When can Victorians expect to go fishing again?

[samjas1316]

Restrict people fishing to their local council area?

Good idea this. Easy to police. Fish within 10 km (this gets me to my local ) or some other distance of your home address? And obviously continue with social distancing and gathering rules.

[PhilN]

Unless political pressure is applied, they will have no reason to allow recreational fishing. So i ask myself - is it morally right and in general in society interest to allow it and therefore to lobby for it? (And I agree with the current blanket ban, especially over Easter.). Assuming the curve stays flat over the next two weeks, i think it is right.

Fishing
Is our exercise
Is our mental health fix
Is used to get fresh healthy seafood and keep us healthy
Keeps people in jobs, keeps an industry going

Assuming the curve stays flat, and the proof point from QLD remains (That Fishing has no material impact to virus spread, but has the above benefits to society), I would propose that we lobby now (your MP, BIA VIC etc) to allow it from May 11. The restrictions could be
Household people only in the boat
For the purpose of catching fish to eat only
Nearest 2 either Inland or Coastal/Estuary ramps only

This would seem a very low risk activity that has the benefits listed above. It would also enable rural people to support country ramps/business without an influx of city folk spreading the virus. And in reality (although for sure the current situation will change things a bit) very few people fish in June, July, August And a lot of us have probably lost our jobs or working from home - no need for the Sunday busy hour - it will be a lot more spread out during the week.
If you don't lobby for it, it ain't going to happen.

[purple5ive]

I took the boat to a glasser for a quote on some works today. Took the tank out prior so if I did get pulled up I could claim I wasn’t going fishing lol. Was half expecting to get reported.

What are you getting done?
I doubt they would fine you for attempting to go fishing, but probably try and get you for non essential travel.
They seem to be trigger happy atm, but don't think it will.last.
Servicing is allowable afaik, but yeah easier to avoid the fine than try and have the hassle of fighting it.

[purple5ive]

End of aprill..stamp it....

you know stage three has been extended into may, yeah?

Yeah , i was just dreaming....

State of emergency until may, wether than means also stage 3 restrictions is anyone's guess these days. I'll still assume the worst for now.

[DougieK]

Fishing
Is our exercise
Is our mental health fix
Is used to get fresh healthy seafood and keep us healthy
Keeps people in jobs, keeps an industry going

The problem being that this can be applied to almost anything.

A week ago I had a couple of guys trying to tell me that fanging their trail bikes around the state forest was 'essential activity' because mental health.

The moment you start to allow one thing, everything else has to follow. Otherwise you're just showing politcal favoritism and for every person who gets to go fishing, you're going to **** off 100 more that want to play golf or ride their trailies or go bowling or play basketball or go to the pokies etc etc.

[ango]

I reckon they have to let it happen soon, people are getting fed up with the erosion of their civil liberties, and pretty soon there will be mass noncompliance. Having different restrictions from state to state makes no sense, also applying restrictions uniformly across the whole state makes no sense. There are regions where the corona virus is not a problem, e.g. east Gippsland has had 1 case only for weeks, so why should everyone put their lives on hold? What needs to happen is to stop people travelling around and spreading the virus.
Cheers
Ango.

[Stumpjumper]

Well they allowed surfing. That's the problem, no consistency and no logic. We know what we need to do to not spread this virus, relying on govt to spoon feed us anything logical or reasonable as far as activities go is retarded. And yes there will always be the ******** minority, your choice if you want to allow your life to be ruled by their actions. This crap has gone on long enough, tell em to stick it up their arse.

[4liters]

If the number of daily infections has dropped significantly by May 11 I think there might be a slight relaxation of the rules for a month or so to see if there is any movement in the rate of infection. That might include allowing things like fishing and hunting while keeping places where people congregate like piers and boat ramps closed.

If they're still finding a handful of people each day by then though I think they'll drag it out another month.

Problem is if you go too early and there's still a bunch of people in the community carrying the virus undetected it's only a matter of time before you get a second outbreak once the restrictions are lifted, and then you have to lock the whole place down again for another 3 months until you find everyone. Wait an extra month to be on the safe side and it'll probably save us enduring a whole lot more time in lockdown further on down the track.

[Stumpjumper]

There will be sporadic outbreaks no matter what we do. We are now i a position to target specific outbreaks so you don't lock up everyone in Victoria because of an outbreak in Mornington.

[cobby]

Fishing
Is our exercise
Is our mental health fix
Is used to get fresh healthy seafood and keep us healthy
Keeps people in jobs, keeps an industry going

The problem being that this can be applied to almost anything.

A week ago I had a couple of guys trying to tell me that fanging their trail bikes around the state forest was 'essential activity' because mental health.

The moment you start to allow one thing, everything else has to follow. Otherwise you're just showing politcal favoritism and for every person who gets to go fishing, you're going to **** off 100 more that want to play golf or ride their trailies or go bowling or play basketball or go to the pokies etc etc.

Problem with that is, they already did last week. And now water police have ok'd SUPs, wind surfing and kite boarding to go with it. So it's perfectly fine to paddle a stand up paddleboard up and down Patto if you're from the surrounding areas, perfectly fine to go windsurfing and kite boarding when it's blowing its ring off Patto if you're from the surrounding areas.

But paddle a kayak or throw a line in is a $1652 fine.....