Live trade ban lifted

[Scotty72]

Joe Ludwig has just announced the resumption of trade.

Let's hope the act has been cleaned up.

Scotty

[Tannin]

Covered up, more likely. But we can hope.

[Scotty72]

I suppose, until we find out otherwise, we should accept that something has been done.

It would be a very dumb industry / govt to go through this again.

[Tannin]

They won't, Scotty. Not soon anyway. They will just make damn sure that no cameras are allowed anywhere where they might see abuses going on, and invite journalists to "inspect" some processing at carefully selected facilities where everything can be stage managed.

To begin with, I reckon they will be reasonably straight. The hard part comes in a few months time when they think the coast is clear and no-one is looking anymore. That's when we need the animal welfare organisations to do their very best to expose what is really going on. Remember, this gutless government has watered down the definition of "humane slaughter" to the point where it wouldn't come anywhere near passing Australian standards (which aren't all that good anyway), so any deviation from the very weak and cruel minimum standards they have signed of on will be cause for genuine outrage.

We shall have to wait and see .....

[Scotty72]

i hope you're wrong

Not confident... But hopeful

[ving]

Yup, just have to wait n see... :/

Sent from my TR718D

[Art Vandelay]

I wonder if all those outraged will now address some closer to home animal cruelty issues.......... or was all that just a convenient media fuelled bandwagon for everyone to jump onboard ?

[Tannin]

Australian animal welfare standards have a few problems, it is true Art, but here in Australia you can't treat an animal anywhere near as badly as you can under these new live export rules. The Australian standard is much, much tougher - so unless there is a large scale flouting of the law going on here, the overseas treatment will still be much, much worse.

This happened because the backbenchers who originally forced the government to act on this scandal were rolled in Caucus, and watered-down non-Australian standards were applied to the live export trade. In other words, it is most unlikely that a home-based issue will overshadow the export issue, as the allowable cruelty is much less.

[Scotty72]

I wonder if all those outraged will now address some closer to home animal cruelty issues.......... or was all that just a convenient media fuelled bandwagon for everyone to jump onboard ?

Probably to the same degree that the other side stops whining that taking a stance against animal cruelty will cause the sky is to fall down and end of the world.

I'm starting to think Tannin has a point

[Tannin]

But the sky did fall down! You should have been in Ballarat today - that much of the sky fell down that I thought the place was going to float away!

[Bennymiata]

It's only on a limited scale however, and there will still be many tens of thousands of these poor animals in confined spaces, eating little, and waiting to be shipped out.

[Tannin]

It's only on a limited scale however, and there will still be many tens of thousands of these poor animals in confined spaces, eating little, and waiting to be shipped out.

So this is better than being in a confined space, tied up and terrified, and having your throat cut slowly and struggling for life for a long time until you bleed to death? Or worse than being in a confined space, tied up and terrified, and having your throat cut slowly and struggling for life for a long time until you bleed to death? I'm battling to work out what your point is here.

[Scotty72]

There was an interesting price on Newsradio yesterday which exploded the myths circling the reasons for not sending them boxed meat - often about lack of refrigeration in Indonesia.

The suggestion was that those in Indonesia who can afford Australian beef in the first case are the ones who can easily afford refrigeration. That at current levels, Indonesians on average, eat much less than 1.5kgs (about 5 servings) of Aussie beef per year. Of course, in reality, the average Indonesian couldn't afford to spend a few days wages on 1 meal - so, it is the Indonesian upper classes who eat the stuff - and having known a bunch of these people at Uni - trust me - they have a fridge (and so do the shops they buy from).

I know, this is one side of the story (ABC commie bias etc - except when they are the mouthpiece of the Murdoch, right wing press) but, at least they relied on evidence instead of broad, sweeping, emotional statements.


Scotty

[Bennymiata]

So this is better than being in a confined space, tied up and terrified, and having your throat cut slowly and struggling for life for a long time until you bleed to death? Or worse than being in a confined space, tied up and terrified, and having your throat cut slowly and struggling for life for a long time until you bleed to death? I'm battling to work out what your point is here.

