Tuesday, Oct 02, 2012 at 23:23
I doubt very much that we will ever have a national fishing licence or one national set of fishing rules.
We can have national drivers licencing equavalency because we have a standardised vehicle clasification system and a national licence clasification system with a more or less standardised set of competencies that licences are tested to...even that is reasonably recent....
well less than ten years..ok maybe 15.
Even the very same fish, will grow to different sizes in different parts of the counrty and mature at different sizes and ages.
Different environments will support different amounts of fish and there are different management stratergies in different
places
Not only would a national set of fishing rules be nearly impossible it would not be good for anybody including the fish.
Then every state has a different way of funding fishereis managment, in QLD we dont have a general fishing licence, but there is a fee alocated as part of every boat regestration to fund recreational fishing management...from memory about $15.
We have a stocked impoundment scheme, that covers most but not all dams, the stocked impoundment permit (after the government takes its cut for managment) directly funds stocking activities on the dams covered by the scheme.
Differently in NSW they have a licence.
spare a thaught for those who live down the tweed......the border runs up the middle of the river.....in QLD you can use a cast net in salt water, in NSW possesion of a cast net is an offence...in NSW you can use bait traps in salt water in QLD you can not...in QLD we have one size and bag limit for snapper in NSW they have a different rule....two different rules for crab pots...in QLD we cant keep female crabs, in NSW you can.......all in the same river.......and it goes on.
The tweed river is a silly enough place...realy (Camelot Camelot..its only a model), BUT if you get in a boat and head out of the
Southport Seaway.....
well inside QLD nearly 30 km inside QLD......if you head due East...it wont be long ( aboit 20 KM) before you are in NSW. The NSW/QLD border heads North East at about a 45 deg angle from the mouth of the tweed........so you can be directly off the coast of QLD and legally catch a fish under NSW regs, but on the way back to port it becomes illegal....ARRRGHH
The fisheries rules in the Northern teritory are some of the most generous and enlightened in the counrty....AND NT and QLD governments have agreed and QLD regs have been made to fall in line with NT on the wester side of the cape in many ways.
Pitty NSW and QLD can't come to some agreement.
If ya think the NT boys have it good....and they do......they have their problems too......you don't need a boat licence and you don't have to register small boats in NT.......grrreatt...untill you want to use your boat in QLD.......you cant register your boat in NT, because they just don't, but it needs to be registered somewhere if you want to use it in QLD....because you aren't a resident of QLD you cant register your boat there either..so ya buggered.
At least we have one standard driving licence system and after many years of fooishness we have on single set of rules for towing trailers.
With some luck ( bad luck if you are in NSW and you like modified vehicles, good luck for the rest of us) we will have one standard set of rules for vehicle modifications..when they can all agree and NSW stop bleep arround.
There is a definite federal agenda to standardise things nationally....everything.....and they are getting arround to stuff....They are realy giving transport a red hot go at the moment, they fixed the trailers, they fixed the licence system, they have uniform traffic signage, more or less one set of traffic rules, they have just done load restraint, at the moment thay are arguing about fatigue managment......but don't hold ya breath about fishing.
They don't even have their story straight about boat licences yet..surely it cant be all that hard.
cheers
AnswerID:
496077