Abolish the Game Council

The message from tonight's meeting is that the NSW Game Council has to go – we need a broad based campaign to wind up this organisation.

Mr Robert Brown presents himself as Mr Reasonable but we should be in no doubt that what he and his colleagues are about is using public money to promote their sporting interests. This is not about feral animal control - it is about going hunting with your mates.

The whole premise of the Game Council is a farce, born out of the reciprocal relationship between NSW Labor and the Shooters Party to exchange favours in the NSW parliament.

The Game Council would never have seen the light of day if it was judged on its merit.

The Game Council is an unaccountable body that:
·    sucks millions of dollars of public money
·    puts public safety at risk
·    inflicts unacceptable animal suffering, and
·    is a set back to the management of feral animals.

The amount of public money is considerable –
o    $3.5 million last year, and
o    $2.8 million is expected this year

The speakers tonight have set out a clear case of why the Shooters Party legislation - the Game and Feral Animal Control Amendment Bill – is an ugly and unnecessary piece of legislation.

I would like to look at how it has come to this. How does a political party, which at the last election gained only 2.8 per cent of the vote, come to have so much sway with the NSW government?  And let's not forget the opposition.

The establishment of the Game Council, the weakening of gun control laws and the other wins the Shooters Party has achieved have been won with both Labor and Coalition support.

Opposition to Shooters Bill

Firstly, some good news. The Game and Feral Animal Control Amendment Bill has not become a law already because of massive public opposition. My office received more than 1000 emails, faxes and letters from people deeply troubled by this push.

Your public outcry put the Labor government on notice that this Bill went too far. I had senior government ministers – and I am not referring to Carmel Tebbutt – say to me not just that the Bill should not pass but that the relationship between the government and the Shooters Party was too close.

I am certainly not saying we have won. We need to keep the pressure on and if you are opposed to this Bill I encourage you to let your local member know and let the Premier know your concerns.

Establishment of the Game Council

A frequently asked question is “How has NSW found itself in this position, where two members of the Shooters Party have so much power that they are able to win support of the government and the opposition to weaken gun control measures, gain millions of dollars for shooting complexes and the establishment of the Game Council?"

It is worth looking more closely at the relationship between the Shooters Party and the Labor government.

When Labor was elected in 1995 they had a majority in the Legislative Assembly, while in the Legislative Council a variety of independents held the balance of power. This was the election that saw the Shooters Party enter parliamentary politics.

Who knows if it is true, but the corridor talk in the 1990s was that the then premier Bob Carr and John Tingle, the Shooters Party MP, who had been colleagues when they both worked as journalists, had a weekly cup of tea.

I know of no evidence of what was discussed at these events but as the years rolled by two trends emerged.

·    Mr Tingle supported unpopular Labor legislation when the government struggled to gain the numbers.
·    From the mid 1990s the gun lobby enjoyed unprecedented success in winning:
o    millions of dollars for new shooting complexes,
o    support for their legislative program, and
o    the establishment of the NSW Game Council.

A major achievement for the shooters lobby was when John Tingle won Premier Carr's support for the establishment of a Ministerial Advisory Committee on Shooting Clubs (MACOSC). The purpose of the committee was to:
·    provide a whole-of-Government approach to issues affecting shooting clubs,
·    help clubs obtain Crown Land for shooting ranges, and
·    obtain government finance.

This is some achievement – shooters having their own ministerial advistory committee that has a whole of govt approach – I think we read that to mean all ministers doors are open to you and its works on obtaining government finance and obtaining public land for the sport of shooting.

MACOSC has delivered for shooters but there is no publicly available information on who sits on this committee, no minutes, no transparency.

Money for Shooting Complexes

Let's look at what has been won for the shooters lobby since the first Shooters MP was elected to the NSW parliament.

·    From 1998 to 2001 the Shooters Party secured over $5 million in additional funding for shooters clubs.   
·    An average 20 clubs per year were given funding ranging from $2,000 to $45,000 for specific projects.
·    Overall shooting clubs received a huge increase in public funding and several new shooting ranges and regional shooting complexes were built. 

John Tingle in his newsletter 22 June 2001 said:

“Sport and Rec has some $4 million to distribute amongst all sporting bodies in the state, and the demand is heavy.    Approximately $100,000 is tagged each year for shooting clubs.   I’d like it to be more, but we try to place it where it will do the most good.     The fact that we’ve managed to persuade the Government to allocate well over $2.5 million extra in the last 3 years, in addition to the standard Sport and Rec grants makes up for the shortfall, I believe.”
https://www.ssaa.org.au/newssaa/political%20archive/documentsofinterest/australianz/nswspnewsletter.doc.

