Drizzt
Member
Weekly Times
January 29, 2003, Wednesday
SECTION: LETTERS; Pg. 16
LENGTH: 438 words
HEADLINE: Duck hunters are no threat to Steve
BODY:
YOUR reporter, Peter Hunt (WT, Jan 15), is living in fairyland when he asks whether the Bracks Government is "willing to take on Victoria's 25,000 duck shooters" in a bid to satisfy Green Party demands for a permanent ban on shooting native waterbirds.
Victorian duck shooters pose absolutely no threat to the Victorian Government.
The recreational shooting of native waterbirds has already been banned in two states by Labor governments. Premier Carmen Lawrence banned it in Western Australia in 1990, saying the community had "reached a stage of enlightenment where it can no longer accept the institutionalised killing of native birds for recreation".
Recreational duck shooting remains banned in that state.
NSW Premier Bob Carr did the same five years later, not long after Labor won office.
Shooters in NSW said Premier Carr would be thrown out of office because of that decision. Yet, eight years on, Labor is still there.
Shooters also vowed to remove the federal Liberal Government after Prime Minister John Howard banned semi-automatic weapons in 1997, following the Port Arthur tragedy.
Yet both the Liberals and Mr Howard are still in office.
When Premier Steve Bracks banned semi-automatic pistols late last year after the tragic shootings at Monash University, shooting organisations huffed and puffed about the proposed ban before running out of steam.
In 1986, there were around 95,000 duck shooters in Victoria.
With the change in public opinion over the past 17 years, the numbers of duck shooters on Victoria's wetlands during the opening weekend of the duck season have dropped to a couple of thousand only.
Although some 21,000 Victorians still hold game licences, few of them are still active.
Following tougher new gun laws introduced in 1997 after Port Arthur, many shotgun owners still retain their game licences as a reason to legitimately own a shotgun, even though they no longer shoot native waterbirds.
No, Mr Hunt, the Victorian Labor Government has nothing to fear by banning recreational duck shooting.
Laurie Levy, South Melbourne
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You're right, it is Aussie-land. The pain-killers seem to be having more effect than I thought.
January 29, 2003, Wednesday
SECTION: LETTERS; Pg. 16
LENGTH: 438 words
HEADLINE: Duck hunters are no threat to Steve
BODY:
YOUR reporter, Peter Hunt (WT, Jan 15), is living in fairyland when he asks whether the Bracks Government is "willing to take on Victoria's 25,000 duck shooters" in a bid to satisfy Green Party demands for a permanent ban on shooting native waterbirds.
Victorian duck shooters pose absolutely no threat to the Victorian Government.
The recreational shooting of native waterbirds has already been banned in two states by Labor governments. Premier Carmen Lawrence banned it in Western Australia in 1990, saying the community had "reached a stage of enlightenment where it can no longer accept the institutionalised killing of native birds for recreation".
Recreational duck shooting remains banned in that state.
NSW Premier Bob Carr did the same five years later, not long after Labor won office.
Shooters in NSW said Premier Carr would be thrown out of office because of that decision. Yet, eight years on, Labor is still there.
Shooters also vowed to remove the federal Liberal Government after Prime Minister John Howard banned semi-automatic weapons in 1997, following the Port Arthur tragedy.
Yet both the Liberals and Mr Howard are still in office.
When Premier Steve Bracks banned semi-automatic pistols late last year after the tragic shootings at Monash University, shooting organisations huffed and puffed about the proposed ban before running out of steam.
In 1986, there were around 95,000 duck shooters in Victoria.
With the change in public opinion over the past 17 years, the numbers of duck shooters on Victoria's wetlands during the opening weekend of the duck season have dropped to a couple of thousand only.
Although some 21,000 Victorians still hold game licences, few of them are still active.
Following tougher new gun laws introduced in 1997 after Port Arthur, many shotgun owners still retain their game licences as a reason to legitimately own a shotgun, even though they no longer shoot native waterbirds.
No, Mr Hunt, the Victorian Labor Government has nothing to fear by banning recreational duck shooting.
Laurie Levy, South Melbourne
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
You're right, it is Aussie-land. The pain-killers seem to be having more effect than I thought.
