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Recreational shoot-to-kill licences issued for our World Heritage Area

RECREATIONAL shooters will soon be allowed to hunt deer in Tasmania’s World Heritage Area and national parks.

In a move described as “delusional” by the Wilderness Society, state Primary Industries Minister Sarah Courtney has revealed the Government hopes to open both to shooters by the start of the next deer season, in February.

Ms Courtney said she asked the Parks Service to find places for hunters to shoot because she believed recreational shoot- ers could play an important role in conservation and wildlife management by limiting the impacts of introduced species.

“I emphasise that the issuing of hunting permits in our parks and reserves will be limited to designated areas away from those frequented by visitors, and informed by the statewide deer census population,” Ms Courtney said.

But Wilderness Society campaigner Vica Bayley said he had serious concerns about recreational shooters being allowed into parks.

Mr Bayley said he agreed there “absolutely” was a deer management problem across Tasmania, including in national parks and the World Heritage Area.

But he said the government, “is delusional if they think that recreational hunting is an effective feral species management strategy”.

“This is a species that is partly protected in Tasmania on private land, the solution isn’t recreational hunting in parks and reserves — the solution has to be a holistic approach to pest eradication on both public and private land,” Mr Bayley said. “I think many people will see it as a free for all and the government’s track record on managing the bad behaviour of individuals is poor.

“I think many people will see this as a permit for a weekend away in a national park to shoot anything that moves.”

Ms Courtney said the plan to “provide opportunities for appropriately licensed and registered shooters to hunt wild fallow deer in national parks, the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area, conservation areas, regional reserves and all game reserves” had been a clear policy of the Liberal Party.

Ms Courtney also said crop protection permits — which allowed the shooting of browsing animals such as possums, wallabies and wombats — would be extended from a maximum of one year to five years.

Tasmanian Greens leader Cassy O’Connor said it beggared belief that permits were being issued to shoot a species that was facing local extinction in some areas of the state.

“Ms Courtney is on one hand, providing modest public funding to help research and tackle the spread of sarcoptic mange, while on the other, she’s authorising the killing of healthy wombats,” she said. “There are fundraisers being run around the state, and concerned community groups and wildlife carers treating sick and dying wombats right now — all while Minister Courtney signs their death warrants.”

Ms Courtney said an average of 34 permits to shoot wombats were issued each year, but there were only two issued last year and six the year before.

The Government meanwhile yesterday announced the new members of the Tasmanian Game Council, to be chaired by former Western Tiers MLC Greg Hall.