Katter’s Australian Party has called on the state government to improve its cattle-handling procedures when it comes to national parks.
Member for Hill Shane Knuth said Queensland Parks and Wildlife officers had been performing shoot-to-kill operations in Cape York, indiscriminately killing unbranded and branded cattle.
The state MP said the kills were often happening without any, or little notice to surrounding landowners who own most of the cattle.
“The department needs to communicate with landowners, who are rarely notified and often held up by government bureaucracy, sometimes waiting up to 50 days before they can obtain a permit to collect their branded cattle from national parks,” Mr Knuth said.
“Cattle are continually shot before landowners are given permission to enter parks to muster their cattle, which is a huge economic loss to the region.”
He claimed that over the past three years more than 5000 cattle, which could be worth more than $6 million on today’s market, had been shot on orders from the Department of Environment.
Mr Knuth said: “The question is, why are neighbouring properties to Cape York national parks given only one week’s notice, or no notice, before the killing of cattle occurs?
“And when adequate notice is given, it’s always during the wet season when it is far too difficult and dangerous to muster cattle.
“It is quite obvious that this government wants to drive pastoralists out of the region, so they can lock it up to meet their environmental agenda.
“I call on the minister to fix this long-standing issue, streamline the permit process, instruct the department to give adequate notice and work with landowners to muster valuable cattle.”
Sally Witherspoon, who runs cattle on a northern Peninsula sublease, said the QPWS was putting the final nail in the coffin of the beef industry in Cape York.
“There is a ridiculous rule that you must contact QPWS 40 days before submitting a Permit to Muster application,” she said.
“The application takes time to be assessed and could then be denied for some reason. For example, too late in the season for a muster.
“National parks should not be purchased unless there are funds to fully fence and maintain the park.
“They are the worst neighbours one could wish for with little to no weed control, no fences, nobody living on the property, little fire-fighting capability, and a propensity to shoot cattle.
“Shooting from a helicopter is often not humane and it is distressing to think our cattle are being cruelly ‘hunted’ and maybe left to die a slow death.
“It is very telling that graziers on Cape York Peninsula and the north-eastern coast of Queensland are being forced out of business in the only areas of Queensland that have guaranteed rainfall.
“It is my belief that this is part of a state government drive to disrupt food production.”
This article appeared in Cape York Weekly, 26 April 2022.
