It’s raining cats and dogs

The Good Oil by Rod Brown*

Last year my family bought me Raffa – a chocolate Labrador – to force me to walk more. Phew it’s been a job dragging him out of ponds, away from golfers and showing him the world! But Raffa came to me at six weeks of age via Echuca without any papers, and it slowly dawned on me that he is from a puppy farm. So I’ve consequently taken a closer interest in the RSPCA’s great work in trying to tighten breeding arrangements and rehousing unwanted animals.

I had a yarn with CEO of RSPCA in the ACT Michael Linke, who is very switched on and passionate about the subject. He said that 250,000 healthy dogs and cats are put down every year in New South Wales alone, but the data collection is patchy.

The laws governing the treatment of lost and abandoned animals varies widely across States. The problem seems to be that the States set their own rules and leave it to councils to do their own thing.

Michael explained that the RSPCA (ACT) leads Australia with a 94 per cent rehousing rate for dogs by committing to keep them until a home is found (a ‘No-Kill Shelter’).

It also has a strong volunteer effort, a foster care program, runs photos and advertisements in local newspapers, radio announcements and so forth.

The 94 per cent figure is about the maximum possible, because the other six per cent are euthanised because they are diseased or have major behavioural problems.

Michael said that smart things were happening in places like Wyong, Hawkesbury and Windsor, where in the last case the jail inmates are foster carers, but in many other places, the rehousing rate is well below 50 per cent.

What’s a best practice solution?

Well after jaw boning some of the players, the consensus is the compulsory registration of dog breeders (cats are more difficult), the regulation of pet shops and mandatory desexing. Such moves would fix the problem at the source.

The trick lies in energising Local Government, and I suspect champions like animal rights activist Brigitte Bardot are needed to make it a front of mind issue.

Aussie equivalents are Kathmandu founder Jan Cameron, Sydney’s Mayor Clover Moore, Bondi Vet Dr Chris Brown (TV program), Canberra vet Dr Michael Archinal (‘Mornings with Kerri-Anne’ TV program), the above mentioned Michael Linke and ACT politician Mary Porter.

Mary tabled a discussion paper in the ACT Assembly recently. This could be a valuable document for councils across Australia given the dearth of analysis of the issues.

Animal welfare is a tricky area, but Local Government has the legislative power and day to day management responsibility. It also has the prospect of significant budgetary savings, given that running costs associated with the larger animal shelters are upwards of $2 million per year.

We estimate that 63 per cent of the 6,600 local councillors own a pet, and therefore have empathy with the issues.

The time is right for Local Government to seize the initiative. A National Animal Welfare Forum jointly organised by the RSPCA, the Australian Local Government Association and the ACT Government might be a good way of getting the ball rolling.

Please contact us for a copy of Mary Porter’s paper.

Understanding
Simon Crean

As the Minister for Regional Australia and Local Government, Simon Crean is now a key Cabinet Minister. I’ve been tracking his speeches and interviews given that he has $10 billion worth of leverage. And being an old union leader, he knows all about leverage.

He is continually advising regional stakeholders to develop creative local solutions. For example, “My job is about encouraging regions to understand that their local solutions have got to be the things that challenge government in terms of its resource base.

“We have a once in a lifetime opportunity to entrench localism and local input into the way in which we govern to ensure that the resources from all levels of government respond to those initiatives.”

This means you shouldn’t be shy about pushing agencies to collaborate with you!

Another of his favourite themes is three way sustainability.

“Increasingly the challenge for regional development is to understand that sustainability is economic, environmental and social,” Minister Crean said. “So we have to make sure that the services are there, that they’ve got the state of the art health and education facilities. But interestingly, broadband is going to provide us with a huge opportunity to really make that connection work.

E-health, e-medicine, e-commerce – this is the challenge to all regions in diversifying their economic base.

“This is the framework the Government is putting in place, but it won’t work unless it’s much more responsive to the creative local solutions.

“The spending in regions has always been substantial. It’s just that we’ve never identified it. That’s why one of the things I’m keen to do in this portfolio is to get all governments to break down their spending in their portfolios by region, so that regions have a better sense of what’s being spent on their education, health, physical infrastructure and so forth, so that there’s the sense of the spatial economics of this sort of thing.”

This is very interesting –
it has never been done in Australia. Your region might offer itself as a guinea pig?

“The challenge is how we spend it more efficiently and use the new spotlight that’s on the regions to drive that efficiency,” he said. “Regions will be far more satisfied with the attention they’re getting, and it will return a productivity dividend for the nation because of the more efficient spend of the nation’s resources.”

Nice rhetoric – again you might think about developing a model that better coordinates business, education and training, trade, welfare, environment, Indigenous and immigration initiatives – a good task for a university.

“Australia’s future is dependent on strong regional economic development,” Simon Crean said.

“We are a vast nation. Our diversity is defined by our geography, but we cannot maximise that diversity unless we get involved in strong, sustainable economic growth.

“That’s the challenge for the regional bodies – it’s a challenge the Government wants to respond to.”

We need to stamp this on everyone’s forehead.

We are here to help you access the $10 billion.

Indigenous jobs –
speaking frankly

I recently got motivated to make a submission to the LG Indigenous Employment Green Paper. My key point was that collaboration is surely needed to create Indigenous jobs. To explain, we get involved in numerous Indigenous related projects, such as scoping a Creative Arts Centre in Wilcannia, developing Indigenous youth mentoring programs, finding ways of reducing airfare costs in remote areas and so forth. 

Virtually all of the projects involve a lot of mucking around, and it could be avoided if only we had some robust collaboration.

Local Government can play a major role in facilitating collaboration in light of the four general problems endemic to ‘Indigenous’ projects:

  • they are often in remote areas, which means delays
    and difficulty in
    coordinating people
  • they get bogged down in the
    bureaucracy – the numerous
    agencies, strategies and
    protocols add to the
    complexity of projects and
    create frustration
  • they invariably lack
    Indigenous champions who
    can bring collaborative
    partners to the table –
    sensitive area, but let’s just
    say that white fellas are pushier and more
    persistent in promoting their
    projects and ideas
  • they often involve
    significant public good
    aspects, which are spread
    across the three levels of
    government and many
    agencies and programs

This coordination problem can only be addressed by collaboration.

It requires people on the ground who are strong, persistent and skilled, and able to drive real outcomes. It’s a risky business, and not a job for amateurs. 

The ideal arrangement is two project managers working in tandem – one within Local Government and an external facilitator/consultant.

*Rod Brown is a Canberra-based consultant specialising in industry/regional development, investment attraction, clusters and accessing Federal grants. He also runs the Cockatoo Network. He can be contacted at apdcockatoo@iprimus.com.au or phone
(02) 6231 7261.

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