Jamie Briggs (Mayo, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Speaker, for the opportunity to address this Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Amendment (Recreational Fishing for Mako and Porbeagle Sharks) Bill 2010. The opposition is supporting it because it has been brought to this House largely due to the actions of the opposition spokesperson on this issue, Senator Richard Colbeck, who campaigned vigorously over the summer months to ensure that this bill could come before this House because of the failure of the Minister for Environment Protection, Heritage and the Arts in the way he went about addressing this issue. I will deal with that later on in my speech.

I thought it was important, firstly, to talk about the importance of recreational fishing in my area in Mayo in South Australia. It is a very important industry to the Fleurieu Peninsula and Kangaroo Island in my area. Recreational fishing on Kangaroo Island is a large part of the tourism industry that drives people’s visitation to the island—fishing for whiting and snapper, in particular. It does form a very large industry on KI. It forms a subpart of the tourism industry. It is very important particularly for tourism operators on Kangaroo Island and also those along the south coast in Victor Harbour and down to Cape Jervis where there is a strong recreational fishing industry. There is also a small commercial fishing industry which operates along those parts as well. This is a very important industry in my area.

It is estimated that recreational fishing is the sport with the nation’s highest participation, which would come as a surprise to many. However, it would not for those who have some role in it. It is a very popular sport and activity for people. In South Australia alone about one-quarter of an estimated 328,000 South Australians enjoy fishing each year. Apart from enjoyment, recreational fishing injects millions of dollars into the economy through the maintenance of boats and retail sales of marine engines, tackle and equipment.

South Australia also has a strong, viable commercial fishing industry. In 2005-06 the state’s commercial wild fisheries were worth approximately $193 million. Mainly they are driven by the very successful tuna farms off Port Lincoln in South Australia in the member for Grey’s electorate. However, as I said, there are small patches throughout other parts of the state in the south-east and off the south coast where my electorate is as well.

It is a very important industry for employment. The recreational aspect plays a major role in tourism. It is one industry that we need to ensure continues to grow and continues to be well managed. It is a challenging industry for many reasons. In the 12 months prior to October 2007 an estimated 236,000 South Australian residents aged over five years fished at least once, representing about 17 per cent of the South Australian population, which is a very large percentage of the population to be participating. A total of 98 individual species were reported by recreational fishers as being caught during 2007-08. Recreational fishing was more popular among males than females, which does not come as too much of a surprise, I am sure. Much of the fishing effort—87 per cent—was caught in marine waters, including estuaries and inshore and offshore waters. There is also a portion of fish caught in South Australia through the Murray-Darling Basin system, but largely they are caught in marine waters.

It is an industry which clearly needs to be managed in conjunction with the environment. I think in South Australia because of reforms in the nineties when the quota system was introduced—and I am sure around the country there are similar stories—we are managing fish stocks in an appropriate fashion. I think it is very important we do so because the sustainability of the industry is obviously very important not only for the recreational fishing industry and commercial fishing industry but also to the challenge we have as a globe with food security.

There have been reports over the last few months with claims that 70 per cent of the world’s fish stocks have been overfished, and this will obviously impact in coming years with the growing world population, particularly in Asia, where people use seafood as a major staple in their diet. We need to make sure that we are sustaining the fishing industry in a fashion which means that it is manageable to enjoy both in a recreational sense and, more importantly, in a food security sense. So these are important issues for us to manage. As I said recently in debate on a bill that the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry presented, which was related to the security of the fishing industry, I think we do need to be very careful that we are sustaining this industry in an appropriate fashion as we go forward.

That brings me to this bill and the reason for the bill being presented to the parliament today. It is the case that the minister for the environment failed and made a big blunder last year in listing the mako shark before consulting with industry. As I understand, there is no proof whatsoever of the minister consulting with the recreational fishing industry, or state authorities for that matter. I would have thought that was pretty important in trying to gather whether this should be a protected species or not. Of course we support action by governments to ensure that there is sustainability in a fish stock and sustainability of a species, but we support that being done on a scientific and consultative basis, not just by an edict from a minister made without testing whether there is in fact a problem. It caused massive dislocation with people who have very much enjoyed catching these particular species of fish. That was the first blunder by this minister. We understand late last year he was busy trying to warn the Prime Minister of impending disaster in the Home Insulation Program and clearly had other things on his mind. But this, of course, led to a lack of detail and rigour being applied to this issue, and thus the species was listed and therefore we now have this bill in the parliament to overturn what was clearly a mistake.

His second blunder was the unilateral decision to declare the Coral Sea a conservation zone on 20 May 2009. It was also done with no consultation whatsoever, with commercial or recreational fishing groups or affected Queensland communities. It appears that the minister had no difficulty siding with the USA funded Pew Environment Group, a division of the Pew Charitable Trusts, which has no take and even no activity agenda that it aims to install across wide areas of the sovereign waters. In other words, the minister again made a decision affecting these very important industries without talking to the relevant fisheries, without talking to the state governments, without consulting with the people who are involved in these industries. In fact, Mr Dean Logan, the national spokesman for the Boating and Fishing Council of Australia, said:

… Garrett has single handedly lost the respect of the entire Australian recreational marine, boating, outboard and fishing sectors and is causing deep divisions within the Australian environmental lobby.

That is pretty stunning criticism from someone involved in the industry.

The third blunder that this minister made in relation to the fishing industry—a minister some on his own side have described to me as the minister for Narnia—was that he caused great angst among recreational and commercial fisheries through the federal government’s bioregional planning process, which, again according to Dean Logan of the BFCA, is ‘in complete disarray’ and ‘a terminally ill process that has so far lacked anything resembling real engagement with the recreational boating and fishing industries’.

My electorate takes in large areas of coastline and includes some of the most pristine marine waters in the world. The quality of the fishing around Kangaroo Island in my electorate is amongst the finest you will find anywhere in the country. Sound management over the years by both state and Commonwealth fishery agencies has helped ensure some of the world’s most productive and sustainable fisheries for rock lobster, abalone, shark, prawns, cockles and scalefish, including the prized snapper and king george whiting that my region is famous for. Fishing is a major drawcard, as I said earlier in these remarks, and it is a major contributor to jobs, income and lifestyle within the region.

We also have the world’s most successful fish tag business located in my electorate. It is a stunning success story of a small business located in Victor Harbor. You would not think that fish tags could be such a popular small business industry to be involved in until you see the amount of money this small business actually makes every year. It is one of two in the world, the most successful in the world. All sorts of research institutions look to get access to fish tags to do the scientific research which obviously leads to decisions like listing different species in marine fisheries. So it is a very important business located in little old Victor Harbor in my electorate.

In conclusion, this is a very important issue in my electorate. It has major implications for jobs and major implications for the enjoyment of many in my electorate and from outside of my electorate who travel to enjoy some of the best fishing in the country. It is an issue where we need to ensure that we consult, that we look at the science and that we do not ever overfish different species. I certainly support a sustainable approach and I think South Australia should continue with the quota system that we have—one that ensures that people can only take what they need at the end of the day when they go out fishing. In this case, I think the great criticism, the criticism very well made by Senator Colbeck and others, is that this minister single-handedly failed to consult, he single-handedly failed to do his research and he single-handedly failed to look at the data, which led to a decision which caused great angst in fishing communities across the country. It is not inconsistent with how this minister has performed in other areas of his portfolio. Clearly he spent a lot of last year trying to warn the Prime Minister about problems in the insulation debacle.

Don Randall (Canning, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Roads and Transport) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No, he didn’t.

Jamie Briggs (Mayo, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That obviously took a lot of time off his plate—we understand that. The member at the table is interjecting that he did not think he did enough of that, and maybe that is right, but I have faith that the minister tried very hard to and unfortunately the Prime Minister ignored those bits of advice from the minister. The minister—who has had 90 per cent of his task taken off him and been left with basically just the fishing industry and a few other issues, like wombats—can hopefully now concentrate more on these industries that are so important for our country and for my electorate. It is disappointing that we have to debate this bill, but it has been a great opportunity to talk about just how important the fishing industry is for my electorate. With those remarks, I conclude.