I guess that my point is that if they stay here, they are still living in poor conditions for a much longer time than they should, and if it's better to wait under these conditions rather than going to be slaughtered.

There is a big cultural difference between the Indonesians and us as far as animal welfare is concerned.
To them, animals are just there to be used and abused, with no regard for their welfare (as it is written in the Quaran), whereas here, we do worry about the feelings, both physical and emotional, of the animals.
When you ship something to another country, you have to be aware of their cultural differences and how your products will be viewed and looked after over there.
It's no good complaining about what they do with your product sometime after you've been shipping them out to them for some years.

[Scotty72]

When you ship something to another country, you have to be aware of their cultural differences and how your products will be viewed and looked after over there.
It's no good complaining about what they do with your product sometime after you've been shipping them out to them for some years.

I guess that is one of the arguments for suggesting we end the live trade.

Should we let $$$ buy off our humaneness: and if so, in which other areas are we willing to sell our conscience?

Clearly, at least some in, the industry think we should.

Scotty

[Lance B]

So what has changed in Indonesia that has made the government have a backflip and lift the ban?

[Tannin]

According to the government, Lance, they have been working very hard for the last month, together with the cattle industry and the Indonesian authorities to be able to guarantee certain (very, very weak) minimum standards, and they are now able to do this for some processing facilities, so - as was always the plan - trade can be safely resumed now that the problems are fixed. There has been no backflip.

According to the Government's political opponents, they have finally caved in to the redneck lobby and backflipped, the same as they always do whenever the redneck lobby puts the pressure on - viz, the mining tax, the emissions trading scheme, and now the animal torture scandal.

Select whichever answer you prefer. I think that there is some truth in both sides of the debate.

[Lance B]

According to the government, Lance, they have been working very hard for the last month, together with the cattle industry and the Indonesian authorities to be able to guarantee certain (very, very weak) minimum standards, and they are now able to do this for some processing facilities, so - as was always the plan - trade can be safely resumed now that the problems are fixed. There has been no backflip.

According to the Government's political opponents, they have finally caved in to the redneck lobby and backflipped, the same as they always do whenever the redneck lobby puts the pressure on - viz, the mining tax, the emissions trading scheme, and now the animal torture scandal.

Redneck lobby? Hmm. I don't see where the so-called redneck lobby have changed the emissions trading scheme/carbon tax. Mining tax? That was not a red neck lobby, but the mining companies themselves.

Anyway, it seems to me that nothing has altered in Indonesia at all. I wonder where Indonesia was/will get it's live cattle from if not Australia and if they get it from eslewhere, which I am sure they will and do, whether any other country is as concerned about the catlle's welfare as we are. If they don't care and they are happy to let Indonesia do what they like to the cattle, then we have the probability of decimating the Australian cattle industry and yet the practice still goes on just that the cattle comes from another country.[/QUOTE]

[Scotty72]

Redneck lobby? Hmm. I don't see where the so-called redneck lobby have changed the emissions trading scheme/carbon tax. Mining tax? That was not a red neck lobby, but the mining companies themselves.

Anyway, it seems to me that nothing has altered in Indonesia at all. I wonder where Indonesia was/will get it's live cattle from if not Australia and if they get it from eslewhere, which I am sure they will and do, whether any other country is as concerned about the catlle's welfare as we are. If they don't care and they are happy to let Indonesia do what they like to the cattle, then we have the probability of decimating the Australian cattle industry and yet the practice still goes on just that the cattle comes from another country.

[/QUOTE]

A good gauge of the redneck opinion is... whatever happens to be spewing forth from Alan Jones' mouth.

I know he is rabidly anti-mining tax (massively watered down)
I know he is rabidly anti carbon tax (massively watered down to the point of being completely pointless)
I have no idea what his stance of the live cattle trade is (it would be what ever Abbot thinks = because he tells Abbot what to think).

According to your logic (other countries don't care: so why should we), if other countries find a way of making money by drowning kittens in boiling oil: then should we follow suit?

[ving]

alan jones seems to me to just oppose anything the govt is for... never been a fan of the guy