Beverley McArthur MP
Member for Western Victoria Region
Media Statement
END POISON BAITS IN PUBLIC SPACES
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Member for Western Victoria Region, Bev McArthur twice called on the State Environment Minister in Parliament this week, to direct Parks Victoria to cease their fox baiting program on the Belfast Coastal Reserve.
Her constituency question and adjournment debate highlighted the irresponsible action of Parks Victoria in their application of first, the lethal 1080 baits and now PAP baits. She emphasised the destructive effects the baiting program had already had on the local wildlife and family pets, due to its “potential for indiscriminate outcomes,” with “numerous non-target animals such as barn owls, wedge tailed eagles, kites and even domestic dogs dying the cruellest of deaths.”
Parks Victoria had intensified their baiting program last September using 1080 poison in a claimed attempt to save plovers from foxes. Data by Birdlife Australia shows that only 7% of nest failures are due to foxes.
Bev McArthur recently met with local residents and reported that the local community were furious at a lack of consultation by Parks Victoria for the new baiting program, having never been able to justify the previous lethal 1080 baiting program. Indeed the baiting notice to landholders came after baits had already been laid.
“What sort of consultation is this?”
“Parks Victoria is a classic example of bureaucratic overkill.” They in fact “created the problem by interfering in the natural order of things.” “Plovers, horse riders and family dogs existed happily before Parks Victoria decided to fence off (various) areas and nesting sites.”
“A return to a common-sense, community based approach is necessary to resolve the disruption caused by Parks Victoria, if we want to properly protect the Belfast Coastal Reserve, the local fauna, its residents and their pets.”
21 February 2019