Perth / Western Australia

Opinion Piece: Trevor Whittington is the WA Farmers chief executive officer and a former staffer to former Fisheries minister Norman Moore

Under the Minister’s new regime, that three million kilograms is being carved up in a way that defies logic: around two million kg for the 10,000 “hunter-killer” high-intensity rec fishers and the remaining one million kg shared between 700,000 beach, dinghy and occasional fishers – plus the two million non-fishers who also own the resource

The rational options were obvious: (1) shut the West Coast demersal fishery for 10 years – for everyone – keeping all licences intact and rebooting only once stocks recovered, or (2) cut the total allowable catch proportionally across all sectors, even if that meant reducing today’s catch by a third.

Instead, the Minister chose the worst possible outcome: remove the commercial sector permanently and gift their share to the recreational side – a small minority of whom vastly out-fish the 700,000 ordinary, low-impact occasional fishers they claim to represent