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I agree with Jamie.......with the amount of 'no visits/contact' othes have had, it seems like they are targeting you for a reason. I have only had my licence for a yr, i have wondered when/how often they would do checks, not that i would mind. I do actually agree that they should be random checks though, a ph call first would just give those doing the wrong thing time to 'clean up'.
 
Hmm sounds like harassment to me,...maybe do a audio recording each time they visit and see if you can't turn the tables on them a little with their threats etc..

If you don't have a warrant to record someone without their knowledge and then you go ahead and record them without informing them, it's inadmissible in court.
 
Anyone concerned about uninvited visitors, print this out and nail it on your front door.


TRESPASS IS AN OFFENCE!

ADMITTANCE TO THIS PROPERTY IS
ONLY BY INVITATION OR PRIOR APPOINTMENT

Appointments may be arranged by correspondence or by telephone

AUTHORITY
High Court of Australia
Plenty v. Dillon (1991) 171 CLR 635 F.C. 91/004
 
If you don't have a warrant to record someone without their knowledge and then you go ahead and record them without informing them, it's inadmissible in court.

While this is true, i have been down this road in court before. I have a very violent ex, who even after 4yrs & numerous protection orders, still continues to make calls to me that are very unpleasent. While i am legally not aloud to record these ph calls, on advice from my solictor i still do. As she has explained it to me, yes they will be dismissed in court, but they are still also heard, therefor still will help me prove that at least the mental/emotional abuse is still happening. I think its kind of 'once you hear it, u cant un hear it' so even after it dismissed, its still been heard!
 
The law says that two persons must be made aware of the telephone call or personal conversation between person A (you) and person B is being recorded. That doesn't mean the person B has to be one of the two. You are A and any other person present can be B.

E.g. if Baden and his wife turn on a recorder while being harassed by unwelcome visitors, that's good enough, the others don't need to be notified of the recording.
 
what are ya neighbours like... do you get along with them... no need to answer but only takes a complaint by one of them and parks have to investigate.... might be worth thinking about....
 
While this is true, i have been down this road in court before. I have a very violent ex, who even after 4yrs & numerous protection orders, still continues to make calls to me that are very unpleasent. While i am legally not aloud to record these ph calls, on advice from my solictor i still do. As she has explained it to me, yes they will be dismissed in court, but they are still also heard, therefor still will help me prove that at least the mental/emotional abuse is still happening. I think its kind of 'once you hear it, u cant un hear it' so even after it dismissed, its still been heard!

That is a bit different to this instance. You're taping an abusive man to sway the judge in his opinion, if someone decided to take on a government dept. and presented that as evidence they would have it thrown out.

I was booked for speeding illegally earlier this year and have the a-hole woman that booked me on tape admitting it. My dad's an ex detective sgt who worked in major crime and homicide. He advised me that I could have fought them, and it could have worked on my favour but it was very unlikely.

Two very different circumstances.

Edit

By "I was booked for speeding illegally" I meant that I was illegally booked for speeding, when I actually wasn't speeding at all.
 
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"I do actually agree that they should be random checks though, a ph call first would just give those doing the wrong thing time to 'clean up'."

Do you think the off-chance that they'll find someone "doing the wrong thing" is worth surrendering the peoples' right to privacy in their own homes? Is whatever they're "doing wrong" likely to be of sufficient harm to warrant unfettered access to the homes of tens of thousands of keepers across the country? Wildlife departmentss are just one lot of hundreds of bureaucracies which could claim right of access to ensure you're doing the "right thing"...

If there is evidence, or a strong suspicion of, illegal trafficking in wildlfe, it may require a different approach, but they already have the means of dealing with suspect activity. Allowing any government official carte blanche access to our private property is not a good idea.

Maybe anyone who has children should be forced to allow free access by DOCS just be sure they're "doing the right thing," or the tax office should be able to come in at any time and check your receipts to be sure you're "doing the right thing" and fulfilling your community obligations...

I don't think so.

Many of those "doing the wrong thing" won't be in the system anyway, so escape the scrutiny licence-holders are subjected to.

Jamie
 
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Extremely well said Jamie!

I was gonna say pretty much the same thing, even with the DOCS eg actually, but you have expressed it much more eloquently.
 
I realise they are different circumstances, although my reasons are not to 'sway' the judges mind so to speak, its more so a matter of just how bad our legal system is that even as the aggrieved i am the one that has to do all the 'proving' of things. Years worth of police & hospital reports are not enough once you reach the family courts! Anyway, all i was saying is that it is possible to find loop holes in certain things. As for going up against a gov agency, yes obviously it makes things perhaps harder, but im sure not totally impossible for someone who is being unfairly harrassed.

Jamie, yeah ok, i get your point. But in all fairness, if im home & someone came to do a random check on my pets, i wouldnt have a problem with them doing so, i dont have anything to hide! As for the DOCS comment.......the relationship i was in caused exactly this for me, DOCS do not give notice before doing checks, they do just turn up.
 
