BLOG: Another broken promise at Broken Bay

ONCE upon a time there was this wonderful country called Australia with a huge pristine coastline and great fishing. All was good and because the Aussies loved to both eat fish and catch them for sport, they brought in limits and quotas and tried to ensure that they had a sustainable fishery for their children to enjoy. They got rid of many bad practices and even set up recreational fishing havens and sanctuary areas to protect their precious fish stocks from the men with nets.

Then one day, in the most populous part of this great country in a place called New South Wales a horrible accident happened and the people found their precious fisheries being ruled over by a minister who neither cared about or understood recreational fishing and just did what the men with nets told her to do. She took money from the rec fishers to build artificial reefs to attract more fish for the men with nets to kill and sell. She closed their Fisheries Research Centre so she didn't have to be bothered about silly things like science which she felt only confused matters. She let the men with nets do what they liked, where they liked – including in the protected havens - until one day, just after the last fishing tackle shop had closed, she was told that nobody goes fishing in NSW any more. And that, children, is why we are learning about angling as part of our history lesson today.....

Ok ... so it might not be that bad yet ... but the direction of travel of fisheries policy in NSW is heading back to the dark ages at a rate of knots and you can bet that things are going to get a whole lot worse unless fishos in this state get themselves organised. I'd like to think that the Shooters and Fishers Party would make a stand on behalf of the State's anglers but after their vow of silence over Cronulla, in return for who knows what, I'm not holding my breath. Salmon are not cuddly enough for the Greens to worry about and the ALP are probably still too shell-shocked and stupid to realise the open political goal that is staring them in the face.

Remember those election promises from the Coalition to make decisions based on "science not political outcomes"? Well check out this report from Katrina Hodgkinson's own fisheries scientists on the status of the Eastern Australian salmon stocks and tell me where it says that there is a case for opening up beach hauling in the north to a staggering 3 tonnes per hauler per day?

This is the latest fishery status report from the DPI Wild Fisheries Research programme which concludes that salmon stocks are fully exploited and that "commercial landings are at historically high levels and the recreational catch is significant". Has the minister even read this report ? If she has it might explain why she wants to close Cronulla!
My colleague, John Newbery, has given Fisho readers the history and background to this appalling decision and posed some very pertinent questions that I have no doubt will be ignored. So all I just want to do is to put a few facts and figures regarding salmon stocks into context.

Prior to 2001 there was virtually a free for all and salmon stocks suffered. Then under Eddie Obied, probably the only decent fisheries minister in living memory, salmon stocks were protected north of Barrenjoey Head at the entrance to Broken Bay. Bag limits were brought in for rec fishers and a trigger limit was imposed on the Ocean Haul Fishery in the south after it had suffered at the hands of the Eden cannery. Not surprisingly, salmon stocks recovered in NSW and everyone benefitted to the extent that a few years ago commercial fishers holding both trap and line and ocean hauling licences were allowed to take up to 100 tonnes of salmon per year from the northern fishery for pot baits. The rec fishers are never thrilled about seeing a great and popular sports fish used in this way and in other, more enlightened jurisdictions, the true economic value of the species would be reflected in fishery management policy.

But a cheap and easy supply of pot bait is not the only thing the pros have their beady little eyes on. A recent report from the Feds at FRDC indicated that our salmon may soon be bound for the slow (and highly profitable) boat to China. Check this out ...

The commercial fisheries for this species are currently limited to bait for lobster and fish traps and a small domestic market for human consumption. There is, however, the potential for a very large export market for this species to be developed (most likely to China: Wilson & McCallum 2001) and the possibility that the stock may be more heavily exploited in the future.

Worried now? You should be. For at a time when her own scientists have produced status reports documenting that salmon landings are at historically high levels and are FULLY EXPLOITED the ridiculous Hodgkinson, acting as the pawn of John Harrison and the Professional Fisherman's Association, has opened the stocks up even further to the "men with nets" to the tune of an eye watering 3 tonnes per hauler per day. Way more than they need for pot bait I'd wager but enough to start thinking about flogging Australian salmon to those expanding, and lucrative, Asian markets.

Which brings us back to that broken promise about following the science and the prospect of future generations only reading about the great salmon fishing we enjoyed in their history books...

Illustration: Robbi Wymer