VICTORIA’S peak farmer group is supportive of RSPCA Victoria’s pledge to cease its activist campaigns against Victorian laws, following a review into the welfare group’s internal operations.
The Victorian Farmers Federation is urging RSPCA Victoria to follow through on its promise to implement all the recommendations made in the review, which was released today, including that the group “discontinues its public activist campaigning against the existing laws of this State”.
“It was great to see that the review confirmed that the RSPCA’s role isn’t to campaign against all animal practices regardless of their legality,” VFF President David Jochinke said.
“It’s wise of the RSPCA to refocus its efforts on preventing animal cruelty instead of attacking people, who are following the law, on animal rights issues.”
The review lists 22 recommendations on improving governance of the organisation, and includes a mixture of administrative and wider reforms.
Mr Jochinke said that while the VFF had broad support for the review’s recommendations that the RSPCA, the farmer group had concerns over the recommendation that RSPCA should pursue the authority to issue infringement notices (Recommendation 18).
“The RSPCA is a membership organisation, not a government organisation, and non-government bodies should have significant government oversight over any power delegated to them; there should certainly be a government review of this recommendation” he said.
“But we support the group getting back to their original purpose – stopping those not taking care of their animals and subjecting them to cruelty.”
While RSPCA Victoria doesn’t deal with farm animals; under their renewed purpose, the VFF would be willing to work more closely with the Victorian-based group.
