I see PJ make comments such as this frequently:


pjb05 wrote on Jul 20^th, 2009 at 8:30am:

We are already using input reductions which are far more equitable and cost effective than marine parks.

To me it seems little more than meaningless gibberish. Perhaps PJ can explain what it actually means.

How much do marine parks and other fishing method actually cost? A well designed marine park, such as the ones I have suggested, would be cheaper to enforce as their design pretty much ensures that fishermen and the general public will do more than enough of the patrolling. Once they are established there is a very low ongoing cost. There is no administration necessary. It drastically reduces the need to monitor stock levels and catch rates, because the effectiveness of marine parks as fisheries management tools does not hinge on close monitoring like with conventional tools.

To me, marine parks are also the fairer option. The equity argument seems little more than personal opinion of preference dressed up as something else, though I'm not sure what. The constant references to equity remind me of a child insisting that something isn't fair just because they don't like it, only in more nebulous terms.

[]I see PJ make comments such as this frequently:


pjb05 wrote on Jul 20^th, 2009 at 8:30am:

We are already using input reductions which are far more equitable and cost effective than marine parks.

To me it seems little more than meaningless gibberish. Perhaps PJ can explain what it actually means.

I have explained it - your mind is like a sieve! Once again we have input reductions such as gear limits, trip limits, closed seasons, limits on the no of commercial licences, bag and size limits and less proscriptive forms of area management such as area bans on trawling.  

How much do marine parks and other fishing method actually cost? A well designed marine park, such as the ones I have suggested, would be cheaper to enforce as their design pretty much ensures that fishermen and the general public will do more than enough of the patrolling. Once they are established there is a very low ongoing cost. There is no administration necessary.

Actually non-compliance is rife unless there is heavy enforcement. Once again real world experience is at odds with your armchair theorising. Our marine parks have expensive boats, rangers, managers and multi-million dollar budgets. Actually a lot of the push for marine parks comes from bureaucratic empire building and rent seeking. And this doesn't even go into the cost of the loss of access to a resource.  


It drastically reduces the need to monitor stock levels and catch rates, because the effectiveness of marine parks as fisheries management tools does not hinge on close monitoring like with conventional tools.

I think their effectiveness has been debunked in other threads. You have vacated the field on those arguments so I don't see how you can now blandly claim their effectiveness.

To me, marine parks are also the fairer option. The equity argument seems little more than personal opinion of preference dressed up as something else, though I'm not sure what. The constant references to equity remind me of a child insisting that something isn't fair just because they don't like it, only in more nebulous terms.

Other other input reductions I mentioned apply to everone equally, or are proportal to the potential impact of the activity. Your green zones are not proportional. All fishing is banned - from catch and release lure fishing to ocean going trawlers! Also some coastal communities get lumbered with a marine park and others can fish where they please - what is equitable about that?

Also FD, I won't go over ground I have already covered too much, but your notion of marine parks simplifying fisheries management are fallacious. Other controls will still be needed in areas still open to fishing if negative consequences are to be avoided. Indeed controls will have to be stepped up to avoid the problems of imcreased fishing pressure due to displaced effort.  

I get the feeling FD is posting bits of trivia in order to bump threads like this off the front page!

So when you say they are more cost effective, you don't actually know what any of the costs are?


Quote:

Actually non-compliance is rife unless there is heavy enforcement.

I have seen plenty of people take undersize fish etc. I have not seen anyone fishing in a marine park. It would become even less likely if there were residents, tourists, fishermen etc along the shore. Also, you wouldn't get such big increases in stocks inside marine parks if non compliance was as common as you suggest.

So when you say they are more cost effective, you don't actually know what any of the costs are?

So do you deny that rangers, managers and flash boats don't cost a lot of money? And thats without going in to fallout of the closures themselves.


Quote:

Actually non-compliance is rife unless there is heavy enforcement.

I have seen plenty of people take undersize fish etc. I have not seen anyone fishing in a marine park. It would become even less likely if there were residents, tourists, fishermen etc along the shore. Also, you wouldn't get such big increases in stocks inside marine parks if non compliance was as common as you suggest.

