Gun debate may go feral in NSW if premier bows to shooters

In the only election Gladys Berejiklian contested as premier, the Liberal leader lashed NSW Labor for doing a preference deal with the Shooters, Fishers and Farmers Party. So powerful did the Liberals believe that message to be, they rolled out party statesman John Howard on the campaign trail as well as in a series of video messages where he warned that the Shooters had only one goal.

The party, Howard insisted, wanted to water down the gun laws he introduced in the wake of the 1996 Port Arthur massacre, one of the darkest days in Australia’s modern history. Not only that, Berejiklian and Howard thundered, the Shooters wanted to put guns in the hands of 10-year-olds. (The party had abandoned that policy, but facts matter little in election campaigns.)

NSW Labor lost the 2019 election, although not on the issue of preferencing the Shooters. Then-leader Michael Daley’s racist gaffe, which emerged just before polling day and for which he apologised, ended the party’s hope of unseating Berejiklian. Nevertheless, Labor has a long history of working closely with the Shooters Party (which added Fishers and Farmers to its name in 2016), dating back to former premier Bob Carr, who set up the Game Council at the urging of founding Shooters MP John Tingle.

The party is now a shadow of its former self, with just two upper house MPs left from a high of five across the parliament (three have quit the Shooters since 2019 and now sit as independents). But it has not lost all power, and gun laws are back as a point of contention before the parliament. The Shooters have a list of demands, the most stunning being to enshrine the “right to hunt” in law.

To the horror of many, including environmental groups and gun control advocates, Labor has making positive noises about backing the new Shooters bill – albeit with amendments – which will expand access for the hunting of feral animals in state forests and Crown land as well as creating a new Conservation Hunting Council. It would take on some of the responsibilities of the Game Council, which was abolished after a scathing report into its operations in 2013.

The government maintains it has not made a final decision on how it will vote, and Premier Chris Minns has vowed he would not allow gun laws to be weakened. This week he met with Walter Mikac, who lobbied Howard for stronger gun laws after his wife Nanette and daughters Alannah and Madeline were among 35 people killed at Port Arthur.

Minns has also ruled out agreeing to parts of the legislation that could allow the use of silencers, night-vision goggles or ballistic vests. But the premier has also shown some personal support for the legislation.

“Is there a way of allowing them [hunters] to shoot a lot of these pests that cause significant damage to private land and public land? I’m open to looking at that,” Minns said recently, “but I don’t want a government-funded gun lobby.” Minns may not, but that did not stop his government setting aside $7.9 million in this year’s state budget for the new hunting council which does not yet exist and never will if the Shooters’ bill does not pass parliament.

The most divisive part of the bill is the push to enshrine in NSW law the right to hunt. Australia has never had a legal right to bear arms and enshrining a hunting “right” would deviate from a key principle underpinning the National Firearms Agreement. Shooters MP Robert Borsak does not agree.

“Hunting is not a hobby,” Borsak told ABC Sydney this week. “I have the right to be able to go out and get food for my family and myself.” Host Hamish McDonald was not convinced by his argument. Are there not supermarkets for that, McDonald asked. “How do you get game meat at the supermarket?” Borsak scoffed.

The Shooters and Labor have had a close relationship under the Minns regime. The Liberals snidely call the Shooters “Labor backbenchers” because of their history of siding with the government in the upper house. Some political observers have speculated that the timing of the Shooters’ bill, which conveniently attracted government support as well as funding for a theoretical hunting council, was tied to NSW Labor’s stalled workers compensation bill. A quid pro quo arrangement, if you will.

The more likely reason is that longer-term politics are at play. In a finely balanced upper house, in which the government does not control the numbers, Labor needs every vote it can get. History also has shown what can happen if you cross the Shooters. After promising to open up as many as 79 national parks for hunting, in return for support for his government’s power privatisation plan, Liberal ex-premier Barry O’Farrell later backflipped.

The Shooters were furious and formed an unholy alliance with the Greens to block the Coalition’s overhaul of planning laws, which scuppered one of O’Farrell’s early major reforms. The Shooters never forgave O’Farrell, or the Liberals, for going back on their word.

Mikac, who first pushed for stronger gun laws 30 years ago, emerged from his meeting with Minns on Tuesday more hopeful than when he went in. “I was struck by his genuine desire to keep Australia and NSW safe,” Mikac said. Minns should remember those words when he is formalising his position on whether keeping the Shooters on side is worth it.

Alexandra Smith is the Herald’s state political editor.

Start the day with a summary of the day’s most important and interesting stories, analysis and insights. Sign up for our Morning Edition newsletter.