Greens to introduce cat containment laws in NSW
New laws will be proposed by the Greens in the NSW Parliament in October that would make people responsible for keeping their cat safely at home and give Councils the discretion to regulate and enforce cat containment measures in priority areas. The proposed law will be introduced after WA joined the rest of Australia in acting to keep cats from killing native animals. NSW is the only state in Australia that has not acted to protect the hundreds of millions of native animals that are killed by wandering cats every year, with 65% of the community wanting action to contain cats.
Greens MP and spokesperson for the environment Sue Higginson said “The failure of the NSW Government to act on cat containment is a tragedy for the environment, and is now a National embarrassment. We are now the only state that hasn’t addressed the extinction of native animals as a result of wandering pet cats,”
“Protecting our precious and threatened native species is the primary driver for us taking this step, but the truth is that irresponsible cat owners that allow their animals to roam free and unsupervised are not taking care of the animals that they have a responsibility to care for,”
“Our plan is two fold and acts to protect animals and empower Councils to work for their community. We intend to create a responsibility for cat owners, to ensure that the cat is kept on the same premises where it is cared for with food, water and shelter. We also want to see Councils given the authority to make decisions about priority areas in their communities where people can be required to take action to prevent cats from wandering,”
“This approach recognises that native animals and the cats that prey on them are kept safe from one another, as well as giving enforcement powers to Councils that can be scaled up and down as necessary to prevent cats from wandering into neighbours yards, nature reserves or anywhere else where there is a problem,”
“The Minns Labor Government has intentionally avoided this politically tricky problem, and have prevented evidence based recommendations from being included in Parliamentary reports. Our message to them is, if you won’t take this step - we will,”
“These laws could be passed as early as October this year, as long as the Government and Opposition stand up for the 65% of the community who are crying out for this type of reform. Our proposal does not immediately create massive obligations for NSW or Councils, but it will finally give Councils the tools to do their job,” Ms Higginson said.