AN Australian conservation group warns that setting up a game council in New Zealand could lead to the same taxpayer bailouts and pest problems it did for New South Wales.

Carol Booth (right), policy officer for the Invasive Species Council, says that a similar council set up in New South Wales in 2002 has been a disaster.

“We would advise the NZ govt not to go down the path of the NSW Game Council,” she told Newswire over email, after we sought comment on MP Peter Dunne’s proposal for a national hunting council to take over management of certain pests from the Department of Conservation.

Mr Dunne’s council would see pests such as deer, thar, chamois, and pigs reclassified as game and their populations sustained on conservation land for their benefits to recreational and commercial hunting.

She said despite the NSW council’s claims that it had helped conservation, it made it difficult for professional pest control operations, and the hunters themselves killed only small numbers of pests, for instance mostly targeting trophy males, which was inadequate for control.

The NSW state government has spent millions bailing out the council, last year spending $3.5 million.

Ms Booth says that’s money that could have been spent on professional eradication.

“The Game Council was meant to be self-funding, but it is nowhere near this and not likely to be in the future.

“So, taxpayers are funding the recreation of a few thousand hunters on public lands, and feral animals are being used as the excuse.”

Mr Dunne (leader of United Future) agrees there have been problems with the NSW Game Council, but says that was because it grew beyond its capacity too quickly.

“We have looked quite closely at the New South Wales experience and it’s not one we want to repeat and I think one of the steps to making sure that this council doesn’t end up in that situation is to start small and grow slowly.”

He says a New Zealand game council would have modest financial requirements and would be able to generate its own funding by, for instance, using money currently spent on conservation, he says.

Deerstalkers Association’ president Alec McIver, a key member of the committee setting up the game council, was confident the mistakes of NSW would be avoided.

“I suppose we’ve got a good example of what happened in New South Wales and that’s why it’s very important that we get this council set up exactly right so this type of thing does not happen for New Zealand.”

Advocacy manager for the Royal Forest and Bird Protection Society Kevin Hackwell says New South Wales shows a striking parallel in more ways than one.

“It’s the same thing. You had an organised lobby group who managed to capture a political party.

“Here in New Zealand this whole thing has been pushed by Peter Dunne, who has taken it on himself to represent the religious right and the hunting lobby.”

Consultation on the discussion paper ends today, and could see legislation in Parliament early next year.

The NSW Game Council did not respond to questions from NewsWire.