There are some crazy arguments being put forward here.
"We can't stop them, so let's encourage them". Well, by all means, if it is something we can't stop we should be involved in making it as good (or rather, as little damaging) as possible, but that's no reason to say we want shops to be allowed to sell.
"Private keepers do bad things too". Well duh! Of course they do, and that's not a good thing. The problem with shops is that it isn't even possible to do the right thing if you want to. Quarantine in a shop simply isn't even something you can begin to acheive. Few shops even bothering thinking about it, and those that do are wasting their time. There is no escaping the fact that the animals need to go through an extra move (which we all know can be disturbing for reptiles even at the best of time) and then held in a temporary enclosure with kids tapping on the glass, etc etc, for an indefinate period of time. Unless each enclosure is designed for one species only, and that enclosure is only ever used for that species (I don't think any pet shop in Victoria has even come close to doing this with their reptiles, and it isn't at all likely to happen), the enclosures are not set up with the species in mind, they are temporary holding bays of general design. There is no escaping the fact that in a business, there are financial pressures, and the animals are being treated as merchanidise on the shelf - liquid assets. Reptiles shouldn't be treated as 'stock', they are living breathing animals. I'm not saying it's bad for people to make money from them as long as they're well treated, but it's not appropriate to put them on the shelf as you would a packet of biscuits. The link between breeder and pet owner is lost, so if the new buyer wants contact with the breeder or previous owner to learn a bit about the particular quirks of that animal, see what the parents looked like, get some first hand husbundry advice from the guy who obviously knew what he was doing, well, tough, all you have is a shop hand, who at best knows about the general care of reptiles, but hasn't raised that individual animal, didn't see it hatch, didn't raise its parents, etc etc etc. Inevitably, this also leads to a loss of locality data on the animal - yes, details can be passed along, but in a shop environment with animals coming from all over the place, these get mixed up and lost, and if the situation is anything like we've seen in Victoria for many years, most of the historical information supplied about the animals will be lies.
Quarantine in particular is something which I am astonished to see someone say is a key issue they want addressed. You simply can not bring animals from a range of sources into one small room and have them all looked after by a number of different people in a small amount of time with members of the public wandering around and then sending them out between a day and several months later, and expect any level of quarantine at all to be in place, even with the best intentions and efforts of the store owners. This is simply impossible, and very, very clearly so. Quarantine requires that animals be kept in isolation for a period of months, in a separate room (preferably a separate building), with the keeper showing and washing their clothes after having anything to do with them. We're kidding ourselves if we think that it possible for a pet shop.
"Impulse buying still happens through internet ads". Hello? Do you have any sliver of a concept of human behaviour at all? Just a tiny bit? People go goo goo over animals, they see it in the flesh and temporarily "simply must have it". The reality of looking after it doesn't sink in until they have it home. This has been happening for as long as pet shops have been selling animals (longer than any of us have been alive). Sure, some level of impulse buying happens even with online ads, etc, but there is no comparison between seeing a picture on a classified site, having to contact the seller, then going over and visiting it, etc etc, and on the other hand seeing an animal up close for the first time and being able to take it home immediately. It's incredibly difficult to understand how some seemingly intelligent people can be so naive in this respect.
There is no reason to say that you can't oppose pet shops, but have a say in regulating them if/when they come in. That's just silly. The shops themselves won't want anyone putting any restrictions on them, and they'd just love to have you on side by fooling you into thinking that you're either going to support their efforts to get their feet in the door, or have no say at all and be forced to watch helplessly as they loot and plunder, but surely you're not stupid enough to be unable to see it doesn't work that way.
Similarly, it is just insane to think that you're going to be able to regulate pushy salesmen. Are you trying to turn this thread into a comedy? In the real world, regulations like that simply don't work, a lobotomised slug knows that.
It's interesting to see the different attitudes of people who have lived and worked with reptiles for over ten years in Victoria, and those in NSW. When you've seen what goes on, you're far more likely to be against them than if you don't know what to expect.
Sadly, it seems people have their heels dug in, for some reason many people just want to ignore the lessons which can be learned from Victoria, and even the USA (no shortage of horror stories there either!). As always, the dollar will stand as more important than animal welfare, we need to push this industry along and become just like the Americans... why that is, I'm not sure, but there you go.
