Fisheries Minister Jim Anderton informed that the government would strongly defend the fishing industy suit filed today. The Federation of Commercial Fishermen, South East Finfish Management Ltd, Challenger Finfisheries Management Company Ltd, and the Northern Fisheries Management Stakeholder Company have filed in the Wellington High Court a challenge to the Minister’s decision to introduce a package of regional bans and other restrictions on set netting, drift netting and trawling which are due to come into force on 1 October 2008.
In the challenge the parties are seeking a judicial review to overturn all the commercial fishing measures, and interim orders in relation to some of them. It is said that the parties’ court action does not apply to similar measures due to come into force for recreational fishers on the same day. Anderton expressed that the industry risked being seen by its customers around the world as driving an iconic species of dolphin to extinction. He said that the industry has the opportunity to be the world’s most environmentally friendly supplier of fish from a sustainable wild fishery.
According to Anderton the decisions he had made had been difficult and the measures he chose were not the most severe of the options being proposed. The government has taken all the stringent measures to protect Hector’s and Maui’s dolphins. Commenting on that Anderton said that he took the decisions on the basis of the best available information—scientific data, information from commercial, recreational, environmental and iwi interests, an analysis of economic and social effects, and advice from the Ministry of Fisheries, NIWA, and the Department of Conservation.