Jim Turnour (Leichhardt, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to support the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Amendment (Recreational Fishing for Mako and Porbeagle Sharks) Bill 2010which amends the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Bill 1999—to allow recreational fishing of longfin mako, shortfin mako and porbeagle sharks in Commonwealth areas. In December 2008 longfin mako, shortfin mako and porbeagle sharks were listed on appendix II of the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals, the CMS. The CMS is an intergovernmental treaty, which is concerned with the conservation of wildlife and habitat on a global scale. The December 2008 listing was made because of concerns about population of these three species in the Northern Hemisphere—and I want to emphasise that it was in the Northern Hemisphere.

Australia has been a party to the convention since 1991. Under the EPBC Act it is a legal requirement that both appendix I and appendix II CMS species be listed as migratory. The Australian government is committed to its international obligations and, accordingly, these species were listed as migratory species under the EPBC Act on 29 January 2010. The effect of the listing of these species under the EPBC Act is that it is an offence to kill, injure, trade, take, keep or move a longfin mako, shortfin mako and porbeagle shark in Commonwealth areas. Mako sharks are highly prized sport fish and are targeted by some recreational fishers. Porbeagles, while not targeted, are difficult to distinguish from makos and are occasionally taken by recreational fishers and in many cases identified as makos. Therefore, the listing of these species has significant implications for recreational fishing.

Because of these implications, an independent review of the EPBC Act was undertaken. I want to stress again that the listings were basically made around concerns in relation to the Northern Hemisphere, and we are in the Southern Hemisphere. The Hawke review specifically examined the provisions of the EPBC Act relating to migratory species and found that the clear intention of the CMS was to differentiate between appendix I and appendix II species and the level of protection required. The Hawke review recommended changes to the provisions in part 13 of the EPBC Act. This bill is an interim response to the issues identified by the Hawke review as they apply to mako and porbeagle sharks while the government develops and implements its formal response to the Hawke review. The government believes that the current situation does give rise to unnecessarily restrictive measures and has decided to act as a priority to address the disproportionate impacts on recreational fishers that stem from the mandatory listing of mako and porbeagle sharks.

I have a large number of recreational fishers in my electorate of Leichhardt—based in Cairns, stretching up through Cape York Peninsula to the Torres Strait. Recreational fishing is an important part of the fabric of our community and is a very important part of not only people’s recreational time but the businesses that flow from that in terms of recreational fishing shops, charter operators and the boat industry in general. A number of locals contacted me in relation to concerns about the listing of these species, particularly in the lead-up to the end of January. They had real concerns that, if we did not introduce this legislation, if they were even to accidentally catch one of these species, then they would see this listing impact on them. I and other members of the Labor side, including the member for Corangamite, the member for Braddon, the member for Flynn and the member for Hindmarsh, who are making contributions in this debate, took those issues up with the minister for the environment. I was pleased to see him respond to the real concerns that we were sharing with him from our constituents.

As I said earlier, the listing of mako and porbeagle sharks was driven by concerns for the Northern Hemisphere populations of these species where their plight due to overfishing is well understood. With no evidence to suggest that mako or porbeagle populations in Australian waters were similarly threatened and while still having regard to our international obligation, the government believes this legislation should provide flexibility to take into account our domestic circumstances.

The amendment to this bill will grant an exemption to recreational fishers to continue to fish for these iconic game fish. In other words, the amendment will address disproportionate impacts on recreational fishers, providing a narrow exemption for recreational fishing of longfin mako, shortfin mako and porbeagle sharks to the offence provisions of part 13, division 2 of the EPBC Act. This means it will not be an offence to kill, injure, take, trade, keep or move mako or porbeagle sharks in or from Commonwealth waters where that action is taken in the course of recreational fishing. It is important to understand that this bill does relate to recreational fishing. I am a strong supporter of the recreational fishing industry. This bill will not apply to commercial fisheries.

As I said, I am a strong supporter of recreational fishing industry in my electorate of Leichhardt. I know that many people enjoy getting out onto the Great Barrier Reef or onto the Coral Sea, and taking the opportunity to wet a line and catch a few fish. It would be inappropriate if people who were going about their everyday business and accidentally caught one of these fish were to suffer the impacts of that listing. Similarly, the game-fishing industry is a very important part of my electorate. There is no scientific evidence to support the listing of these species given that the reasons for their listing were based around decisions that needed to be made for the Northern Hemisphere.

I want to make a few further comments in relation to the support for the fishing industry locally in Cairns and also down the east coast of Australia. There has been much debate and concern in the fishing industry around a proposal brought forward by the PEW environment group, which wants to establish a no-take zone in the Coral Sea, effectively banning fishing in an area bounded by the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park and our maritime border with PNG, Solomon Islands and New Caledonia, an area of more than one million square kilometres of sea.

During the course of the last year I have met with the recreational fishing industry, the commercial fishing industry, marine tourism operators, Super Yacht Group and the Cairns and Far North Environment Centre. I have told them all the same thing—I do not support the PEW proposal and have made my views clear to the minister for the environment, Peter Garrett. The PEW proposal is not endorsed by the Rudd government. It actually sought to pre-empt, effectively, the marine bioregional planning process that was started by the former Howard government and has been continued by our government to establish well-balanced, scientifically based planning frameworks for our marine environments around Australia. They sought to pre-empt the East Marine bioregional planning process by lobbying for and campaigning for a no-take zone in the Coral Sea.

Under Australia’s marine bioregional planning program, the Coral Sea Conservation Zone was established in May 2009 to provide interim protection to the area while it is being assessed for possible inclusion in one or more Commonwealth marine reserves. So, in May last year Minister Garrett established an interim conservation zone around the Coral Sea. There has been some confusion around that and the proposal put forward by PEW, and I have said very clearly—I know the member for Flynn, the member for Dawson and the member for Capricornia have all made this clear—that we do not support the PEW proposal. In many ways the PEW organisation sought to verbal the government on this issue. There has been some confusion about the PEW proposal and the Coral Sea Conservation Zone, established by Minister Garrett last year. I can assure you that they are quite different—the conservation zone established by Minister Garrett as an interim measure as part of the bioregional planning process had no impact on existing users, whether they were recreational fishing, commercial fishing or tourism operators. I worked hard to ensure that particularly recreational fishing and tourism interests and commercial fishing interests were considered as part of the process. The bioregional planning process is about developing a plan that ensures that resources are managed sustainably into the future and that we protect these very important environmental icons that exists in places like the Coral Sea.

The different interests with a stake in the Coral Sea, whether they be economic, recreational, heritage or conservation, should be able to work together with government to develop a plan for the region without a small group, the PEW organisation, hijacking the agenda, as they have sought to do. I do not believe that the evidence put forward by PEW makes sense. The arguments from the conservation groups in support of their proposal are quite confusing. On the one hand they say that the region is in pristine condition because there is not a lot of fishing activity, yet on the other hand they argue that the region is under threat and needs a total ban on fishing. I find that a very confusing argument. The Battle of the Coral Sea is also put forward as a reason for protection. It is a significant wartime event worth commemorating, but you do not need to create a marine park of one million square kilometres to commemorate this event.

