The Biodiversity Council welcomes the opportunity to provide feedback to the Standing Committee on State Development’s inquiry into the Game and Feral Animal Legislation Amendment (Conservation Hunting) Bill 2025.

Overall, the Biodiversity Council does not support the bill as the assumptions upon which it is based are not supported by the best available evidence. If enacted, the proposed amendments to the Game and Feral Animal Control Act 2002 risk substantial harm to environmental, social, cultural and economic values, including public safety and amenity.

The Bill amends the Game and Feral Animal Control Act 2002 to:

• abolish the Game and Pest Management Advisory Board and replace it with the Conservation Hunting Authority,

• recognise and make provision for a right to hunt,

• abolish restricted game hunting licences and replace those licences with conservation hunting licences, and

• provide that national park estate land must not be declared as land on which hunting is permitted.

The rationale for the amendments assumes that recreational hunting plays an important role in controlling invasive species and that bounty schemes are a proven and effective tool to incentivise the community to control pest species. These assumptions are not supported by best available evidence.

This submission responds to these assumptions in the form of overarching comments, namely:

• Recreational hunters do not play an important role in controlling invasive species such as feral pigs, European rabbits, red foxes and feral deer species in New South Wales.

• Bounty schemes are not a proven and effective tool to incentivise the community to control pest species.

And outlines concerns with specific sections of the Bill, namely:

• legislating the ‘right to hunt’.

• creating a Conservation Hunting Authority to replace the existing Game and Pest Management Advisory Board.

• requiring public land managers to consider any impacts on recreational shooting before making land management decisions.

Download the full submission for more details.