The real picture is somewhat wider than your limited personal experience. I also recall you saying that size limits are actually very popular with anglers but your point was that this was a misguided belief.

PS where are the big increases in stocks inside Australian marine parks?

Also if the parks are so popular why is so much effort and expense put into enforcement and why are the penalties so heavy?

You keep talking about effort and expense as if you know how much the costs involved in each option are. Do you? So far it looks like you are just making it all up as you go along.

Fishing in Marine Parks is rife, it is where I live anyway. I live on the Ningaloo Reef. Although most locals despise it, I have heard stories of people doing it because, okay we are lucky we can go out for, say 4 or 5 hours, have a few beers with a couple of mates, catch a few top rated table fish and go home. We don't need to worry about running out because we can go all year round. The problem comes when tourist come in during the middle cooler months go out and absolutely slay it, taking home 40 kilo's of fillets.
They will resort to sneaking into the Marine parks if they are getting to the end of their trip and still only have 1 esky full of fillets.
There has been many pub fights over this and also boat ramp brawls.
They sneak into Marine parks and spear a few Coral Trout a couple of Bluebone and then piss off again.
Do they work as a fisheries management tool???? The problem with supporting Marine Parks is that if D.E.C had their way the whole Freaken accessible ocean that has reef would be one, they would leave us with all the sandy areas to fish the imaginary "spillover effect".

freediver wrote on Sep 6^th, 2009 at 4:51pm:

You keep talking about effort and expense as if you know how much the costs involved in each option are. Do you? So far it looks like you are just making it all up as you go along.

Really is that the best you can come up with after a week? It's just more projection on your part. You made the ignorant statement that you won't need much management or patrolling of of marine parks when they are in fact a mini industry (taxpayer funded). All the NSW parks have offices, rangers, boats and managers. I'll look the budget of the GBRMPA, but I recall it is in the muli million dollar range and not money well spent (compensation for shore based businesses has run to nearly 300m dollars). You have said existing fisheries management methods will still be needed, so there is no saving there. Many marine park proponents say that these need to be stepped up so there is no displacement of fishing effort.

PROTEST SUBMISSION INTO GBRMPA’S AMENDMENT BILL FOR
THE GREAT BARRIER REEF
The Secretary,
I wish to make a formal written submission to the inquiry into the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2008, with GBRMPA’s proposals.
I am 62 years of age and I have been an avid fisherman since I was  Through my career I have been a commercial representative in the main followed by commercial fishing with my own vessel and working on prawn trawlers. I also spent a number of years merchandising seafood. I have lived at Forrest Beach outside of Ingham for the
last 27 years. I no longer have any financial interest in the fishing industry what so ever and presently I am a support worker with the handicapped.
However the experience I gained whilst working on the Great Barrier Reef gave me an insight into knowing that when the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority (GBRMPA) introduced their Representative Areas Program (RAP) it was a SHAM!!
Consequently I have been relentless in fighting against this legislation and making government aware. The RAP addresses no real threat to the environment. At the time it was introduced the government realized the world was in the grip of an environmental surge, not unlike a new religion. Although government might have
believed the GBRMPA’s environmental charade and their claim they were going to save the reef the most important thing politically was that it was good for votes.
There were many seasoned reef users who all in good faith, contributed with constructive input by putting in submissions, only to see them ignored. The submission process was a SHAM!! It was only conducted to make the public feel they contributed. The decision to go ahead with the RAP was decided irrespective.
Consequently it was steamrolled through legislation. Australians, especially north Queenslanders hate to be CONNED. Knowing their countless letters of concern were being ignored, they looked to the Fishing Party for support and fight the unjust legislation on the political front.
The surge of support flushed out a number of scientists who approached the Fishing Party stand at a Townsville boat show and voiced their disapproval of what the
GBRMPA were claiming. However they were not prepared to go public, in fear of loosing their jobs. Along came Dr Walter Starck PhD. A marine scientist with 50 years experience with coral reefs world wide, including 10 years doing research on
the GBR with his own exploring vessel. With Dr Starcks wealth of knowledge he was able to see through the GBRMPA’s environmental charade and being a freelancer, he was not frightened to voice his opinion. Dr Starck soon became a thorn in GBRMPA’s side and their only defence was to ridicule and defame him.