I will continue to do all I can to ensure that common sense prevails when it comes to the management of the Coral Sea. I have asked the minister for the environment to clear up the confusion and to rule out the PEW proposal. I understand that there is some confusion on the ground, and there are some interests that choose to confuse the two issues. The reality is that the PEW proposal is an independent campaign being run by the PEW conservation organisation and it is not supported by the government. As I said, I am a strong supporter of the recreational fishing industry and the commercial fishing industry, and I want to see areas protected and preserved for future generations. I am committed to working with all stakeholders in the Coral Sea, including recreational, commercial and environmental interests, to ensure that we can protect this pristine sea environment for future generations. I do not believe, though, that that requires a ban on fishing. Human beings are and will continue to be part of the environment

Wilson Tuckey (O'Connor, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Amendment (Recreational Fishing for Mako and Porbeagle Sharks) Bill 2010 is important legislation, notwithstanding its brevity. It is legislation that highlights the problems that arise when governments—I use the plural—go out and make international commitments that it is not in the interests of Australia to keep. The EPBC Act, which we are amending, was an invention of a fellow called Robert Hill, a senator here, who brought it to the Liberal party room. As far as I am concerned, it was the greatest fraud practised on the Liberal party room in the many years that I have been a member thereof. It is the sort of silly legislation that abrogates the responsibility of our governments and plays into the hands of people who never take any notice of it anyway. It is one thing to get a lot of people to sign up to a particular agreement; it is another thing to get half the world to comply with it. No doubt, as the explanatory memorandum advises us, these decisions were taken probably in Geneva in December 2008—longfin mako, shortfin mako and porbeagle sharks were listed on appendix II of the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals, primarily due to concerns about populations of these species in the Northern Hemisphere. Both appendix I and appendix II of the CMS specify that they be listed as migratory. Accordingly, these species were listed as migratory species under the EPBC Act on 29 January 2010, and of course this legislation is to overturn that listing.

The reality of the matter is that in the Northern Hemisphere there are some of the greatest fishing pirates in the world. Having virtually destroyed their own fish resources, many of them want to come down and attack Southern Hemisphere resources which, in the case of Australia, are very limited. We have a very fragile fishing environment. In the Great Australian Bight, for example, you do not find millions of seagoing bird species. Why not? Because there are no fish there, of substance, for them to eat. We do not have the Gulf Stream or some of the great assets of places like South America. On the other hand, I well remember a visit to Columbia in years gone by as the representative, as I am to this day, of the rock lobster industry in Western Australia, which has a typical catch of about 10,000 tonne a year, to look at the sort of lobster, or crayfish, as I have always known them, that were being caught and marketed by the fishing boats of that region. Those crayfish would be known locally as kakas—babies—and, by the admission of one of our guides, these people had virtually destroyed an industry by overfishing. That does not mean that there is necessarily such a shortage of the sharks that we are talking about—shortfin and longfin mako and porbeagle sharks and others—that it is necessary to deny the opportunity for recreational fishing.

The best conservationists in Australia are our professional fishermen. I have had many an experience of them actually fighting the authorities for a reduction in fishing effort—in the crayfishing industry, for instance. Western Australian crayfishermen went to the state minister and asked for a 25 per cent cut in the number of crayfish pots they were allowed to put in the water. Those pots were tradeable and valued at about $30,000 each at the time, but 80 or 90 per cent of that industry in Western Australia knew, to use my words, that we had got too smart at catching fish. The argument was put to me that you needed to put three or four pots in the water in a single location simply to make sure of one drop on the appropriate spot; and, of course, with three or four floats in the water you had a reasonable chance of finding them when you went back the following day. Today, underwater technology takes you to that appropriate spot, that bump in the ocean where crayfish aggregate, and you have got a GPS to lead you back the next day with the automatic pilot and you can drive within a metre of one float. So the extent of their ability to spread their catching equipment was excessive, and the commercial fishermen said, ‘There must be a reduction.’ There were, as there usually are, a few who said otherwise. As I recollect, one of them actually stood for the National Party against me. The National Party minister in WA actually watered down the request of the fishermen. I give that as an example.

I have been to the Abrolhos Islands with a professional fisherman and have been taken out handline fishing with other people. He just takes you somewhere and the next thing you know the fish are virtually jumping into the boat, they are so easy to catch. But when you have caught five or six, he says, ‘All lines in; we’ll move to another spot.’ In other words, ‘We’re not going to kill every fish in that vicinity.’ That is the attitude of the professional. I have got to say that the attitude of the recreational fisherman varies, with all the high technology that is now also available to them. Although we do see examples, promoted by Rex Hunt, who had that TV show where everything went back in the water. I am not sure they all survived, but that does not matter. The fact of life is that you can have recreational fishing without seriously damaging the fish stock, if it is treated purely as a sport, and of course there is nothing wrong with someone going out to ‘get a feed of fish’. The tragedy is when they go out for a week to some of the fishing spots in more remote areas known to me and fill up whacking great big eskies of fillets and take them back to distribute amongst their friends or whatever they do with it. That is destroying the environment, and all of these things have got to be taken into account.

I had a term as fisheries minister and I was gravely concerned about the future of southern bluefin tuna. Historically they were in huge numbers south of Australia until the Japanese longliners came down, in a period when it was laissez faire, and reduced the numbers of that particular fish stock dramatically. Eventually, to the credit of the fisheries people here—not the environmentalists but the fisheries managers in Australia, supported very strongly by Western Australian fisheries management, which has typically been of a very high standard—limited entry fishery is now a byword in the commercial fishing industry in Western Australia. You let two boats in and, if they are doing all right, you let in another two, in new greenfield areas, and you control the catch to make sure that it is sustainable.

The cause of conservation can be overrun by environmental aspects, and people do not even know what that means. One might wonder why we are now correcting something that was decided in December 2008, when presumably we knew what was going on in Geneva or wherever the decision was made, and we should have been there arguing against it in the interests of Australia. As has been said, it was a Northern Hemisphere problem; and when it comes to fish stocks everything is a Northern Hemisphere problem. If you go and have a look at some of the vessels they use, they are ocean liners, and they just rip everything out of the sea. That should stop. This is how much political pressure they can bring up there: when the price of fuel got too expensive and it looked like it was going to act as a conservation measure, the European governments gave them free fuel; they gave them money to go and rape the ocean further. As a kid, we all knew about English fillet, or yellowfish, as we kids called it. You can still buy it under the label of ‘South African cod,’ because they have still got a few to catch, but the people of the Northern Hemisphere destroyed that industry by overfishing it. At one stage the Icelanders—and this is a long time ago—sent their gunboats out to protect their area of resource. Of course, the long-term outcome of that was 200-kilometre fishing limits that exist today, which give sovereign states some chance of protecting their resources. The tragedy is, when you draw some of those islands around our South Pacific neighbours, you create large areas of water—and that should be good—and it is sold off to American purse seiners.

A purse seine net is murder. The original means of catching southern bluefin tuna, as we used to see on the movies, was with poles—they bit on a hook and you pulled them into the boat. In those circumstances, some got away. But when you go with a purse seine net to a schooling variety and put it right around them and zip the bottom up, nothing gets away. These are all issues, but it does not alter the fact that the parties who can best manage that are the sovereign nations. When we know that certain South Pacific islands are selling these rights and the cash is frequently not even going into their own government coffers, we should be dealing with that severely in terms of the aid we give to them, and other issues, because that is a tragedy and it is not needed.

Coming back to southern bluefin tuna and the downside of my argument: we were hanging on by our fingernails maintaining an agreement with the Japanese. Of course the word ‘research’ kept coming up: ‘Could we just do a little bit of research and see if we can catch a few more fish? It won’t affect the fish stocks.’ But then, all of a sudden, one year the big tuna came right in close to Tasmania, within Tasmanian waters. Tasmania has recreational approval for charter boats to catch two tuna for every passenger on board, and they were going out and doing that. These were really big fish. Do you know where they put most of the fish? On the tip! When I went down there to talk about it, I had a jumped up state fisheries bloke saying, ‘Don’t you dare lecture us, we are the state of Tasmania!’ Think about that. It almost got violent. The fact of life is that, in these circumstances, this is a matter that requires some discussion across the board.

