Cruel, Un-australian Sport Makes Bligh's Queensland Icon Voting List

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8th March 2009, 03:56pm - Views: 725





Media Release


08/03/09


CRUEL, UN-AUSTRALIAN SPORT MAKES BLIGH’S QUEENSLAND ICON

VOTING LIST


Anna Bligh wants voters to consider choosing rodeos as an iconic Queensland event

for the 150th anniversary celebration of Queensland’s statehood. A rodeo cannot

provide good welfare for the animals involved and frequently puts participants in

hospital with serious injuries. This is hardly an event that warrants iconic status or

taxpayer funding.


In 2008 Anna Bligh commissioned a report estimated to cost the taxpayer $50,000

plus into whether the Mt Isa Rodeo was worthy of considerable further taxpayer

funding to promote it as a major rural, tourist event.


10 years of monitoring rodeos in Australia by the nation’s peak animal advocacy

organisation, Animals Australia, of which Animal Liberation Qld is a member group,

has demonstrated repeatedly how abusive they are to animals, (there is not even a

veterinarian present), how dangerous they are for participants and how frequently the

industry’s own Code of Practice is violated. 


In early 2008 Today Tonight exposed the cruelty involved in the wild horse race

event, deemed an undesirable event even by the Australian Professional Rodeo

Association (APRA) itself.


Correspondence with Anna Bligh’s office and the Queensland Events Corporation on

our concerns about rodeos have yet to produce the courtesy of a reply.


The Queensland government is currently drafting new Standards & Guidelines

(Standards are legally enforceable requirements) for rodeos held in this State.


The only Australian attribute of the Mt Isa & Warwick rodeos is their location.

Rodeos are not representative of traditional Australian stockmanship skills and are a

highly Americanised form of entertainment. Steer wrestling and calf roping were

introduced into Australia from the USA “Cowboys of the West” tradition in the 1930s

and 1950s respectively.


Animal Liberation Qld calls on Anna Bligh to make public the consultant’s report on

Mt Isa rodeo, to drop rodeos from the short list of iconic events and to ensure her

government cleans up this industry in the new legislation currently being drafted.


DVD footage of the 2008 Mt Isa rodeo showing roping events, horse activity, a

(sanitised) wild horse race and competitor injuries is available upon request from

Cynthia Burnett  0412 100 539/3379 2461.


Further information: 

1) Wendy Parsons, Rodeo spokesperson Animals Australia 0418 831 361 or (08)

8272 4004

2) Cynthia Burnett, media spokesperson Animal Liberation Qld 0412 100 539








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