Thread: Game Animal Council (GAC) to be scrapped by Conservation Minister?

My personal view is that Hunters should join NZDA. They can never be disposed of by Govt, and if you read their code of ethics on what they stand for you will see they line up with majority of our views.

https://www.deerstalkers.org.nz/code...uidelines.html

Although I have disagreed with several of the comments made by the previous Nat. president in the past, instead of continuing to complain I've actually got involved instead. First with Wellington Branch, then the NZDA Heritage Trust and now as Lower North Island delegate on the National executive. The NZDA do a huge amount of lobbying behind the scenes but have struggled to get that message out to their members and hunters, so most people believe they do very little, when that is not true. They are hoping to turn that around.

The old bumper sticker comes to mind "Over 200,000 Kiwis Hunt, Fish and Vote". If we could all come together under the one banner then we'd be taken a lot more seriously by Govt with those kind of numbers. The NRA in the US comes to mind- if they don't want something to happen, it usually doesn't.

Then I believe a hunting license would not be necessary. We already pay taxes and we already pay to go into ballots. Our collective voice and voting power at election time could sort-out getting our game animals off the "pest" list and more herds of special interests could be created. The FWF has shown the way with their excellent herd management.

A good example of the influence we could have, was the recent social media back-lash against the proposed Arms Act changes by Police. The Firearms community got in the ear of a lot of politicians and got those changes marginalized.

It will always be a constant battle, but if we put the squabbling/egos aside and came together then we would be a lot more effective.

One of the ideas I'm thinking of proposing is that the NZDA makes a special low-cost membership option (and then ran an effective marketing plan to promote it) so that our "voice" would go from the current approx 8000 members to far more. It would be good to hear your thoughts on this.

-Tim