Land for shooting complexes

The Shooters Party, through MACOSC:
·    gained 540 hectares for the Illawarra Shooting Association in the Dharawal Nature Reserve. 
·    played a key role in establishing or extending shooting complexes at Cessnock, Emmaville, Inverell-Glen Innes, Mudgee, Bodalla, Port Macquarie, Kempsey, Hilltop and Hornsby.
·    obtained Crown Land for the Far South Coast Hunting Club at Bodalla.
·    started lobbying for the Southern Highlands Regional Shooting Facility.

John Tingle was very proud of his achievements and set them out in his many newsletters.

Shooters Party support for government bills

Shooters Party MPs in the Upper House have provided reliable support to the Labor government:
·    in tight votes to have bills passed,
·    to block the release of secret government documents, and
·    against potentially embarrassing parliamentary inquiries.

Legislation backed by Shooters Party MPs

·    Law and order bills - Crimes Act, various amendments
·    Weakening of Workers Compensation Legislation. (2001)
·    Planning laws - Environmental Planning and Assessment Act amendments (Part 3A) and Environmental Planning Legislation Amendment bills. Part 3A allows large developments, like shooting complexes, to more easily proceed. (2005)
·    Gene Technology (GM crop moratorium) Bill. (2003)
·    Biodiversity Banking Bill, set to cause loss of high conservation areas. (2005)
·    Stopped the public release of documents relating to the Sydney desalination plant and the proposed M4 East motorway. (2007)
·    Helping the government avoid a public inquiry into how planning laws have delivered the planning system to the big developers who donate millions to the Labor Party. (2007)
·    Keeping the Greens off the Political Funding Inquiry, which had been initiated by the Greens. (2007)
·    Blocking the Greens private members bill to ban mining on prime agricultural land. (2009)
·    V8 supercar race at Homebush. (2009)
·    Repco rally in northern NSW. (2009)

Why do 2 Shooters Party MPs have so much power?

In the NSW Legislative Council:
·    Total number of MPs - 42
·    One MP becomes President
·    Majority needed to win vote - 21

From 2003-2007:
·    The government had 18 votes and needed at least 4 additional votes to get a majority, however it had a cross bench of 11 to work with.
·    There was only one Shooters Party MP.

After the 2007 election:
·    The government has 19 MPs – one MP is President leaving 18 government votes.
·    Cross benches
o    Four Greens MPs
o    Two Shooters MPs
o    Fred Nile – Christian Democrat
o    Gordon Moyes – independent
·    The government needs three of these votes to secure a vote.
·    Fred Nile regularly votes with the government.

Current state of play in NSW Upper House

·    The Shooters MPs have been reliable supporters of the government for unpopular legislation.
·    Shooters Party MPs Robert Brown and Roy Smith and Christian Democrat MP Fred Nile have voted with Labor in over 60% of divisions in which they voted.
·    Shooters Party vote becomes more important because they represent 2 of the 3 votes needed by the government.

Shooters Party wins since 2007 election

Since the 2007 election the Shooters Party have had a number of wins in the Upper House. The nature of these wins gives an insight into why Robert Brown and Roy Smith would have thought they were over the line with their planned amendments to the Game Council Bill.

Two major changes that Shooters Party lobbied for since the 2007 election were both passed:
·    with support of all Labor and the Coalition MPs.
·    during the busiest time of parliamentary sitting when the Shooters Party has maximum leverage as government has many bills it wants to pass.

1.    June 2008 – Shooters Party introduces Firearms Amendment Bill.
o    Labor and Coalition vote to bring this on as a matter of urgency. Bill passed.
o    Changes mean that unlicensed people can access and use guns at shooting clubs, an end to waiting times for licensed owners buying additional guns and weaker penalties for breaches of the Firearms Act.
o    This is the first watering down of the national uniform gun laws brought in after the Port Arthur massacre in 1996.

2.    December 2008 – Government legislation on domestic violence amended.
o    Perpetrators of domestic violence who have been the subject of an apprehended violence order can regain their firearms when the AVO is revoked.
o    Prior to this change anyone subject of an apprehended violence court order had to wait 10 years to hold a gun licence.

