News | 27th Jun, 2010

Green groups up in arms at duck shooting deal

Sunday, 27 June 2010
Melissa Fyfe, The Age

The Brumby Government has struck a ''sneaky'' deal with shooters to allow duck hunting along hundreds of kilometres of the state's newly created Murray River Park, a development that has infuriated the environment movement.

Green groups say they will withdraw their praise for the new system of river red gum national and regional parks across northern Victoria – the government's biggest environmental achievement this term – because they feel betrayed by the last-minute concession to shooters.

In the next few weeks, the Victorian National Parks Association will join anti-duck-hunting groups to letterbox key Labor seats on the issue. Friends of the Earth, the Wilderness Society and Environment Victoria have also condemned the decision.

The deal was discovered through letters released to the green groups under freedom-of-information laws.

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