Bendigo yards feel the heat over lack of shelter for livestock
Animal welfare concern is putting pressure on Bendigo Livestock Exchange to install a roof to protect livestock from the elements.
APATHY and ignorance go to the heart of many a bad situation.
And they seem to be part of why the Bendigo Livestock Exchange finds itself the focus of an animal activist campaign and online petition over its lack of roofing to provide shelter and shade for livestock.
The issue started brewing publicly this year, and in recent weeks stories have aired on TV, ABC radio and in local newspapers.
It reached a crescendo this week when the temperature was forecast to hit 42C and, in a first for the Bendigo yards, the weekly sale was moved to an earlier start at 8.30am.
On top of this, lamb and sheep numbers were capped at 15,000.
Essentially Band-Aid solutions for an issue that does not pass the pub test of public opinion or common sense.
A roof on a saleyard is not a luxury any more, it is a standard that was set down many years ago when the first undercover centres with soft flooring started to be built.
Which begs the question: how did the Bendigo saleyards, which alongside Ballarat is Victoria’s premier lamb and sheep market with regular throughput of almost a million animals a year, get so far behind the curve in regards to updating its facilities and, yes, installing a roof.
And how did it get to the point that it took animal libbers to push the topic into the headlines?
It goes back to the first point of apathy, and a lot of fingers are being pointed at the City of Greater Bendigo Council — which owns and operates the yards — for not being proactive or willing to spend money on the facility.
While the council is currently “reviewing operations” at Bendigo to create a masterplan for the site, there are claims by stakeholders that council has done little in the past decade to support the facility, often ignoring proposals, including the lobbying for a roof by agents who have to work there exposed to sun, rain and wind for hours at a time.
One stakeholder said the lack of action by council in tapping into the government money available to upgrade facilities was telling and in contrast with what was happening across the state.
“The yards have never been a priority for this council, and that’s why government funding was never even chased,’’ one stakeholder said.
In recent years a swag of saleyards have tapped into state and federal government funding to help install roofs, examples being Yea, Euroa, Horsham, Hamilton. Other big centres, such as Ballarat and Wodonga, have privatised their yards and built new facilities.
The Weekly Times has been told the Bendigo council has never applied for any government grants for its yards, yet all around it other saleyards, with much smaller throughput and sales rosters, were grabbing the cash and moving ahead.
And now as pressure for a roof builds, the cost of installing such a structure becomes problematic, which council has highlighted in recent media.
The following statement from Ben Devanny, Manager Business Services: “The city is currently reviewing operations at the Livestock Exchange and there has been feedback from stakeholders during this process that a roof needs to be a priority project.
“A roof at the Livestock Exchange is a multimillion-dollar project. Delivery of projects such as this require long-term planning and funding over many council budget cycles and also need to be considered alongside other priority projects for the municipality.”
And, if council figures are to be believed, the Bendigo yards operate at a loss.
When asked for financial figures for the saleyards, the council provided the following to The Weekly Times.
Last financial year the yards had revenue of $1,224,536 and expenditure of $1,307,363 for a loss of $82,827.
It works out to running costs of a tick over $25,000 a week.
Creative accounting always appears to be part of saleyard operations, as costs and the money they bring in is filtered across wider council business to end up as losses on paper.
Frustration with the council’s “priorities” — recently announcing a big spend on a shade project for the Bendigo Mall — meant agents were actually supportive of the animal liberation campaign calling out the lack of shelter at the Bendigo yards.
“We applauded it as finally something was happening and people were talking about how we desperately need a roof,’’ one agent said.
Leading the campaign is a group called Sheep Save Melbourne, and it has started an online petition, which by Tuesday morning had almost 2000 signatures.
The interesting, and somewhat concerning, aspect of this animal welfare campaign is that it is not built on emotional drivel but rather sets out a rather sensible argument.
The group has targeted the “guidelines” in a 2018 industry document: Australian Animal Welfare Standards and Guidelines for the Welfare of Animals.
There are standards in the document that have to be met, and “guidelines” which should be followed if possible.
The Bendigo saleyards are not breaking any animal welfare laws.
The guideline for shelter in the document reads: “The provision of shade or cooling systems in hot climates and shelter from excessive cold for animals in holding facilities is desirable, recognising practical and economic limitations.’’
Sheep Save Melbourne wants these guidelines made into enforceable standards. It is also calling for guidelines about on-farm shelter and animal welfare to be made enforceable.
And therein lies the broader lesson from what is happening at the Bendigo yards.
All the apathy and lack of action around upgrading facilities has led to an animal activist group setting the narrative on the issue.
Farmers and industry need to be more proactive about animal welfare and OHS so they cannot be attacked and made to look bad.
Almost a million sheep and lambs go through the Bendigo saleyards each year from all parts of the state plus southern NSW and South Australia.
Lobbying for a roof should be coming from all the farmers and agents involved in these transactions rather than animal activists.
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