In the remaining time available to me, I want to make a couple of points. I plead guilty on the EPBC Act because I was misled in our party room as to its purpose. It was explained to us by the minister at the time as a devolvement of environmental matters to the states. Of course, it is the opposite of that. It does not reach only into the sea; it binds us into international decisions where we should not be so doing. We have every reason in the world to control our fisheries resources. We should consult the recreational and commercial fishing industry for their advice because it is frequently very good. They are conservationists because they understand the simple fact that, if they overfish the resource next year, they go broke. That is always a good test.

I would make the same argument for our forests. Since state governments found a reason, under ‘the environment’, to save the forests, we have been burning them down and killing them at a rate that never occurred while the private sector was in there harvesting forests and turning them into sawn lumber, which happens to be the major form of sequestration of carbon. A sawn plank in a house, a flooring plank, is likely to be there in a hundred years time, but leave that same timber in the forest and it will be burnt within a 10- or 20-year cycle, as is the evidence now being given to the royal commission in Victoria. We had to ‘murder’ 170 people to even get that inquiry! I say ‘we’ because the other day in this place we had a valedictory. It is a year since all those people were vaporised. Most of their bodies were never found. That is how hot the fires were. In those 12 months, this parliament has done nothing to oblige state governments to manage their forests as a safe environment. You would never tolerate for a second the sorts of dangers that people were put into by state government forestry policy in the name of the environment. Marysville was not a new suburb. It had been there for 100 years. It was a forestry town. It had never burnt down, and they had some pretty big fires in the past.

But we go into this environmental argument. I have to laugh because a little bit of that evidence has now hit the media. The government decided it could make energy efficiencies and reduce emissions by gifting a couple of million Australian households some insulation in their ceiling. I will not go into the pros and cons of that—it has had enough airing. Who did the government ask to run the project? The environment department, a department focused on one thing only: saying no. You can come up with any sort of project and their culture is: ‘How can we stop it?’ You say to them, ‘Go and administer three billion bucks!’ It was a pretty poor choice. Of course, the other day the newly appointed director had to tell his 700 employees that he does not know anything about running a project of this nature and does not really want the job. At least the man was honest.

But it is a culture we can do without. I object to signing treaties that put the decisions of this parliament under the supervision of a foreign power. I do not object to this parliament making laws from time to time that add to environmental protection. I just wish they would realise that, when trees burn down and the heat of the forest fire is so intense that all seed in the ground are burnt as well, it is hardly environmental protection.

The reality is that it was done because one political party had a belief about that, and other political parties were prepared to subjugate common sense to chase their preferences—a pretty lousy reason to kill 170 people; and there is no doubt about it. The Victorian parliament thought they were on a real winner. They locked up the forest, sacked all the forest workers and saved money. Look at what they have spent this year? After all that I had a minister from that state say to me as minister when I urged for preventative measures in their forests, ‘If we’ve got to touch one tree, we won’t do it.’ They had 80 bulldozers working in that forest trying to put the fire out. God only knows how many trees they touched with those bulldozers, and what was necessary and what was not.

It is the same with fishing. Of course there should be opportunities for recreational fishers, and this legislation fixes it. The question is: why are we in here having to do this to protect our recreational fishers from a decision made in Geneva; and why have we got legislation surviving that does those sorts of things? It is a heartbreak and a tragedy to me. Fishing is an area that requires a closer conservation effort simply because you cannot count them like kangaroos or other animals found on the land. (Time expired)

Darren Cheeseman (Corangamite, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Amendment (Recreational Fishing for Mako and Porbeagle Sharks) Bill 2010. I have a lot to say about this particular issue, particularly with regard to my federal electorate of Corangamite, which has a very significant recreational and charter fishing community. The member for Braddon, Sid Sidebottom, and I worked diligently over the January-February period with our minister, Minister Garrett, in dealing with this particular matter.

Recreational fishing is a very popular pastime throughout Australia. Many people take up fishing as a recreational activity, me included. During January I was fishing in Port Macdonnell off the South Australian coast. I know many people from Victoria go to South Australia to fish but also along the Great Ocean Road and other parts of my electorate, and many take the opportunity to fish for sports fish such as the mako shark.

A very significant recreational fishing and charter fishing community has been established to fish for the mako shark. Many employment opportunities have been created within my electorate, particularly in areas such as Queenscliff, Torquay and along the Surf Coast. Recreational fishing in my electorate is very significant. Significantly, the ban that came into place was because of the crisis in shark populations in other parts of the world. There is very little evidence to suggest that the mako shark and other associated species are in any danger at all within our region; in fact, it is quite the contrary from evidence I have heard firsthand in my consultations with the recreational fishing community in my electorate.

I was very pleased to hear the member for O’Connor’s contribution about the recognition that the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act, an act enacted by the previous Liberal government, was the cause of this particular problem. We are undoing a legal straitjacket that was imposed on us by that particular act and an international treaty. This amendment enables that decision to be overturned to enable recreational mako fishing to continue in Australia’s Commonwealth waters. It is very significant for the fishermen in my electorate but also for the charter boat operators who operate within my electorate and throughout south-west Victoria and across the nation. The laws passed by the previous Liberal government meant that the mako shark had to be listed under treaties that are associated with the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act. This amendment overturns that decision.

I am a passionate fisherman. I think I caught my first fish when I was about four years old. It was a rock cod. Again, I listened with interest to the contribution by the member for O’Connor.

Chris Trevor (Flynn, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Trevor interjecting

Darren Cheeseman (Corangamite, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Flynn cheekily asks me whether it was four or five centimetres long—it might have been slightly bigger than that but I am not sure it was quite large enough to take home for the plate.

In my younger days I had the opportunity from time to time to go out on a cray boat at Port Macdonnell in South Australia and I came across many fantastic people in that activity. Fishing and sport fishing is a wonderful way to relax. The mako shark species is a real thrill to catch. It puts up a significant fight. It is a shark species that is known to frighten fishermen when they have hooked one often by attempting to jump into the boat. I know a lot of people take tremendous pleasure in targeting that species.

This particular bill, the environment protection and biodiversity conservation amendment bill, will put in place the necessary amendments to enable the status quo to continue, which is fantastic. I urge the Liberal Party and the minor parties in the Senate to pass this particular amendment as speedily as possible to enable charter boat operators and recreational anglers to get back to their particular passion.

In 2008 the longfin mako, the shortfin mako and porbeagle sharks were listed in Appendix II of the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals, particularly because of concerns about populations of those sharks emanating out of the Northern Hemisphere. The independent review of the EPBC Act, the Hawke review, examined the provisions of the EPBC Act relating to migratory species and found that the clear intention of the CMS was to differentiate between appendix I and appendix II species and the level of protection required. The Hawke review recommended changes to the provisions of part 13 of the EPBC Act. This bill is an interim response to the issues identified by the Hawke review, as they apply to mako and porbeagle sharks, while the government develops and implements its formal response to the Hawke review.

The government of course takes its international obligations seriously. However, it is important that laws properly reflect and implement our international obligations, whilst also providing the flexibility to take into account particular domestic circumstances. This is a very clear example where those species of shark are not, in any way at all, threatened as they are in the Northern Hemisphere.

The Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals is an intergovernmental treaty that is concerned about the conservation of wildlife and habitats on a global scale. Australia has been a party to that convention since 1991 and, under those arrangements, it contributes actively and constructively to international conservation efforts. These changes will leave our international obligations intact but will ensure that local circumstances and local decisions are based on the science of populations of these particular species.

