2018/09: Should Australia continue live animal exports?
Introduction to the media issue
Video clip at right: On July 20, 2018, Perth News ran a report on a protest rally involving over 1,000 farmers seeking to preserve the live sheep export industry in Western Australian.What they said...
'They're not going to be happy until they've closed down the live sheep trade, the live cattle trade, the live goat trade, until people out west are poor again and then they'll go back to their inner suburban hives and say they've done a good job'
Former leader of the National Party, Barnaby Joyce
'It doesn't matter really whether the ships are destocked, whether they're better ventilated. It's like putting a dog in a car on a hot summer's day - that will lead inevitably to death'
Liberal MP and farmer Sussan Ley who has moved a private members bill to ban live sheep exports
The issue at a glance
On April 8, 2018, Channel Nine's 60 Minutes aired a program based on footage supplied by the activist group Animals Australia. The footage showed sheep in various stages of distress on a livestock carrier bound for the Middle East in August 2017.
The footage was accompanied by an Agriculture Department report on the ship's journey showing that 2,400 sheep out of a total load of 64,000 had died of heat stress, doubling the Government 'approved' death rate of two per cent, or 1,280 in a shipment of 64,000 animals.
Prior to the 60 Minutes telecast, the footage was presented by Animals Australia to the Federal Agriculture Minister, David Littleproud, who expressed his shock at the images of dead and dying animals. 'This cannot go on,' the Minister told an ABC reporter.
Mr Littleproud declared that he was not aware of the situation until the footage was given to him, despite the fact that the Agriculture Department report had been available a week earlier.
Both the live cattle and live sheep export industries have been mired in allegations of unavoidable cruelty for decades, with attempted reforms deemed inadequate by animal conservation groups and others.
In May, 2018, so-called 'rebel' Liberal backbenchers Sussan Ley, Sarah Henderson and Jason Wood moved to have live sheep exports banned in response to a further government attempt to reform the industry.
The Labor Opposition has pledged to phase out live sheep exports if elected to government.