true – the reality is that neither of them are.

The truth is that Game status is a means of managing hunters not wildlife. It’s a mechanism to ensure that there is a sustainable offtake of wild game to meet a diverse range of objectives – social, ecologically, agricultural and cultural.

These groups are mobilising their small but committed band of supporters to make submissions to the act geared around dismantling the current arrangements for sustainable game hunting.

Sumbissions to the panel review close on 30 June with the panel set to report to the Environment Minister in August. From there more consultation and a directions paper will be released ahead of the State election in November next year.

We are urging all hunters to take some time to read the fact sheet and the issues paper for this review and answer the questions or make a submission via the Engage Victoria website.

Point out where you can that well regulated game hunting is valued by tens of thousands of Victorians and that game licencing is not an impediment to sound and sustainable management of wildlife – in fact it is an enabler.