Shooter, Fishers and Farmers MP Robert Borsak will tomorrow introduce a bill that will change public-land hunting in NSW, potentially increasing hunting opportunities and possibly creating a Minister for Hunting and Fishing.
The Game and Feral Animal Control Amendment (Conservation Hunting) Bill 2025 will revise the management system for public-land hunting in NSW, introduce reforms including allowing licensed hunters to use suppressors, and recognise hunting as both a conservation tool and a cultural tradition.
Sporting Shooter understands the SFF has gained the support of the NSW Government and has the numbers to see the bill through.
“This is about balance,” Mr Borsak said. “It ensures hunting is well-managed, ethical and effective, it encourages participation on public and private land, benefiting our environment, economy and regional communities.”
The bill will create a new Conservation Hunting Authority (CHA) to replace the existing Game and Pest Management Advisory Board, and it will replace the R-licence with a new Conservation Hunting Licence.
The bill has not yet been tabled but a summary of it provided to Sporting Shooter gives an overview of what Mr Borsak is trying to achieve.
“The Bill formally recognises hunting as a conservation tool supporting biodiversity, pest control, sustainable land use, and cultural heritage,” the notes say.
It will encourage the use of technology, including thermal, night vision and suppressors on private land.
Access to “ethical, regulated hunting on suitable Crown lands” will be expanded — and the bill explicitly slates another 50,000 hectares of public land to be opened to hunters.
“The cultural, social, and spiritual importance of hunting to both Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians” will be recognised under the bill.
Significantly, voluntary or conservation hunting will be formally integrated into the state’s pest control regime under a “community-based conservation model,” although details of that model are not yet available.
“For too long, government pest control programs have been costly and always ineffective,” Mr Borsak said. “This Bill empowers licensed hunters to contribute to a community-based conservation model that works.”
As part of this, bounty systems will be enabled, rewarding hunters for pest control efforts.
The Conservation Hunting Authority will handle education, licensing, policy advice etc, but the Department of Primary Industries, under which public-land and game-bird hunting is currently administered, will continue to have responsibility for regulatory compliance.
The CHA would be a statuary body without authority for regulations, and ultimately the Minister for Hunting and Fishing — or if that position is not created, the Minister for Primary Industries — will retain that responsibility.
Greater detail will be available once the bill has been tabled on 28 May.
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