They would make statements like—‘he is only one scientist and we have many scientists who will disagree with him.’ (When your job depends on it then I guess you would disagree).

Precautionary Principle
No one will forget the bare faced lies the GBRMPA conned us with. How they led us to believe during the second submission process, that if we showed them our most important fishing areas and safe anchorages they would give them a wide birth in their
final draft plan. Then they betrayed us. They used this information we gave them, all in good faith, as a basis for their green no go zones. Let’s face it, how else could a body of academics with no knowledge of the fishing industry or fishing in general know where to put fishing no go zones without this information?
Bill Izard is a trawler operator in Cairns specialising in catching brood stock for aquaculture. He received the full brunt of the GBRMPA’s deceit. Bill is the last small trawler operating in the Cairns local area. At the conclusion of the GBRMPA’s first draft plan for the RAP. GBRMPA personal approached Bill and told him if he
would show them the area he worked they would make sure he would retain 100% of the area. Bill sat down with the personal and drew the areas on a map and you guessed it!!, when the GBRMPA released their final plan, 92% of the area Bill worked was made green. You can speak to any fishermen that fish the Great Barrier Reef, commercial and amateur alike and you will get a similar story.
We are all aware that the RAP was legislated without one shred of scientific evidence, it was all based on the precautionary principal. Locking everything up and calling it sustainable is irresponsible. The precautionary principal is something these authorities revert back to when they are challenged and forced into a corner without
an answer. No science is involved.
Dr Starck has not been alone with his criticism Professor Robert Kearney Bsc (Hons),PhD, DSc—Professor in fisheries management—Institute of Applied Ecology—University of Canberra Australia. (They deal with Ecological Solutions for a Healthy Environment.) Professor Kearney has released a 17 page damming paper condemning the falsehoods and poor science involved in establishing Australia’s Marine Protected Areas. (MPA’s) http://aerg.canberra.edu.au/php/showstaff.php?usercode=kearney)
Professor Kearney infers that the placing of the (MPA’s) lacks scientific credibility.He advocates that some may be doing more harm than good, and said they may even be creating the very problem they are supposed to be preventing. He uses similar terminology in describing MPA’s in NSW, as Professor Starck used when he condemned the GBRMPA’s-- RAP on the GBR. Both of these senior scientists have
been highly critical of the poor science used to support MPA’s. Dr Starck has said he has many colleagues who shared his views, but are unwilling to go public in fear of losing their funding even their jobs. Perhaps, now that such a high profile figure as
Professor Kearney has spoken out, other scientists will begin to voice their dissent and stem the flow of taxpayers money being wasted on unwarranted MPA’s.
Australia’s MPA’s now comprise of 1/3 of the global total and with the planned additions this is set to soon become close to half of the world’s MPA’s.—Not a single marine species has been lost in Australia and no reduction in marine biodiversity has ever been found or even suspected. MPA mania has become detached from both

day and age against environmental matters, they receive personal denigration and social disapproval. A person of Professor Kearney’s statue would not come out and say these things without being convinced they are valid and important.
What he has to say deserves careful consideration. This precautionary principle should be deleted.