I would like to pay particular tribute to a number of people, whom I worked very closely with, who represent my local fishing community and charter boat operators. Steve Burton, who is the commodore of the Torquay Angling Club, and Shane Korth, the secretary of the club, worked very hard with me through January and February to ensure that the government was taking heed of the advice coming out of the recreational fishing community. That advice was of course fed to the minister responsible, the then Minister for the Environment, Heritage and the Arts, Peter Garrett. The member for Braddon, Sid Sidebottom, was also working very closely with his representatives. In conversations with them and their club members they made it very clear that they recognised the efforts the government was taking in overturning this decision. Not only did they recognise that we were in a difficult position, in a legal straitjacket, because of the decisions of the previous government but also that parliament does not sit in January or February and that it would take some time for these amendments to work their way through this place. Today I would particularly like to thank and acknowledge Steve and Shane for their efforts. They have made it clear to me that they are diehard Labor voters, as is the recreational and charter boat fishing community. It was important that government took these decisions as quickly as we could to ensure that Labor voters in those fishing communities could get back to recreational fishing.

I would also like to thank the Victorian peak lobby group, VRFish, a thoroughly professional group of recreational anglers. I would particularly like to thank Christopher Collins and Ben Scullin, who did a fantastic job in advocating for the Victorian recreational fishing industry. Again, I would like to acknowledge their contribution.

I want to put on the record a very clear caution, in the same spirit as that of the member for O’Connor. That is, as recreational fishermen, we need to ensure that we are fishing in a sustainable way. We need to ensure that decisions into the future on mako or any other species are made based on proper science and that that science needs to take account of our local circumstances, including our local population of fish species and others. In future, when making decisions, we must work very closely with recreational fishing bodies to ensure that we take account of the evidence on the ground rather than simply impose international obligations on ourselves without having due regard for the science underpinning those decisions. Recreational fishermen do want to leave a sustainable legacy for future generations and we need to ensure that proper science is undertaken that considers local circumstances, not just those of the Northern Hemisphere.

I commend this bill to the House. I do request that the Senate considers these matters in a timely way and acts upon this amending legislation so that our recreational fishing communities can get back to what they love and that is fishing.

Robert Oakeshott (Lyne, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I also rise to welcome the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Amendment (Recreational Fishing for Mako and Porbeagle Sharks) Bill 2010 and this move by government. I do so for several reasons, which are similar to those already spoken about. On the first reason, I will give a local example from the Golden Lure Fishing Tournament held in January. It is part of the colour and movement, the culture and life of a Port Macquarie summer. Recreational fishers come from all along the east coast of New South Wales to that tournament. This year, many of them thought they had done the last tag-and-release of a mako shark. What went with that was a lot of discussion amongst and a lot of frustration felt by people who enjoy fishing and who, like everyone else in debates on ocean biodiversity, want more fish in the water. Wanting more fish in the ocean is common ground, whether you are an environmentalist or a fisho. From some of the anecdotes I heard, and given the cost-benefits of this decision, and the binding international agreements, I am pleased to see—I hope I see—that a bit of faith in government and government processes is coming from this change to a decision that initially caused a great deal of concern amongst the very tight and very talkative group which is the recreational fishing community.

I think the word that the minister used in introducing this legislation was ‘proportionality’. It was unfair to the recreational fishing industry to ask them to implement changes to their behaviour when the evidence for a shortage of mako sharks on the east coast of New South Wales just was not there. Comments have been made by several others about respecting the science. I think that if we are to truly respect the science, as a parliament—and this goes for all the topics before us at the moment—then when the evidence trail clearly says that we as a parliament need to do something we should do it. However, respecting the science also means that, when the evidence trail says that there is no issue, we need to be the defenders and the protectors of the science by upholding what it says. And, in this case, the evidence trail says that there are plenty of mako sharks on the east coast of Australia and of New South Wales. Therefore I am pleased with this decision to, in a small way, break an international agreement.

The question of the binding nature of the international agreement is an interesting one that has been raised. A few people who I have listened to in this debate have had a crack at the concept of international agreements. I would have thought that this legislation, and the process that has gone on in regard to it, is a very good example of how we can uphold sovereign issues while still being party to international conventions. I think this is an eminently sensible alternative to all of us having to deal with all the issues that may present themselves with any international conventions and to all of us getting wrapped up in decisions about whether a particular species in the ocean is an Appendix II type fish or not. I do not think that is necessarily the business of this House. So, as an approach, this is an eminently sensible alternative to that—as it is a sensible alternative to having no international binding agreements at all.

It might come as a surprise to a few members in this chamber that fish do not really understand international boundaries; they do swim around a lot. Therefore, international agreements are worth the paper they are written on and, therefore, being a party to that is a sensible approach. But here we have an example of a decision that is relevant, really, to the Mediterranean and the Northern Hemisphere but of not much relevance to sovereign Commonwealth waters having been put on to us. Yet the process that has followed from that should give us confidence in the processes in and around this international convention in that here we see a piece of legislation responding to that lack of an evidence trail and therefore upholding sovereign rights. So, rather than being critical of international binding agreements, I say that this process strengthens the role that we play in these international agreements because it is an example which shows that we still can uphold sovereign rights whilst agitating and advocating, at an international level, for much higher standards within ocean biodiversity.

On that point, I will raise a broader issue. The issue really is one for the executive—and for the minister responsible, who has not had the best couple of months. Here lies an opportunity to supercharge a ministerial career. This issue of ocean biodiversity is waiting for Australia to grab it and run with it and, potentially, lead the world with it.

We are an island nation. We face many challenges to do with fishing rights and complex issues right throughout our region, whether in the Pacific or the Asian regions. I think the point was rightly made by others that overfishing in the Northern Hemisphere is—without being shy about it—out of control. Australia has a rare opportunity to lead by being a protector and an upholder of the importance of ocean biodiversity. I made the point previously that, whether you are a recreational or a commercial fisher or the deepest of environmentalists, everyone wants more fish in the ocean, and to have more fish in the ocean you need to have an active and live biodiversity that goes with that. There are some common points for everyone in this debate within Australia. And I think there is a need for us to lead within the Asia-Pacific region as the issue of overfishing and many other unsustainable practices continue to present some pretty difficult challenges for the future.

If anyone is in any doubt about what I am saying, then they should take the time to read chapter 18 of Bill Bryson’s A Short History of Nearly Everything. That talks about the importance of what is in our oceans. If that did not get them excited, and if that did not allow them to sniff out a potential opportunity for an Australian government to show some leadership, then I would be sorely disappointed.

Last week, members from both sides of this chamber—from memory it was the member for Fremantle, Melissa Parke, and the member for Moore, Mal Washer—presented a very good documentary, The End of the Line, about substantial overfishing issues in the world right now and the lack of government action to address these issues. I would encourage everyone to try and get their hands on a copy of this documentary and to reflect on it—particularly, please, if you are in the executive and are wondering whether this is an issue worth getting involved in.

I keep coming back to the fact that we have had divisions and clashes in the past between environmentalists and those who want to use our natural resources. The issue of ocean biodiversity and the desire for more fish is one of those rare occasions where natural resource management has many friends. On the east coast, for example, fishing clubs, which sometimes do not get the recognition that they deserve, are self-regulators of many of the environmental issues. Most of the clubs now have rules around dropping anchors in weed beds. That is a very small but practical example of fishing clubs themselves starting to take responsibility and to lead on many of the environmental issues in play.

Likewise, I can report that right up the east coast of New South Wales we are seeing a greater demand for opportunities to participate in underwater research. A group recently formed in Port Macquarie, the Port Macquarie Underwater Research Group, with the acronym PURG, was based on a group that had been formed at Coffs Harbour, the Solitary Islands Underwater Research Group, with the acronym SURG, which was based on the Byron Underwater Research Group, with—you guessed it—the acronym BURG. What we have seen over the last couple of years at a community level from divers, recreational fishers and environmentalists is a growing interest in and desire for a real understanding of what is happening on the ocean floor and the role that that plays in fish stocks and natural resource management generally. I think that is a good trend.