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I have no problem with allowing access if it's convenient, that's a given. But if 'routine' inspections by government officials involve mandated access to your private property, we're heading down the path of a police state - reptile keepers in Australia will become the Jews of 1930s Germany. Hand bureaucrats power on a silver platter and they'll use it.

All for the sake of a few illegally held lizards or snakes...

Jamie
 
I do actually agree with what you are saying, i do feel the same way. Maybe i could have worded my other post a little better, but all i basically meant was that i personally wouldnt mind letting them in if they turned up at my house out of the blue. That was all.
 
DOCs just turn up but you still don't have to allow them access without court orders in place. As for the "I'm not doing anything wrong" thing, maybe your not but too much power in the hands of bureaucrats or even law enforcement is a bad thing. An example of this is my sons Indonesian friend. When they brought in the anti terrorist laws after 9/11 and made it ok for the police, AFP etc to hold people without bail and search houses without a warrant my sons friends uncle and aunty who are market gardener were raided because one of their racist neighbors (who knew full well they were market gardeners) dobbed them in for buying lots of fertiliser. The AFP raided at gunpoint at 5 am. The house was ransacked, the kids were terrified, they were screaming abuse at them and threatening to shoot the husband and oldest son,they took the husband away, he was in custody for 10 days before they even interviewed him and then a further ten days with no charges laid, no access to legal representation and then finally released without charge. When they tried to get some justice they were told that under the Border Security and Anti Terror laws the AFP had done nothing wrong. This is the reason unfettered power can not be given to any government department, too much margin for misuse and misconduct.

Bel I was still typing after you answered Jamies post, haha
 
That is not technically correct under the ppra of 2000 you do not need to always inform,

If you don't have a warrant to record someone without their knowledge and then you go ahead and record them without informing them, it's inadmissible in court.
 
I had a visit once, when I upgraded my license, the rangers where lovely (one begged to touch the roughy as he'd never seen/touched) one before.
 
I had DOCS at my place after every beating i copped. I am quite sure i had NO right to turn them away, their job is to check that in cases like this the children are safe. In each report DOCS presented to the courts it was stated why they were doing checks & that i always co-operated with them. Maybe i could have just turned them away, but im pretty sure they would then think that perhaps i had something to hide & would have just have come back with the police anyway.As for how traumatic it is on the children involved, whether it be DOCS or the police coming through your house, i completely agree, it can be very scary for little poeple, but in most cases, they dont make a habit of just targeting innocent people so in reality it isnt the agency's in the wrong, it is the people at the premises & whatever it is that causes them to keep coming back that is the problem.
 
I'm sure that would be the case for most of us Bel711. We should always be mindful of the fact that one of the great things about this country is supposed to be our ability to go about our lives pretty much unfettered by intrusive bureaucracies. By degrees, this is changing, and we are more and more having to comply with constraints applied by governments of all colours. We as a group need to be careful about mindlessly handing intrusive powers to anyone, for any reason. Maybe reptile keepers are a suspicious lot and think that everyone else is up to no good, but I think you'll find that the very large percentage of keepers does nothing more wrong than allowing their books to get a bit behind... or they might perhaps leave a poo in the enclosure a bit too long if they've been busy.

I don't think either of those common failings justifies allowing the intrusion of government officials whenever it suits them.

That's not to say that some keepers don't need their arses kicked - if you see someone doing the wrong thing by all means make the call and get something done about it.

Jamie
 
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Random or prearranged inspections are OK with most of us who feel they have nothing to hide and as long as the officers are polite and reasonably intelligent, it's cool to go through the process. However, whet it comes to what Baden is experiencing, it's another matter and I would certainly be writing a letter to the Regional Director outlining the unacceptable conduct of the particular officers and demanding reasons why such frequent inspections are necessary.
That would be my first step.
 
DOCs just turn up but you still don't have to allow them access without court orders in place. As for the "I'm not doing anything wrong" thing, maybe your not but too much power in the hands of bureaucrats or even law enforcement is a bad thing. An example of this is my sons Indonesian friend. When they brought in the anti terrorist laws after 9/11 and made it ok for the police, AFP etc to hold people without bail and search houses without a warrant my sons friends uncle and aunty who are market gardener were raided because one of their racist neighbors (who knew full well they were market gardeners) dobbed them in for buying lots of fertiliser. The AFP raided at gunpoint at 5 am. The house was ransacked, the kids were terrified, they were screaming abuse at them and threatening to shoot the husband and oldest son,they took the husband away, he was in custody for 10 days before they even interviewed him and then a further ten days with no charges laid, no access to legal representation and then finally released without charge. When they tried to get some justice they were told that under the Border Security and Anti Terror laws the AFP had done nothing wrong. This is the reason unfettered power can not be given to any government department, too much margin for misuse and misconduct.

Bel I was still typing after you answered Jamies post, haha

Excellent example of recent changes to the laws which will erode the traditional freedoms we have taken for granted in this country...

Jamie
 
cause i have a seperate controlled enviroment room for my reps.... if parks rock up do ya reckon i could tell em that they can see them but they will have to go threw a quarantine period... of my descrection... and then they can go threw and have a look... then sit the buggers out back with the bull terrier for a coulpa hours...
 
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