*Pic: Bader 111 rusted (Arjan Elmendorp Shipspotting). The Bader 111 was built in 1978
First published July 1
Never before has the live export industry triggered and maintained the rage and grief of the Australian community than now. Tens of thousands of people have taken to the streets, and that many, and more, have made distressed phone calls to the Departmental hotline, and written heartrending letters and signed petitions, calling on our politicians not just to do right, but to stop doing wrong.
Ever since the expose of the horrendous conditions on board live export ships blasted onto our television screens via ’60 Minutes’, on April 8, the public outrage has shown no sign of abating, and is even escalating. The vision was provided to Animals Australia by a young Pakistani Trainee Navigation Officer, Fazal Ullah. He did this at great risk to his safety, and it was pretty much a career ender for him – until Australia stood behind him and had his back.
Several weeks ago, Australia’s biggest exporter, Emanuel Exports, a Liberal Party donor, was issued with a ‘show cause notice’ by the Department of Agriculture and Water Resources as to why its licence should not be cancelled.
Presumably, the notice applied to the high mortality rates on board Emanuel/Kuwait Livestock Transport and Trading ships including the Al Shuwaikh and Al Messilah, and the Saudi owned Awassi Express.
The Department was not satisfied by its 30 page response, and 10 days ago, suspended Emanuel Export’s licence. In the intervening period, the other large exporter, Livestock Shipping Services, concluded that new welfare measures required by the Department were too costly and onerous and moved its operations, including its equally old and decrepit ships the Maysora, Bader III and Ghena, temporarily to South America.
The cancellation of Emanuel’s licence has left 60,000 sheep who were due to be loaded on to the Al Shuwaikh, to sail at extreme risk from our winter to the searing heat of the Middle Eastern summer, in an export quarantine facility near Fremantle. Typically there is much hand wringing from WA farmers and others about this halt in the sheep trade.
We’re seeing the same old, same old ‘they’ll have to shoot all their sheep and bury them’, ‘they’ll be walking off their farms’, and the usual suicide threats, despite the fact that this only affects a small cabal of farmers and a relatively very small percentage of Australia’s total exports. The trade in frozen/chilled meat is worth many, many times more to this country than the trade in live animals and contributes far, far more in jobs and GDP. It is wrong that the taxpayer has to prop up the live export industry when it is actually detrimental to our economy.
A review of government records by Animals Australia found that the directors of Emanuel Exports and associated companies have been involved in over 30 voyages since 2005 on which over 1000 animals perished on each shipment. Animals Australia’s CEO, Glenys Oogjes, said: “For us, this isn’t about the ship, it’s about the exporter. It defies belief that Emanuel Exports may still be granted export permits.”
But back to the 60,000 sheep. No-one seems to be able to explain why they cannot be returned to their properties of origin. They have been in a quarantine facility, for heavens sake, so what diseases could they possibly have caught? If there are diseases in these facilities, does the public now have the right to know about it?
But now, disturbing reports have come out today that Emanuel Exports is trying to get another exporter, Harmony/Phoenix to ship the 60,000 sheep reportedly ‘stranded’ in Fremantle off to the Middle East using its licence – despite offers having been made to process them here.
Here is why this cannot happen.
How is that even possible? It’s effectively ‘business as usual’ for Emanuel Exports, the suspension of the licence is not worth the paper its written on.
According to the website of the Harmony Agriculture and Food Company, Garry Robinson is the Manager, Commercial Livestock Sales. He boasts about his experience in the live export trade.
Robinson, formerly of Emanuel Exports, Wellards and Livestock Shipping Services, pretty much got off all those fraud related charges relating to those sheep in Pakistan in 2012. He was convicted, and got a good behaviour bond because he claimed he has PTSD after the Cormo Express disaster. Despite a 18 month prison term being imposed, he walked free from the court.
Harmony itself states: ‘With more than 15,000 head of livestock across those properties at any one time and more than 40 people employed, we supply to both the Australian domestic and the international market and are expanding into China and a number of other export markets’.
According to the Australian Meat and Livestock Industry Act at s12 Part 1 (c)
‘each person who participates or would participate, in the management or control of the applicant’s meat or live stock export business or proposed meat or live stock export business is a person of integrity’.
That being the case, with Robinson having been convicted on these charges, the Department cannot grant Harmony a Livestock Export Licence. Since it already has one, the Department must comply with the AMLI Act and withdraw or cancel it.
And worse, the Emanuel/KLTT ship Al Shuwaikh is hanging around Fremantle. Is it the plan that Harmony would apply for permission to load these sheep onto the Al Shuwaikh, currently sitting off Fremantle? It is the ONLY ship anywhere near large enough in the region.
What a tight little web of corruption this trade is.
*Suzanne Cass has a Master of Social Work (MSWQ) Monash – Current; Grad. Cert. Professional Legal Studies (Griffith); M-PET (Master of Professional Education and Training (Deakin); Grad. Cert. Educational Studies (Newcastle); Dip. Management and Leadership
• Cheryl: A shipload of sheep left our shores on June 6, heading for hell …
