WA seafood goes off the menu as state eco-policies run off the rails

It’s a common topic among WA communities: When children behave badly, are the children to blame, or is it the parents, who may have inadvertently given permission for the poor behaviour?

Today, we see this situation playing out across Western Australia’s environment department.

On one hand, we have eco-zealots behaving badly across the state, yet on the other, we have a WA Government environment agency that is actively supporting these same groups and even calling them in to help set eco-policies for the state that will have enormous socio-economic impacts on regional communities. It’s no wonder the eco-zealots are brimming with confidence.

It’s a situation that would fail any pub test, yet somehow the Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions (DBCA) is standing by its decision to work with offshore, international eco-groups, at the exclusion of genuine WA-based stakeholders and WA’s world-best marine scientists.

And it’s not only the WA fishing industry calling out the blurry lines with WA’s environmental policy setting, with the ABC Investigations team reporting potential concerns that there was perceived influence applied in regards to a major policy decision change made by the independent environmental regulator.

We can’t comment on the veracity of this media report but one thing is for sure, just like with marine parks, the community needs greater confidence that pre-determined outcomes aren’t over-riding the integrity of government consultation and decision-making processes.

You can read the full story in this week’s ProWest.

You can also read the ABC Investigations story here.