Page 1764 - Week 05 - Wednesday, 4 May 2011
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Mr Stanhope was shouting across the chamber at Mr Rattenbury, saying, “It was your choice.” It was actually the government’s choice to go down this path we have today. We agreed to adjourn the debate after agreeing to this in principle to allow the government to go through the process, particularly given that the government was stating that in some way the Greens had not been through a proper process—which I will outline later—but that was not agreed to. Now we have the situation today where Ms Le Couteur’s legislation is going to get voted down because the government will not agree to what the Greens have put forward.
We have had points put forward about the Greens’ process in relation to consultation on this. Mr Rattenbury has already outlined—as Ms Le Couteur will, I am sure, in her speech—that the Greens received over 50 submissions in relation to this legislation. We spoke to the advisory council, and Mr Stanhope has mentioned that the advisory council is doing some work. I note that it is working on a particular issue in relation to animal welfare issues. There has been some discussion in the press release Mr Stanhope has put out today—and I will go to that shortly—and Mr Coe has also spoken about a number of points. Mr Coe has disappeared, which shows how seriously he takes this legislation.
One point that is very much focused on is the sale of pets in pet stores, and that is a part of the legislation. But as Mr Rattenbury has outlined, there are many parts to this legislation which go to a variety of animal welfare issues around the licensing of breeders, regulating of advertising, point-of-sale desexing and regulation of pet stores which have been the focus of some of the fairly outrageous statements we have heard today.
Mr Coe seems to think the banning of sow stalls is a great joke, but it is an extremely cruel practice. It would be a great step forward for the ACT to actually make a statement saying that we do not accept this practice in the ACT. But, again, we will not have that today.
Ms Le Couteur will, I am sure, outline some of the very positive statements we received in relation to this legislation, but I would just like to read out a couple of quotes from one particular submission from a pet store owner who offered strong support for this legislation:
Having worked in the pet industry as a shop owner and as an animal welfare advocate, I can vouch for the fact that it is near impossible for the required amount of policing to occur to uphold the minimal regulations in regard to pet sales that exist at the present. The only way to stop the mass breeding, irresponsible sale and continued abandonment of pets is to limit the sale of pets through shops to those supplied by welfare groups.
Further:
Having owned a pet shop, I am often amazed at the amount of ignorance among the general public as to where exactly pet shops source their animals and what health and regulatory conditions apply to the sale of them.
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