Definition of Fishing
Overfishing was the main claim by the GBRMPA for introducing the RAP on the GBR. De-Anne Kelly Federal member for Dawson called for an independent inquiry into GBRMPA’s RAP and cited fishing was the only thing the RAP was addressing.
Her request was ignored. This claim is totally absurd and only scaremongering. The Florida Keys with less than 1% of the reef area of the GBR, has for many years sustainably supported a larger catch than the entire GBR. The commercial sector has been restricted to a mere 3161 tons of product per year averaged over the 347,000 km square of reef and lagoon area which comes to just under 9Kg/kmsq/year. The average harvest over a broad range of reef areas elsewhere in the Pacific is 7700Kg/kmsq/year and even the conservation NGO World Resource Institute cites 4000Kg/kmsq/year as being a sustainable level for coral reef fisheries.Now the GBRMPA are not only refusing to acknowledge the facts on overfishing
which make their claims ridiculous, they propose to ban any activity in a green zone that remotely is associated with fishing, like operating an echo sounder, a safety navigation must when negotiating the reef and general activities such as viewing in glass bottom boats, snorkelling, viewing sea animals like whales etc and underwater
observatories. Overfishing is unfounded and stopping the public from carrying out every day leisure activities is not justified and making these illegal is unwarranted and wrong.

3 strikes and you are OUT
The most frightening proposal is if a person is breached three times in ten years, this attracts a lifetime ban. This Authority is obsessed and completely out of control. This is absurd and must be omitted from the act.

Powers to inspect
From my interpretation this means the authority is given the powers to search, even frisk fishers. It would be outrageous and irresponsible to give them further powers to impose such laws on Australian citizens for frivolous instances. This also must be omitted from the act.

Legal Defence
The GBRMPA are proposing to reword the act to cove up loop holes where they have lost cases in the past and take away basic legal rights of ones defence. This is not right and must not be allowed.

The Goals
They have disregarded sharing the zoning with wide use activities other than fishing just the same as they have evicted the fishing industry (which has been decimated as a result), a pearl industry, giant clam research for aquaculture to name a few.

Queensland, more so the Australian economy can ill afford to loose such industries. I ask you to omit these clauses.

Criminal Convictions
The GBRMPA (Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority) and AFMA-(Australian Fish Management Authority) believe they are a law unto themselves. Criminal convictions for fishing in a green zone is absurd; yet over 300 Australians have received such convictions which restricts them from obtaining a passport, a bank loan and many
areas of employment. Most never caught anything. Their only “crime” was to cross an imaginary unmarked boundary in the sea while fishing.
Commonsense has prevailed and the legislation has since been changed and now only attracts an on the spot fine. It is no longer a criminal conviction for this offence that is equivalent to a parking fine. However 300 plus Australians still have these criminal
convictions and the Labor Party have gone against their pre-election promise to waver them. Investigation into the people who made these laws initially is a must. There is simply no comparison or balance in relation with the penalty for such a minor crime that warrants a criminal conviction. This has to be addressed as it is not acceptable.
This country is vastly over governed and overregulated. Fifteen years ago, a caravan park in Cairns required only six permits to operate. Today it must have over 100. Finally a few politicians have spoken out in our support. Senator Ron Boswell and MP Warren Entsch have delivered very factual scathing speech’s in parliament
condemning the GBRMPA. I must confess I never thought such an attack would ever happen. It is a shame these politicians didn’t come forward sooner. However they were lied to and mislead also. Senator Boswell recalls GBRMPA personnel sitting in his office and they assured him that a minimum of reef users would be disadvantaged
with the RAP. Warren Entsch did approach the then federal environmental minister Senator Ian Kemp expressing his concern about how the livelihoods of local fishermen would be affected by the RAP. Kemp told Entsch you are making a fuss about nothing, he said the GBRMPA have allocated $ 2.4 million to compensate
them. Compensation payments to date are well over $200 million and there is every real chance they will exceed $ 300 million.The GBRMPA are constantly sending flawed surveys, scaremongering stories to the government and media to justifying their existence. Presently just running this organization is to the tune of approximately $40 million dollars a year. Government should be looking at ways to clip the Authorities wings instead of allowing them to shore up their ivory tower. What GBRMPA is proposing is WRONG—WRONG—
WRONG and must not be allowed.

Yours faithfully
Glenn Winsen

This graph should dispel FD's myths and exaggerations regarding overfishing/ lack of primary proctivity of Australain waters:

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