Page 1768 - Week 05 - Wednesday, 4 May 2011
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I ask Ms Le Couteur and her colleagues to act with wisdom today and not with haste and to agree to adjourn debate on this bill.
MS LE COUTEUR (Molonglo) (11.43), in reply: Firstly, I seek leave to table some correspondence between myself and the Chief Minister on the subject of this bill.
Leave granted.
MS LE COUTEUR: I table the following papers:
Animal Welfare Legislation Amendment Bill 2010—Exposure draft—Copies of correspondence between Ms Le Couteur and the Minister for Territory and Municipal Services—
Dated 11 March 2011.
Dated 24 March 2011.
Secondly, I would like to refocus the debate on what on earth we are actually debating. We are not here to debate whose idea it was first or whether this is a good process or not. What we are here to debate is something to improve the welfare of dogs, cats and other animals in the ACT. That is what the Greens are about. That is what I am about. That is what I would like to see the ACT Assembly be about.
I will read out some statistics. In 2009-10 the ACT RSPCA alone was presented with 1,670 dogs and puppies and 2,748 cats and kittens. This means, on average, the RSPCA is presented with over 12 cats or dogs every day of the year. And this is in addition to the hundreds of dogs processed by ACT Domestic Animal Services and the dogs which are rescued and rehomed by other volunteers in the ACT.
Each year, hundreds of these animals have to be euthanased. In 2009-10, for example, the RSPCA had to euthanase 1,183 cats and 98 dogs, and DAS euthanased over 100 of its saleable dogs and an unknown quantity of unsaleable dogs. In addition, we have no idea how many animals were euthanased by pet shops because under the current requirement pet shops do not have to disclose data about this.
That is what we are on about here. We are on about animal welfare and we are also on about the welfare of pigs. Mr Rattenbury mentioned that in his speech. For anyone who has not seen sow stalls, I was unfortunate enough to see a video on sow stalls and I have to say that it makes battery cage egg production by hens look enlightened. It is horrible. And that is a practice.
I must admit I am amazed that we could not find, as the lowest common denominator, among the Assembly that all three parties would be prepared to agree that this was something we did not want to ever see in the ACT. I point out that it is something that the Labor government in Tasmania have agreed they do not wish to see any more in Tasmania. I would like to see us be at least as enlightened as Tasmania.
Before going on, I would like to thank my fellow Greens for their support on this, and Greens staff members, as well as the members of the public and the RSPCA who are
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