Biggest Shooters Party win remains the NSW Game Council

·    Set up in 2002 on an initiative from the Shooters Party.
·    Responsible Minister Ian Macdonald promised that the Game Council would be self-funding.
·    The NSW Auditor General in 2008 raised significant concerns about the financial viability of the Game Council.
·    The Treasurer approved $5 million dollars in NSW Tcorp loans between 2004/2005 and 2006/2007.
·    When the Game Council failed to pay back $2 million the government wiped the loan.
·    October 2007 the Cabinet Standing Committee on the Budget approved additional recurrent funding and requested the Game Council develop a business plan by 30 June 2008.
·    Minister Ian Macdonald has refused to:
o    release the 2008-2012 Business Plan for public scrutiny, deeming it 'commercial in confidence'.
o    provide a date for when the Game Council will become self-funding. The government will only say it has 'developed a number of scenarios regarding the future funding of the Game Council'.

The Game Council's poor financial health continues despite an increase in the number of restricted game hunting licenses being issued following an advertising blitz across Sydney and rural areas in 2008/2009.

New figures just obtained by the Greens show that the NSW Game Council has spent well over $1 million over the last five years in advertising, with its annual advertising budget increasing more than five times since 2004/2005. 

Government funding

Government funding levels have increased dramatically since the Game Council was first established. A significant drop in funding in 2006/2007 was followed by an unprecedented boost in 2007/2008 as a result of the Council's pressing debt problem . Questioning from the Greens revealed that $2.89 million is expected to be allocated to the Council in 2008/2009, but the final figure is not yet publicly available.

Game Council = hunting weekend with your mates

·    372 State forests licensed for hunting.
·    Over 9,000 licensed voluntary conservation hunters today in NSW.
·    standard license fee costs an economical $60

Is the government keeping the Game Council afloat as a trade off for the Shooters Party MPs voting with the government when the numbers are tight on crucial votes in the NSW Upper House? 

We may never know the answer to that question. But whatever the reason, the financial arrangements of the Game Council should be clear and publicly available.


Shooters use language of science and conservation to mask their intent

In 2007 Shooters Party MP Roy Smith, in his first speech in parliament, said his party would "pursue the reintroduction of science-based duck and quail seasons and the expansion of the highly successful Game Council model to include conservation hunting in national parks".

The use of this language does not legitimise the Shooters Party attempts to pursue their sport using public money and public land.

Shooters Party donations

In the lead up to the 2007 election the Shooters Party declared taking $667,370 in donations.  Roy Smith was the Shooters Party candidate. He brought in huge donations from the Sporting Shooters Association Australia (NSW) Inc (SSAA (NSW)). 

Roy Smith was the Executive Officer of the SSAA (NSW) at the time that it donated a total of $428,175 to his own Shooters Party election campaign.  His name even appears on some of the donor forms.  A further $124,786 of the campaign money was donations in kind made from the SSAA (NSW) to the Shooters Party for office expenses, staff and advertising.  That’s well over half a million dollars. 

Roy Smith was certainly delivering for his mates when he undertook to expand the Game Council and resume duck-hunting season. 

In the lead up to the 2003 election, before Roy Smith and his SSAA connections came on the scene, the Shooters Party only raised $256,782 - half the amount raised in 2007. 

A question for Robert Brown is why doesn't he attract the same level of donations from his shooting mates as Roy Smith and is he pushing so hard for hunting in national parks to shore up support for his 2011 re-election bid.

Greens policy on firearms

The Shooters Party run a scare campaign on the Greens position on firearms.
·    Greens policy is not to stop sporting shooting or take all guns off people.
·    Do not support guns being stored in urban homes.
·    Call for guns in urban areas are to be stored at gun clubs under lock and key, with firing mechanisms kept at designated police stations.
 
National Parks – protection

·    In recent months understandably public concern has concentrated on the Shooters Party push to shoot in national parks.
·    At same time national parks under threat from the NSW government's plan to expand commercial tourism development and in particular construct new accommodation facilities inside National Parks.
·    Our voice of concern needs to be heard in opposition to the commercialisation of national parks.

Our message to the government

I urge that you contact your local member and Premier Nathan Rees with a clear four point message -
·    Wind up the NSW Game Council.
·    Re-direct the Game Council budget to truly scientific feral animal control programs.
·    No commercialisation of national parks.
·    In the Upper House no deals, debate legislation on its merit.

Thankyou.


End