Media Release

KAP member for Kennedy, Bob Katter thinks the verdict and fines handed down to an arborist and Cairns Regional Council by Magistrate on Tuesday for pruning the infamous flying fox trees are wrong.

Mr Katter said, “Cairns Regional Council is not even allowed to carry out normal safety measures from qualified arborists! These greenies are dangerous fanatical extremists and they’d be more at home in Iraq or Syria than here.

“These bat extremists have spiritual belief systems that fly in the face of common humanity. Future generations will look upon them as they’ll look upon the abhorrent behavior of other crazy extremists down through history without the slightest scintilla of humanitarian values.

“We can’t continue our tourism industry with bat droppings falling out of the sky above you carrying all sorts of diseases and let me go through them:

The bat-born Lyssavirus (A.K.A “Bat Virus”), (rabies like disease). In a Qld government health paper it says that Lyssavirus is almost always fatal. A young boy died a terrible death from Lyssavirus after being bitten or scratched by a flying fox in North Qld in 2013.

Leptospirosis (Which would kill cane cutters. This is transmitted via the urine of infected animals. A main originating factor is flying foxes.)

1. Hendra Virus (We’ve had 6 cases of Hendra in Qld and four have been fatal.) Hendra is almost always fatal.
2. Salmonella
3. SARS
4. Avian Flu
5. Nipah Virus

“We need jobs from the tourism trade and I’m sick and tired of ratbags telling me this is the bat’s habitat. The proliferation of pythons have vanished because of the cane toads, they’re mostly gone. The owls and other predatory birds have been crowded out of the trees because of the massive bat numbers. Nature is completely out of balance. Humans have a right to defend themselves and protect their families.”

“Bats and human health” from QLD Health.

http://conditions.health.qld.gov.au/HealthCondition/condition/14/33/14/Bats-human-health