I would hope that the government recognises that as a good trend and supports it on a broader basis, and that it taps into that sentiment and provides all the support possible, because there are still anomalies in practices in the field. One that absolutely kills us on the minerals coast of New South Wales, despite good self-regulation within fishing clubs and a growing desire for knowledge about the ocean floor, is the issue of beach hauling, which is shaped largely around state regulations. We can talk about and have all the best environmental practices in the world, but it only takes two or three days a year for outside commercial fishos to stand at any river mouth around Australia and rip into the smaller fish—in our case in Lyne it is the mullet run—and thus decimate the breeding-ground stock of fish that everyone wants. These are anomalies in practice that still continue. It absolutely kills everyone to see piles and piles of dead fish lying on a beach, stinking away and serving no purpose to anyone. Yet this is still seen as an acceptable fishing practice in Australia today.

This bill is good. It reflects our government ‘getting it’ with regard to both international agreements and also the use of evidence to drive policy. Marine biologist Dr Julian Pepperell, who normally is not a friend of the sceptics, is quite strong in saying there is no evidence trail connecting the mako sharks in the Mediterranean and the shortfin mako sharks off the Australian coast. It is good that the government has listened to those who are the keepers of the science and has responded accordingly. It is a sensible move the government is making, but there is plenty more to do. There is a huge opportunity here for government to lead this parliament and the region in taking the issue of ocean biodiversity and the desire for more fish seriously and actively and, hopefully, to make a difference to ocean biodiversity not only right throughout the region but throughout the world.

Chris Trevor (Flynn, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Lyne for his contribution. I too rise today to support the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Amendment (Recreational Fishing for Mako and Porbeagle Sharks) Bill 2010. Like many others in both my electorate of Flynn and around Australia generally, I am a keen fisherman. It is a sport, and often a food-gathering exercise, that I am very passionate about. There are very few sports—and I have played a lot of them—that can compete with the thrill that fishing provides when you finally pull your fish onto the boat after the long and exhausting battle against it—man against fish, fish against man. It is an incredible experience that can be enjoyed by all and it is enjoyed by thousands in my electorate of Flynn.

The mako shark is just one of the many fish that provide this experience, which is why it is both highly prized and targeted by people engaged in recreational fishing, although the porbeagle shark also is taken by people engaged in recreational fishing in southern Australian waters. The targeting of mako sharks is often the cause of the porbeagle shark being taken, as it is very difficult to distinguish from mako sharks and is often misidentified.

I have elected to speak on this bill today because the changes it will make have significant implications for recreational fishing, with particular specificity to longfin mako, shortfin mako and porbeagle sharks. The changes in this bill allow for the continuation of recreational fishing for mako and porbeagle sharks. This bill will use the term ‘recreational fishing’ and clarifies that this includes fishing by charter boat staff, competition fishing and fishing undertaken primarily for media and entertainment purposes.

The bill will provide an exception to all offences under part 13, division 2 of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act relating to listed migratory species which will apply only to recreational fishing of longfin mako, shortfin mako and porbeagle sharks in Commonwealth areas. This includes the provisions that prohibit killing, injuring, taking, trading, keeping or moving listed migratory species in Commonwealth areas and trading, keeping or moving a listed migratory species that has been taken in a Commonwealth area. It is important to note that the bill is not designed to overrule any state or territory laws prohibiting recreational fishing for longfin mako, shortfin mako or porbeagle sharks.

The restrictions regarding the recreational fishing for longfin mako, shortfin mako and porbeagle sharks were paused on 29 January 2010, when these species were listed as migratory under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act. This was considered necessary to comply with the legal requirement under the act that specifies that species listed on appendices I and II of the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals be listed as migratory species. Our country has been part of this convention since 1991 and we contribute actively and constructively to international conservation efforts.

These species were included in Appendix II to the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals due to concerns about populations of these species in the Northern Hemisphere, where overfishing has resulted in reduced numbers. Despite this, there is insufficient evidence to suggest that the populations of these shark species in Australia are under the same level of threat as in the areas in the Northern Hemisphere that have caused their inclusion in Appendix II to the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals. The result of their being listed on Appendix II of the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals is that it has effectively caused significant detrimental implications for recreational fishing because of the offence provisions that now apply. However, the problem cannot be resolved administratively or by regulation. The implication for commercial fisheries will be addressed through accreditation processes under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act.

The changes proposed in the bill will ensure that recreational fishing activities in Australia will not be affected by the international changes to the protection of mako and porbeagle sharks. This is because the restrictions imposed by domestic legislation as a result of the international changes are not an appropriate response to the level of protection intended by the addition of these species to Appendix II of the convention. The independent review of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act, the Hawke review, examined the provisions of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act relating to migratory species and identified the fact that the indisputable intention of the convention is to differentiate between Appendix I and Appendix II species and, therefore, the level of protection required. Appendix I includes migratory species that are in danger of extinction throughout all or a significant proportion of their range. These animals should receive a very high level of protection under our national environmental laws. However, migratory species listed in Appendix II do not require the same amount of protection. These species are not endangered but have an unfavourable conservation status. Currently, the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act does not distinguish between migratory species listed in Appendix I and migratory species listed in Appendix II, despite the fact that they are clearly intended to be treated differently.

In order to have this reflected in our legislation, changes need to be made to provisions in the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act. Currently, once a species is listed in either appendix and then included in the list of migratory species established under the act, it is prohibited to kill, injure, take, trade, keep or move a listed migratory species in Commonwealth areas and to trade, keep or move a listed migratory species that has been taken in a Commonwealth area. This is not necessarily an appropriate response to the species listed in Appendix II. It is clear that changes should be made to amend this problem. The amendments in this bill are designed purely as a temporary measure to respond to this and to the issues identified by the Hawke review as they apply to mako and porbeagle sharks, until the government can develop and implement a formal response to the Hawke review.

It is important to remember that the government remains committed to shark conservation measures, both domestically and internationally, and will continue its active engagement in efforts under the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals. This bill will provide a narrow exception for recreational fishing for longfin mako, shortfin mako and porbeagle sharks to the offence provisions of part 13, division 2 of the act as the level of protection under the act is excessive in relation to the status of the species and their listings on Appendix II to the convention.

Our government also acknowledges, as it should, the social and cultural importance of recreational fishing to many, many Australians, and its economic benefit to some coastal communities. A prime example of this economic benefit is felt in my home electorate of Flynn in Central Queensland through the annual fishing competition held in Boyne Island-Tannum Sands, known as the ‘Boyne Tannum Hookup’. The hookup has been run for many years by volunteers and injects tens of thousands of dollars into the community as well as giving the money raised back to the community for charitable and other worthwhile purposes. I would like to say a big thankyou to Darryl Branthwaite and his crew from the Boyne Tannum Hookup. Fishing competitions such as this are a very important part of the year for both locals and the many people from out of town who come in droves to compete. I despise the thought that these restrictions, which are unwarranted and unnecessary, could have drastic negative implications for competitions like these now or in the future where mako and porbeagle sharks may be prized. Although this does not apply to the Boyne Tannum Hookup, where these types of fish are not weigh-ins, it is simply irrational to penalise people engaging in recreational fishing, and communities that hold fishing competitions, just because of an inaccurate reflection of our international obligations in our domestic legislation.

This bill will provide the interim measures necessary to ensure that international changes to the status of mako and porbeagles and the consequential listing of these species under the act will not affect recreational fishing activities in Australia. We, as the government, recognise the fact that the act as it currently stands causes unnecessary restrictive measures on species that are listed in appendix II of the convention. This bill will provide an exception to all offences under part 13, division 2 of the act to prevent people engaging in recreational fishing for longfin mako, shortfin mako and porbeagles being penalised.

