Wednesday, 26 August 2026

 Ellen SANDELL (Melbourne) (19:16): (1805) Tonight I raise a matter for the new Minister for Environment. I ask the minister to urgently tackle the bird flu crisis by banning duck hunting, pausing the destruction of critical habitat in Victoria and reversing Victorian Labor’s cuts to our environmental workforce. Tragically, a fur seal has just been found dead in South Australia, the first recorded fatality of an Australian mammal from bird flu. Right now Victoria has over 100 confirmed cases of bird flu, and I think everyone would agree that is just devastating. It feels pretty terrifying watching this news, and you can feel powerless seeing these cases spread from Portland to Western Port Bay and all the way inland to Mildura. I am really terrified for what it means for our native wildlife – birds and mammals – across the country, and I know so many other people are as well. Tragically, there is no cure for the virus, but there are things that governments can do to help wildlife become more resilient and also to recover. I want to talk about these, because we need governments to act now, and there is no time for delay.

First, we need to finally ban duck hunting and quail hunting in Victoria. Duck hunting puts extra pressure on native bird populations right when they do not need it. Banning this cruelty is one of the easiest and most effective things we could do now to support native bird populations. The Labor government could do it right now. In fact Victoria was to put an end to duck hunting, but Labor then backed down after pressure from the hunting and shooting lobby. Those excuses just do not fly in a bird flu pandemic. We need strong and healthy bird populations, and that means banning duck hunting.

Secondly, we need a genuine, funded national response to bird flu. A $200 million emergency fund is what organisations are calling for as the absolute minimum required to ensure wildlife carers, conservation organisations and scientists have the resources they need to respond rapidly and effectively. State and federal governments need to work together and start funding nature protection, but that also means undoing Labor’s cuts to nature protection that we have seen in Victoria. Recently Labor cut hundreds of conservation and biodiversity staff. We have recently seen Zoos Victoria having to cut a hundred staff, right in the middle of a bird flu pandemic. Those cuts need to be reversed.

Finally, we need a moratorium on any projects that are destroying critical bird habitat. We know that healthy wetlands, breeding sites and landscapes are absolutely critical if populations are going to recover, so we need to pause any project that is costing these healthy habitats. We still have time to limit the damage from bird flu, but governments need to act fast. We need to ban duck hunting, pause Labor’s war on our environment and pause the destruction of critical habitat that is happening right here in Victoria.