A triumph for commonsense

After the last (Nov) AWF&G council meeting, a Councillor stalked off muttering because no one (not staff, not council, not the hunters) supported the premature closing of the AWF&G owned blocks, per last year's abbreviated block season. As such, it was not particularly surprising that he looked to have rallied some of the 'not newly elected' AWF&G councillors to support a motion for a special meeting to discuss the goose season length, and to overturn the council's decision to leave the blocks open for the duration of the waterfowl season.

There are some pretty important principles at stake here; those blocks were purchased with YOUR money, and MY money. As license holders, we are effectively the landlords of these blocks. Our license fees are actively spent in the blocks, yet we were being asked to deny the licenseholder the opportunity to benefit from the use of the facilities they own. This IS NOT what F&G is about. An additional detail was that in the previous council meeting, Councillor Carey asked the council to consider zoning the region into management areas, a remit that was roundly dismissed as "being unmanageable". So there we were, being asked to consider denying license holders their right of access to their own land asset; and by doing so set in place a separate management zone.

The meeting, which was not particularly well advertised, was surprisingly well attended. And the attendees, rather than relying on a proxy who was perhaps not representing their wishes faithfully, had their say. And the things they had to say were enlightening. They wanted their blocks open. They wanted a say in voting about issues affecting their blocks rather than having minority will imposed on them; they felt sideswiped by last year's block closures and they certainly had no inkling of it before the regulations were passed last year.

I think that last night the AWF&G council made a quantum leap - the paid staff's advice was adhered to (almost faithfully). The fact that we spend far too much time endlessly debating regulations WHICH HAVE ABSOLUTELY NO IMPACT ON GAMEBIRD POPULATIONS and then do the same next year, and the year after ad nauseum... the fact that this cacophony stops us from discussing and supporting real research... well as Guy pointed out quite rightly we just need to put this behind us forever and do some REAL work. And I think that shifting the powerbase in the council back onto a proper management course was a vital step-change in this particular council. The effect of the license-holders input and feedback was dramatic; from a position of what looked to be a split small majority of the council voting in favour of closing the blocks, the decision to keep them open was a landslide.

The license-holders saw that they do have a voice, and hopefully from this point onwards they will use that voice.

A triumph for commonsense and democracy and a massive vote of support for the paid staff.