This is the most logical action to take in order to respond effectively to an issue that has arisen from current legislation and has been identified by an independent review. There can be no justifiable argument against this bill because the changes in it aim to align our domestic legislation more accurately with our international obligations regarding restrictions to recreational fishing of these sharks. It is clear that this bill is a temporary method of achieving this to ensure that people who engage in recreational fishing for these species are not disadvantaged unnecessarily.

I rarely get to drop a line these days because of my commitments and public service to the people of Flynn. But I have spent a lifetime as a recreational fisher. I have worked on professional fishing boats as a deckie on tucker trips too, been out on many charter boats and spent many days and weeks with my mates searching for that elusive big one. He is out there somewhere. All recreational fishers are looking for him. That is the joy of the recreational fisher. I commend this bill to the House.

Bob Baldwin (Paterson, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Defence Science and Personnel) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak today in support of common sense. This bill, the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Amendment (Recreational Fishing for Mako and Porbeagle Sharks) Bill 2010, is common sense. It is common sense and it is also a backflip on the part of the Minister for Environment Protection, Heritage and the Arts. Can I say that the difference between this and the bungling of the insulation program is that this has not cost the government any money. It has cost many fishermen opportunity. It has cost communities opportunity. It has cost game fishing and recreational fishing associations money and opportunity, but it has not cost the government any money yet.

This bill has come about because the minister failed to consult. This is a minister, Minister Garrett, who simply consults within his own group, his own peers, and is yet to question any science. One of the problems that we have seen and that has been experienced, in particular with climate change or global warming, is the failure of people to recognise the value of outside peer group reviews of science. What has happened here is that the minister, and please excuse the pun, has taken the line hook, line and sinker from his department.

Both the Southern Hemisphere and the Northern Hemisphere have mako sharks and, thinking that they are a pelagic and a migratory species, one might come to the assumption, an ill-informed assumption, that these fish travel from the Northern Hemisphere to the Southern Hemisphere, but the reality is that they do not. Where this minister has made a mistake is that he has observed part of the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals where in the Northern Hemisphere they were to introduce a ban on catching longfin mako, shortfin mako and porbeagle sharks in December 2008—they are listed in appendix II. But in the Southern Hemisphere it is a totally different fishery and it has different fishing pressures.

The three species that we are addressing here are the longfin mako shark, with the scientific name of Isurus paucus, the shortfin mako shark, with the name Isurus oxyrinchus, and the porbeagle shark, with the name Lamna nasus. These sharks are highly valued in recreational sports fishing, in game fishing tournaments and, indeed, as a prized commercial fishery. I have no issue in shutting down commercial fisheries, particularly where they are pursuing sharks just for the fins, because what we see there is the pursuit of animals who are brought onboard, who have their fins cut off and who are then thrown back into the water alive. I think that is disgraceful. It is disgraceful because something more could be done with the flesh of the animal, if indeed it is to die—because they will die when they go back in the water without their dorsal and pectoral fins. There is not the same dollar value in the rest of the shark meat as there is in the fins. I was overseas recently and I had, quite to my surprise, some shark fin soup and I have to say that I cannot see why people see it as such a highly prized delicacy as a dish.

Going back to the core essence of this and why this minister has now had to bring this amendment in, as I said, it is because he failed to consult. He failed to consult with a range of people, including marine biologists and specialists, he refused to consult with the recreation and sports fishing industry and he believed a mantra chant from those within.

A press release from the recreational fishers association, Recfish, says:

Recfish CEO Len Olyott said that the exemption recognised that recreational fishing for Makos and Porbeagles was a sustainable activity which posed no threat to their conservation. “Existing limits that apply to the capture of these species are extremely conservative. Most are tagged and released with subsequent recaptures providing essential scientific evidence to assist in the further conservation of these shark species.”

               …            …            …

This sentiment was echoed by Grahame Williams, President of the Game Fishing Association of Australia. “Our Association has a long history of supporting scientific research on gamefish species. 87% of Makos caught by gamefishers are tagged and released. Our tournaments are also run under a strict Code of Conduct.”

I suppose I should declare a pecuniary interest in this. My background is, in part, in the marine industry. I am a qualified skipper. I have run game fishing boats and charter boats and I have been out there first hand.

When this bill first came up, I thought, ‘Why haven’t they consulted? Why haven’t they spoken to the people in the industry?’ I emailed Dr Julian Pepperell. He is a significant marine science researcher who has done amazing work as a marine biologist, particularly in his involvement in the interface between the game fishing community and the science community. Dr Julian Pepperell has been researching ocean fishes across the globe for over 30 years now. He is also a fishaholic. I see him quite regularly at the weigh stations when we are handing in tag cards or when fish are being brought to weigh in at Port Stephens during the game fishing competitions. His work has particularly been on the research of tag and release, so I put to him the question about how many makos have been captured or tagged and released across the game fishing tournaments. He came back to me with numbers for the last three years. In 2009 there were 110 makos captured, of which 14 were killed and the rest tagged and released. In 2008 there were 171 captured. Eight were weighed in and the rest were tagged and released. In 2007 there were 164 captured. Seventeen were weighed in and the rest were tagged and released. Most of those, because of the nature of the species, were tagged off New South Wales and some off Victoria. But the captures of makos are from tournaments generally between Port Macquarie and Bermagui. Of course there will be people who go out recreational fishing who capture mako sharks and there is very little recorded on the impact of those, but they are not a species that are in short supply in and around the east coast. I have not been out fishing as much in recent times as I have in the past but I did a fair period in my sabbatical from this place between 1998 and 2001 where I skippered a number of boats and I can say from personal experience that almost every time I went out fishing, whether it was summer or winter and whether we were chasing yellowfin tuna or marlin, we would see makos. There was rarely a day that went by when I did not see makos swimming free.

One of the problems I have when people say, ‘We have to ban this species and that species,’ is that when a bait or a lure is set out—and makos do tend to take lures as well as baits—the mako sharks will not know that it is not for them. He will not know it is not for him the same as the great white pointer does not know it is not for him and the grey nurse shark does not know it is not for him. I thought there might have been greater support, opportunity and involvement by this government for tagging and releasing programs where scientific data can be captured on where the fish were caught and then let go and an approximation of their size and weight. When these fish are recaught, whether they are caught on commercial longliners or in the shark nets on our beaches or indeed recaptured by fishermen, the tag is taken out and where they were caught and their approximate size and weight is recorded. That helps with scientific data tracking of where these species have been caught, where they have migrated to and it gives us a deeper and better understanding. More needs to be done on that. If indeed we want to establish more on the migratory patterns and more history on recapture then this is a program well worth supporting.

I have had a lot to do with my game fishing club—the Newcastle and Port Stephens Game Fish Club—where I was a former director, and I have had the members and the president of that club in my office talking on this and a number of other issues in relation to recreational sport fishing. No-one could believe that back in January this government was going to sign up to this ban. No-one could believe that they had not been consulted and that their opinion as professionals and people who care a lot about our marine environment had not been sought. Unless you have a sustainable marine environment you will no longer have recreational fishing. They were not consulted at all.

As I understand in reading the work of Senator Richard Colbeck, he has done a tremendous job in driving this, getting around the community, attending meetings, organising petitions and actually doing what the minister should have been doing—and that is getting out and talking to the people on the ground instead of people who sit behind desks. There is a lot of difference between sitting out on the water with a rod and reel and experiencing things first hand and sitting behind a desk and pretending you know everything.

The problem is that in the initial stage this failed minister—in yet another stuff-up that we are seeing here with this—failed to consult. In the insulation debacle, he refused to heed the warnings and he failed to consult; with this debacle, he refused to heed the warnings and failed to consult. So what we have here is a minister who accepted hook, line and sinker what was being applied in the Northern Hemisphere. He just thought that with the stroke of a pen he could please the egos of some of his mates who sit around the desk, drink fancy-looking teas and talk about the environment, with very little real, practical experience about being out there and doing the things that count. So we have had this imposed upon us.

