Hansard debates

Mrs McARTHUR (Western Victoria) (23:01): My adjournment matter is for the Minister for Energy, Environment and Climate Change. Last November’s Greater Gariwerd Landscape: Draft Management Plan contained the suggestion that dingoes might be reintroduced to the Grampians National Park. While it is only a small part of the plan, I must admit that it worried me. It takes no imagination to understand the potential damage to some of the state’s best grazing land which surrounds the park, nor does it stretch credibility, knowing Parks Victoria’s record, to realise that attempting to keep dingoes within the park would be extremely expensive and almost certain to fail. It seemed like yet another idea with good intentions but sadly no connection to reality.

What I have learned since, however, is that even the purported environmental benefit of the scheme is highly questionable. John Higgins has bred dingoes for more than 40 years and in his career has worked with farmers and with government agencies to identify and combat stock predation. John explained to me not just the reasons dingoes would hunt neighbouring sheep populations for preference but also the danger to other species. In his view local populations of koalas would be threatened, as would the brush-tailed rock-wallaby, a critically endangered species only recently reintroduced to the Grampians. Mr Higgins is just part of the growing opposition to the proposal. The response was at first muted, probably because the idea is so outlandish that most people with little experience of Parks Victoria considered it too ridiculous to be serious. I hope I have helped make clear to people that common sense is no requirement in these matters and that the most absurd ideas can eventuate if the flaws are not widely exposed.

I want to pay particular tribute here to John and Rhonda Crawford of Rock-Bank merino stud, who have done a huge amount to inspire media interest and to mobilise the local community. Farmers, tourism operators and environmentalists as well as other residents who recognise the risks of the idea are united in their opposition. 1921 people have now signed the change.org petition, and the paper copy circulated in Dunkeld, Cavendish and Hamilton has over 800 signatures. The flaws in the plan are so evident they need little restatement here, so instead I would ask the minister for something different—namely, a full and rigorous assessment of the ecological arguments for and against reintroducing dingoes, for if even this case is weak then the whole idea must surely be removed from the landscape management plan before its ultimate approval.