The Hon. Beverly McArthur, Member for Western Victoria, Media Release, 10 February 2023
The Victorian Government is overseeing the slow demise of National Parks, ignoring the very rules that established their existence and importance in the state.
In State Parliament, the Member for Western Victoria, Bev McArthur, has asked the Minister for the Environment to immediately review a decision made last year to change public access rights to the Grampians National Park.
The ‘Set Aside Determination for Grampians National Park’ removed public right access for the park and then reinstated it, in certain areas, for certain purposes.
Mrs McArthur told the parliament that the decision is wrong.
“In one stroke it removes all public right of access and then hands it back in a very piecemeal, limited way in certain areas. It is extraordinary,” Mrs McArthur said.
“It does not protect individual sensitive environments, or sites of cultural or ecological significance.
“Instead, it is a blanket ban on our access to the park except where Parks Victoria majestically and oh so graciously, grants us entry.
“Have we gone from the understanding that National Parks should be “reserved permanently” and “made available for the public benefit” to this?
“National Parks are parks for people no more.”
Mrs McArthur’s comments come as Victoria this year celebrates the 125th anniversary of the first National Park in the state, at Wilson’s Promontory in 1898.
The preamble to the National Parks Act 1975 defines the many reasons why the parks are important.
It describes that “…certain areas of Crown land…of particular interest and suitability…for the enjoyment, recreation and education of the public…should be reserved permanently and made available for the benefit of the public…”.
A section of the Act, Section 4, specifically outlines that the use of the parks should be “…by the public for the purposes of enjoyment, recreation or education”. It describes that the use should be encouraged, but also controlled.
Mrs McArthur said the National Parks of today do not resemble their original intent.
“Sadly, by degrees, and apparently without any public debate or even awareness, today’s position is very different. Victoria’s National Parks apparently aim to exclude the public, not to encourage them.
“Last year’s Set Aside Determination for the Grampians stands in contrast to the 1975 Act.
“The minister should review it immediately.
“The regulations were only supposed to allow for an area of the park to be ‘set aside’. What this Government has done is set the whole park aside.
“This was not the intent of the legislation.
“In first revoking access to the entire park, then permitting limited activities in certain areas, surely the decision undermines the principle of our national parks.
“National Parks are for the people. The public’s enjoyment of them ensures their protection as special places.
“Let public access protect them, not unruly authoritarian legislation.
“The effect of these legislative changes may not be immediately obvious to the public – but they contribute to the insidious creep of politics into our parks and the residual and deft decline of the rights and intent provided by the 1975 Act.”
