Proposed New Victorian Dog Laws Dead Wrong

[Casster17]

Erny is it worth sending to both upper and lower houses now???

Or is it better for us to wait until its passed lower house???

[Erny]

In the absence of a crystal ball, I honestly don't know. I initially sent to every Upper House member, because the news that reached me was that the Bill had been passed by Legislative Assembly (lower house) and the next step was for it to be debated at Legislative Council (upper house) level.

But since sending my letter out, I found out that the Bill has NOT in fact been passed (I did wonder how they could pass a Bill but adjourn talking about it .... but shrugged because nothing about Government surprises me anymore) by the lower house (apparently it had been mis-reported), so the second letter I wrote, I sent it to all the lower house members.

It is the lower house we want to target - if we can convince the Government at Lower House level to hold back and consider this very seriously and stop themselves before the lives of families and their innocent dogs pay for flawed law then it won't get to Upper House and the letters sent to Upper House will have simply been unnecessary.

So I'd suggest hold on to your hat and wait until we know the results of the Lower House debate.

I love the fact that you have thought to ask though, Casster17.

Mind you - for all that I've been involved in Govt Bureaucratic process, it never ceases to bamboozle me. Sifting through documents that cross from one Act to another Act; trying to remain clear as to whether you're dealing with a regulation or a legislation etc etc can alone drive one gah gah .

The people who are watching this even more closely than I am able to, are those at GoodforDogs (refer link in I think post #47). You can ask questions and post in that blog if you wish, as well.

I really appreciate that some of you are paying some interest to this matter and taking on board the seriousness of it.

Sad that VicDogs are so blinded as to think that VicDog Member's dogs would never be affected by these laws. Or that if it's only one or two, it will be rare. Like as though that won't matter.

Edited May 21, 2010 by Erny

[Casster17]

Thanks Erny...

Maybe We should continue to harrass our lower house members until Tuesday and then switch to the upper house after that???

My Fingers are crossed that someone reads the masses of emails and letters they are getting and gets with the program...

If there is anything further i can do to help, please let me know...

[Erny]

Thanks Erny...

Maybe We should continue to harrass our lower house members until Tuesday and then switch to the upper house after that???

We certainly should continue to "harrass" our Lower House members. For anyone reading, please don't think there's no time. The Bill was adjourned to be debated on 20th May, but I'm now informed it is set down for 25th May - but that's if they get to it even then. It depends on other matters that they have for discussion and how long those 'debates' go for as to whether they run out of time or not. So keep letter writing, one and all (as painful as that is ).

I'm not certain that it will be a fast matter of going to the Upper House if it is passed at Lower House. "GoodforDogs" would possibly know better. I'm pretty sure it would have to be registered on an agenda and the process wouldn't be immediate. So, as long as we can keep our fingers on the pulse regarding the Lower House debate, I think we'll have time to address Upper House if and when we need to.

BUT .... well, you never know. If Upper House were already getting streams of letters (that's me being hopeful), by the time the item is put on the agenda for debate, there might be enough of them already versed and aware and ready to discard it for all the flaws it does contain . I guess one would have to know how pollies think. And I don't think I want to go there .

My Fingers are crossed that someone reads the masses of emails and letters they are getting and gets with the program...

Lordy ..... wouldn't that be nice. It would certainly make my day and would be like a breath of fresh air. But it's almost as though they've dug themselves a hole with all their other "ban it/kill it" laws (that don't work) and instead of trashing much of those and working over, they just keep doing much of the same but worse.

If there is anything further i can do to help, please let me know...

Thank you. If there's anything I can think of doing, stay tuned.

Oh .... I have a petition that I'm working on getting out and around, but the urgency for letters was foremost in my mind. Once I have the petition worded I'll link it up somewhere so people can download, print, sign and post it back. That's if the petition is going to be needed. It's a bit premature at this stage, but better to be ready with it just in case.

[Erny]

The Government have the majority in the Lower house (Legislative Assembly) but do not in the Upper House (Legislative Council)

It is really important to focus also on the Upper House, particularly all of the opposition. It could be stopped there.

There's a point, lmwvic.

But is there a point to do it now, when it hasn't gone to Upper House (yet), do you think?

I was also hoping that it being an election year, some of even the ALP pollies might be a bit sensitive to numbers of votes they could lose if they continue with these sorts of flawed laws. But that's about "numbers" and it depends, I guess, on how many responses they are receiving. Or perhaps I'm being naive and they don't really give a toss in that respect (ie that our numbers are not high enough to be of concern).

Edited May 21, 2010 by Erny

[~Shepherd~]

Have you thought of setting up a facebook page? That way we can shoot off the info to hundreds, then send the comments wall as well? I'm no good at setting things up like that. It seems to be the way to put thoughts forward these days without doing any work.

[Erny]

Have you thought of setting up a facebook page? That way we can shoot off the info to hundreds, then send the comments wall as well? I'm no good at setting things up like that. It seems to be the way to put thoughts forward these days without doing any work.

I think that's kind of what "GoodforDogs" is about. Although that blog is not facebook .... (shakes head ..... I don't understand that stuff)

I'm useless with facebook both in setting up and in navigating around it. I get lost all the time. Anyone who's computer/facebook savvy want to?

[Andrea&John]

Oooooooooooh, our newspaper said they are gonna publish my letter at some stage next week!!! I hope my words were good enough and I hope they don't edit it too much and hopefully it will be in time....

Not that I'm getting excited or so

PLEASE people, at least try. It might work sometimes

[Erny]

Oooooooooooh, our newspaper said they are gonna publish my letter at some stage next week!!! I hope my words were good enough and I hope they don't edit it too much and hopefully it will be in time....