I am glad that common sense and public pressure have come to the fore. I can only believe it was in part through the work of Richard Colbeck but also because of some Labor members in marginal seats who all of a sudden got a kick in the pants when they saw the size of the meetings that were occurring in their town halls—who up until that stage were prepared to sit back and just wear this. It was not until their communities got up in arms. So there is a simple lesson: ministers need to get out and consult. They need to question the science. They can no longer just accept as given, as irrefutable fact, propositions that are put to them. They need to get out, they need to listen, they need to talk and, importantly, they need to question the science.

The coalition supports this bill—this retraction, this backflip by the government—because it is the coalition that has driven this. It is the coalition that has driven common sense to be applied across this fishery. With those final words, Mr Deputy Speaker, I say to you: we will support this, and let’s hope that the minister learns a lesson and gets out and consults.

Steve Georganas (Hindmarsh, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

At a time when the environment attracts emotions and headlines in equal parts, we have a responsibility to deal with environmental issues. We need to deal with them responsibly, well and appropriately. Today I rise to speak on the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Amendment (Recreational Fishing for Mako and Porbeagle Sharks) Bill 2010, the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act more broadly, the findings of the eagerly anticipated Hawke report and how we all need to address the matters that were raised within that report. Released in December last year, this particular report says a lot about how seriously this Rudd Labor government is taking the environment. Instead of paying lip-service to environmental needs, we commissioned a report on the right way to address perhaps the most pressing issue in the world today. Now we have to act on the findings and also bring all the parties together in a bipartisan fashion and effort to achieve something for future generations.

Dr Hawke put together a team of eminent people who were prepared to do the hard work, look at the particular issues and not take shortcuts. They include the Australian National University’s Australian Centre for Environmental Law director, Tim Bonyhady, and the University of Melbourne’s Professor of Environmental Science, Mark Burgman. The report reflects the government’s stance on the environment—that it is something to be taken seriously and not just a means of grabbing a headline or a few votes. The Hawke report makes some recommendations that are just plain common sense and all of us would agree. These include making the environment the first consideration instead of weighing it equally with social and economic factors. Economic and social factors are important, of course, but the report recognises strongly the need for the environment to come first in the statute concerned with the environment. Anything less would be a cop-out, making it a Clayton’s act.

The report makes many recommendations—in fact, 71 recommendations—including establishing an independent environment commission to advise the government on matters such as project approvals and strategic assessments in all areas. It suggests giving the government additional powers to protect ecosystems and list vulnerable ecosystems as matters of national environmental significance and, at the same time, overhaul regional forestry agreements to keep logging companies accountable if they intend to keep their licences. It also recommends the establishment of an environmental reparation fund and a national biobanking scheme—very important. There are too many recommendations to list here today, but one deserves special attention: the need for environmental performance audits. The need for environmental performance audits is something that we cannot step away from. We need to be accountable when it comes to the environment. The Hawke report recommends we reduce the regulatory burden, maintain and enhance environmental protections and provide an integrated and balanced package. It is an interesting point. It stipulates the environment must come first but also acknowledges that a balance can be achieved.

The amendment to the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act currently before us is a perfect example of this balance. It provides an exception to the act to allow for a continuation of the recreational fishing of longfin and shortfin mako sharks and porbeagle sharks. Why? Because, despite international changes to the status of these sharks, fishing them here in the Southern Hemisphere is not a threat to them within the Northern Hemisphere. Their numbers and exploitation may well be a problem in the Northern Hemisphere. It is an issue that governments need to address. In the Southern Hemisphere we can make an assessment of the numbers and critical mass of these types of sharks and the degree of risk that they will face as a result of the amendment before us and the continuation of recreational fishing.

So we have made a common-sense decision on this matter. We have made a decision that is sensible and has been thought out. The decision has considered the relative needs of recreational fishers and any threat to these sharks. Of course, if recreational fishing contributed to a greater threat, recreational needs would not need to have been entertained. Recreational fishing, as we know, is a great hobby and sport for many people around Australia. The seat of Hindmarsh which I represent has Gulf St Vincent as its western boundary and there are many jetties along that coastline. I see many people go down there to go fishing with their children and enjoy this recreational sport. In fact, I have participated in recreational fishing many times over the years, especially growing up in my electorate, which has one of the most pristine coastlines. Recreational fishing offers great joy to many families, and we would not want to see that spoilt in any way. The government remains committed to shark conservation measures and will continue its involvement under the convention of migratory species. The amendment makes the point that we do not need a knee-jerk reaction to every issue that has an environmental tag attached. It is far better to address the real issues and treat them seriously than to win a few points without thinking an issue through.

In Parliament House we recently saw the film The End of the Line. It was characterised as the first major documentary about overfishing and the depletion of world fish stocks. Many members on both sides saw this very interesting film in Parliament House a couple of weeks ago. As I understand it, it retains some power and some very interesting statements from people working in the fishing industry as well as fish conservation experts, fishermen, scientists, et cetera. The website states quite boldly, ‘Scientists predict that if we continue fishing as we now are, we will see the end of most seafood by 2048.’ That is not too far away. It goes on to talk about the need for controlled fishing by reducing the number of fishing boats across the world. It also talks about protecting large areas of the ocean through a network of marine reserves off-limits to fishing and through educating consumers—that is us, the people who eat the seafood. We have a choice to purchase fish from independently certified sustainable fisheries. We have all heard about the big trawlers that go out there and basically clear up everything on the ocean bed, taking with them every single kind of sea life that is available.

When I see and hear statements such as these, when I hear these quotes, especially the first quote, I know that, irrespective of any science, some people will disbelieve anything said in the interests of the status quo. We continue to see those vested interests and the prospect of comparative disadvantage driving action. It is a pity that we factor in automatic disbelief in any debate, because these are serious issues. In this case, what does the science actually say in relation to fish stocks in our ocean? As I said earlier, scientist predict that, if we continue fishing as we are now, we will see the end of most seafood by 2048.

Today I can only touch on the subject and give one answer in part. In mid-2009, a report was released on the impact of overfishing and the effectiveness of current restoration efforts in the Western world. It was prepared by 19 co-authors from around the world, including from the University of Washington in the USA and Dr Beth Fulton from our own CSIRO. ‘Troubling trend of increasing stock collapse across all regions’ is not an encouraging title and not an encouraging start. But in the paper prepared for publication in Science, 31 July 2009, the author states:

In 5 of 10 well-studied ecosystems, the average exploitation rate has recently declined and is now at or below the rate predicted to achieve maximum sustainable yield for seven systems. Yet 63% of assessed fish stocks worldwide still require rebuilding, and even lower exploitation rates are needed to reverse the collapse of vulnerable species.

Efforts here and around the world are making a very positive impact. Overfishing clearly was leading us as a global community towards the brink of radical ecological upheaval—the permanent interruption of the known marine ecosystems and the food chain that keeps species of fish in balance. The effects on jobs in our own fishing industries and the balance of species within our oceans would have been radical. We may have turned the corner. The global community is aware and it has argued that it is responding, to an extent. We here in Australia are highly affected by our marine environment—its weather, its resources, its beauty and its perils. Work around this country in harvesting the sea responsibly and sustainably is very much a feature of our economy, our lifestyles and our legacy to future generations.

The people and businesses in my electorate of Hindmarsh in South Australia understand that balance between everyday life and the environment. As I said earlier, the western boundary of my electorate is Gulf St Vincent, with its pristine beaches, its golden sands and its lovely jetties. The area is home to industry, tourism, major retail outlets and even Adelaide airport, but they are not damaging the local environment. All forms of government, local, state and federal are committed to ensuring—

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! It being 2 pm, the debate is interrupted in accordance with standing order 97. The debate may be resumed at a later hour and the member for Hindmarsh will have leave to continue speaking when the debate is resumed.