Book Review: Fisheries Law in Australia

Many Australians grow up with happy memories of fishing on a beach but few realise the complex jurisdictional issues and laws that regulate their activities. Most young kids learn from their parents basic rules like “you can’t keep jennies [female crabs]” and that small fish must be thrown back. Commercial fishing also is an important employer and industry in many coastal communities that is even more heavily regulated than recreational fishing. A dazzling and frequently changing array of controls apply to fishing areas, fishing seasons, fishing gear, catch limits, and protected species.

Warwick Gullett’s book, Fisheries Law in Australia (LexisNexis Butterworths, 2008), is, therefore, a welcome new publication that will be of interest to environmental law practitioners, academics and students, as well as people working in the fishing industry and fishery regulators. It is well written and the style is free-flowing, with clear explanations of many complex topics within the rubric of “fisheries law”.

It is structured in eight chapters covering introductory matters, constitutional arrangements, the common law, legislative objectives in fisheries legislation, ecosystem and species protection, commercial fisheries, recreational fishing, and enforcement. Some of the topics dealt with in the book, such as the Offshore Constitutional Settlement and the concept of ecologically sustainable development, are well covered in many other publications. However, it is valuable for its more thorough coverage of fisheries specific topics than is found elsewhere. Readers unfamiliar with fisheries regulation in Australia will find the discussion of the complex jurisdictional divisions between the Commonwealth and State and Territory governments particularly useful.

From a practical perspective, a major criticism of the book is that it does not include references to the vast amount of information available on government websites. There is only one internet reference in the entire 316 pages of the book. That is a real loss for readers as there is a treasure trove of information on government sites such as the Australian Fisheries Management Authority, Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority, and the Queensland Department of Primary Industries and Fisheries.

The book could also have been made much more user-friendly for readers unfamiliar with fisheries regulation by including more maps and diagrams to explain jurisdictional issues and fisheries regulations. It is a real shame that the book includes only rudimentary maps, such as one showing the Australian Fishing Zone. The discussion of Marine Protected Areas would have been greatly assisted by a colour extract of part of a zoning map from, say, the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park. Similarly, references to By-Catch Reduction Devices and Turtle Excluder Devices would have been greatly assisted by inclusion of a diagram of such devices.

The book is purely descriptive, so readers interested in a critical evaluation of fisheries laws, such as the intractable difficulties of regulating High Seas fisheries, will only find the book useful for its explanation of the regulatory regime. This is a common feature (or failure) of most law textbooks driven by the mainstream philosophy of Legal Positivism where interest focuses on what the law is not what the law ought to be or any sort of policy evaluation. While the book is useful as a teaching resource, it is a missed opportunity to recommend to policy-makers what is working well and what needs improvement in Australian fisheries laws.

Overall, there is much to commend this book and it will be a useful addition to many professional and university libraries. It provides good, clear descriptions of Australian fisheries laws that many people will find invaluable in understanding this complex and poorly understood area of law.

Chris McGrath

(This review is also published in the Environmental and Planning Law Journal)