What could possibly be worse than to have your sworn enemies engaged in the management of your industry?

As far as I can tell ever since PETA launched this campaign our leaders have given PETA the run of the market.

We have jumped to their every call, signed off on an agreement with PETA which our leaders hailed as a great step forward, and still PETA are wiping us out.

I trust the "industry leaders" will have the sense not to engage in any further dialogue or negotiation with PETA as this provides them with a platform and a certain degree of credibliity for their arguement.

They thrive on engaging the industry in such public debate and require the industry to concede to further demands.

This enables them to create the image in the public eye that the industry has a case to answer.

Customers should be invited to enquire and be given a frank explanation as to why wool producers carry out the mulesing operation and the alternatives.

PETA will only use any concession or negotiation by the industry as the basis to launch their next offensive.

As an industry participant I have to object to any concessions or discussions with ignorant unethical fanatics.

If PETA really thought their arguement through, if the mulesing operation was abandoned without a viable alternative, they could possibly be condemning 30% of the future sheep drop to death by flystrike.

I would suggest that even a 2% loss woud be unacceptable to most wool producers.

At present mulesing is the best alternative available to wool producers to ensure the long and productive life of their flock.

This is unrealistic.

It would be good if PETA could back off and stop trying to enforce their fairy tale vision on the rest of us.

They seem to think that mulesing will go, clips will never arrive, the Australian flock will instantly be bare breech because we said it will be, and no sheep will ever get flystrike again (.... and no Australian child will live in poverty...).

Nice, but not real.

Bare breech breeding is obviously the future of the industry, but it's going to take some time to get it right - you can't replace the Australian flock overnight using selective breeding.

So in the meantime, what are we supposed to do about the sheep which aren't bare breech?

This article refers to pain relief measures, but where do they come in if there is no longer mulesing?

Clips aren't a perfect solution but the evidence so far is that they are better from a welfare perspective than mulesing (which is better than flystrike).

Where is the common sense in this?

How many sheep need to get flystrike - unwitnessed by PETA in New York, retailers in Europe or consumers around the world - before we accept that this is nonsense?

What PETA is aiming at is a capitulation by the wool industry on the mulesing issue. Call any such capitulation 'Czechoslovakia 1938.' Then wait for a pause in proceedings until "Poland 1939' gets under way. As with the fascists of those times PETA today will not stop until it achieves all its basically mad objectives. Let us hope that no one named Neville is in charge of the Australian wool industry for if that is so the future of our wool growers is none to promising.

I hear there is a big demand in the cosmetic surgery market for the removal of excess flab. Maybe the clip research could be re-directed to human applications to recoup investments to date. I am not aware of any PETA-like organisations checking up on human welfare. Some of the above may volunteer for trials to see if pain levels are acceptable.

"They all recognise that breech clips still cause pain by cutting circulation off, even with pain relief this process is unnecessary.

"There are more humane solutions such as early crutching and jetting and of course bare breech breeding," Mr Prescott said.

Doesn't the above quote prove to any remotely sane person that they have no idea what they are talking about??

Perhaps an education campaign launched by AWI will inform the public on why mulesing is so vital to the Merino industry.