Not that I'm getting excited or so

PLEASE people, at least try. It might work sometimes

Fantastic, Andrea&John!!! Well done!! Perhaps slip them a copy of the "GoodforDogs" response as well, to give them something extra to digest.

Good work!!

Which paper?

[leannek]

Thanks for raising this Erny

Email sent to the 88 members :D and I've also attached a list of the emails concatenated together, so they can be copied and pasted for a single email

Will be contacting friends to send this off as well.

Thanks Wendy. Steve (MDBA) has contributed as well. But we'll need more than that. We CAN head them off at the pass, if we get enough people driven to put pen to paper.

Although individual letters are the best, I acknowledge that some people find that too hard (time poor; don't like writing letters .... mind you, I don't particularly like to write them either).

So what I propose here is that every person who wants to help in at least one way could write a simple covering letter - something like the following :

Covering email letter :

"Dear Parliamentary Member

I support and endorse the objections and content encompassed in the attached response to Government by Good for Dogs and would ask that you not only accept these points as though they were my own writing, but also take on board and heed the refutes and information it provides, as though it was I who was the author – BEFORE the

Government proceeds to passing of yet even more laws that are flawed and which have the tendency to target the responsible people and not those who are the mainstay causes for community interference by their own dogs; and which do NOT and have not had any effect on the lowering of bite statistics; nor which embraces the ideology of “education”. “

Attachment to email :

With your email, attach the GoodforDogs response - the link for this is http://www.goodfordogs.org/blog/wp-content...nse_to_Bill.pdf .

And this is the Member of Legislative Assembly contact list which will give you all the names, addresses and email addresses you can send to (the more the merrier).

Legislative Assembly (Vic) Member Contact List

Of course, the "GoodforDogs" well thought out response may actually make sense to you of what the proposals are and how they are likely to (adversively) affect us, to the degree that you might like to take from that and formulate your own individual response. That would be great, but at the very least, please respond to Government one way or the other. Better something than nothing at all.

Cheers, and let's band together to fight this now. Once the law is passed the effort to change it when we see and experience the wrongs that it will cause, will be a far greater task than the one at hand.

[Erny]

Email sent to the 88 members :D and I've also attached a list of the emails concatenated together, so they can be copied and pasted for a single email

Will be contacting friends to send this off as well.

That's so great!! Thank you Leannek!!!!

Edited May 21, 2010 by Erny

[Casster17]

Many Thanks LeanneK I was getting tired of copy and pasting from the web... and my email kept crashing and have to start again... Even managed to email it to myself... how bizarre...

[leannek]

BUMP

Thanks for raising this Erny

Email sent to the 88 members :D and I've also attached a list of the emails concatenated together, so they can be copied and pasted for a single email

Will be contacting friends to send this off as well.

Thanks Wendy. Steve (MDBA) has contributed as well. But we'll need more than that. We CAN head them off at the pass, if we get enough people driven to put pen to paper.

Although individual letters are the best, I acknowledge that some people find that too hard (time poor; don't like writing letters .... mind you, I don't particularly like to write them either).

So what I propose here is that every person who wants to help in at least one way could write a simple covering letter - something like the following :

Covering email letter :

"Dear Parliamentary Member

I support and endorse the objections and content encompassed in the attached response to Government by Good for Dogs and would ask that you not only accept these points as though they were my own writing, but also take on board and heed the refutes and information it provides, as though it was I who was the author – BEFORE the

Government proceeds to passing of yet even more laws that are flawed and which have the tendency to target the responsible people and not those who are the mainstay causes for community interference by their own dogs; and which do NOT and have not had any effect on the lowering of bite statistics; nor which embraces the ideology of “education”. “

Attachment to email :

With your email, attach the GoodforDogs response - the link for this is http://www.goodfordogs.org/blog/wp-content...nse_to_Bill.pdf .

And this is the Member of Legislative Assembly contact list which will give you all the names, addresses and email addresses you can send to (the more the merrier).

Legislative Assembly (Vic) Member Contact List

Of course, the "GoodforDogs" well thought out response may actually make sense to you of what the proposals are and how they are likely to (adversively) affect us, to the degree that you might like to take from that and formulate your own individual response. That would be great, but at the very least, please respond to Government one way or the other. Better something than nothing at all.

Cheers, and let's band together to fight this now. Once the law is passed the effort to change it when we see and experience the wrongs that it will cause, will be a far greater task than the one at hand.

[Casster17]

ahhh... And to *BUMP* again...

Erny can I repost this on another forum???

[Erny]

ahhh... And to *BUMP* again...

Erny can I repost this on another forum???

Feel free, and yes, please do :p.

Thanks for the *bumps* peoples . I've been out training all day.

[~Shepherd~]

ahhh... And to *BUMP* again...

Erny can I repost this on another forum???

Feel free, and yes, please do :p.

Thanks for the *bumps* peoples . I've been out training all day.

might be worth cross posting to rescue also if thats allowed

[Erny]

might be worth cross posting to rescue also if thats allowed :p

That's an idea.

Thanks.

ETA: Cross posted to rescue .

Edited May 22, 2010 by Erny

[~Shepherd~]

no worries. A clever lot that recue bunch, and hard workers too

[melzawelza]

I just sent an email through to all the members listed in the attachment. I used your template Erny, and attached the goodfordogs paper, however I also added my own thoughts too.

Although i don't live in Vic this is too important to not get involved in.

(Also Erny.... have just realised who you are after receiving the email from the NDTF.... loved the headcollar workshop last week )

Edited May 22, 2010 by melzawelza

[Erny]

Hi Melzawelza - thank you for contributing to our Victorian 'cause' - very much appreciated .

Also, thanks for the comment regards the workshop and am glad you enjoyed it.

But no fair, because you know who I am but I don't know who you are

Edited May 22, 2010 by Erny