THE Victorian government has lost its fight to let high country graziers back into the Alpine National Park, with federal Environment Minister Tony Burke announcing today that the application had been rejected.
Mr Burke said in Canberra that his department had advised him that the application by Victoria to allow grazing was inconsistent with federal environmental law.
"A national park should not be used as a farm," Mr Burke said.
"It's there for nature and it's there for people to enjoy nature. It's not there to be used as a form of free feed for a handful of local producers."
In 2005, the then Labor Victorian government banned grazing in the high country. But after it won government, the Coalition in January last year announced a trial whereby 400 cattle would graze in certain areas of Alpine National Park near Mansfield.
After the federal government ordered a stop to the trial, Victoria put in an application late last year for federal approval to allow cattle back into the park.
"The application from the Victorian government is clearly unacceptable under federal law," Mr Burke said.
"The reasons go to the national heritage values of the alpine national park. It is clearly outside of those heritage values to go ahead with the sort of trial that the Victorian government is talking about."
Mr Burke said nine of the 10 trial sites chosen by the Victorian government were partly or entirely within national park area that was included on the national heritage list in 2008.
He also dismissed Victoria’s claim that grazing was an important way to reduce the risk of bushfire and to control pests and weeds.
He said he would write to the Victoria, New South Wales and ACT governments today inviting them to sit down and discuss ways to combat those problems.
"Let’s come up with some joint proposals on ways of doing that. I want to be able to sit down and say, "e have problems there with deer, we have problems there with the brumbies, we have problems with a range of weeds, and let’s find a way of working together on sensible ways of dealing with those issues rather than having some side way of trying to provide free feed for a handful of producers."
He said he was "not in the slightest" worried about a legal challenge by the Victorian government.
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