Lisa Singh (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Shadow Attorney General) Share this | Hansard source

Labor does not support this disallowance motion. Every year foreign hunters export the carcasses of 665 wild lions from Africa—an average of nearly two lions every day. In Zimbabwe, the country where Cecil the lion was killed just last month, hunters exported 49 lion trophies in 2013 alone. Since Cecil's death in early July it is likely that at least a dozen other lions have been shot by trophy hunters. Banning the import and export of lion specimens—implemented following robust public consultation—is an important step towards greater protection of the African lion, and is welcomed by Labor.

A century ago there were some 200,000 African lions prowling the savanna. Now, according to the last complete assessment in 2012, there are as few as 32,000 left—that is 200,000 down to 32,000—living on less than 20 per cent of the land that they used to roam on. They are considered vulnerable by the IUCN Red List, and last October the US Fish and Wildlife Service proposed to list the species as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. Labor believes it is effectively impossible to justify the continued hunting of a species that has declined by more than 80 per cent in the past 50 years by invoking benefits to local communities and by mentioning that areas leased to hunters increase the scope of habitat available to wildlife beyond that available in protected areas. Therefore, Labor cannot support this disallowance of the ban of importing lion specimens or lion hunting trophies. Research has also shown us time and again that trophy hunting of African lions is a threat to the survival of lions in the wild. On top of that, it simply does not flow that there are any social or economic benefits to local communities from trophy hunting.

I am aware of awful reports that travelling Australian wildlife volunteers have unwittingly worked in African shelters to help hand-raise lions and other animals that were later used for canned hunting, where relatively tame animals are lured before waiting hunters with meat and are then shot with rifles or crossbows.

Personally, I find the act of hunting for pleasure or trophies unconscionable and I find it is sad that many trophy hunters resort to the default argument that killing animals is good for conservation. Countries that are active in the trophy-hunting trade have seen the biggest decreases in lion populations, putting genuine conservation efforts at risk. Recent studies have shown that in areas in which trophy hunting has been permitted by government authorities, lion populations have severely declined even in the absence of other threats.

Research also found that the social and economic benefits of trophy hunting do not flow to local communities. Research published by the pro-hunting International Council for Game and Wildlife Conservation and the UN Food and Agriculture Organization found that hunting companies contribute only three per cent of their revenue to communities living in hunting areas. And according to a 2013 report by the International Fund for Animal Welfare, trophy hunting accounts for 0.27 per cent or less of the GDP of each African country in which it is conducted.

Labor supports the appropriate use of powers under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act to further the protection of threatened or endangered species around the world and therefore does not support this disallowance motion.