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The Sporting Shooters Association of Australia (Victoria) was incorporated as a public company on October 1, 1973. We exist to promote the shooting sports and protect firearm owners' interests.

With more than 40,000 members, SSAA Victoria is a leading body representing licensed firearm owners in Victoria. SSAA Victoria has more than a dozen branches and more than 30 sub-clubs and disciplines within the organisation.

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SSAA Victoria News

Cabinet reshuffle cause for some optimism

The new Victorian Premier has today announced the shape of her new cabinet. Anthony Carbines will continue in the Police portfolio. This is an important portfolio for shooters as the regulation of firearms falls under its remit. SSAA Victoria enjoys a solid working relationship with Minister Carbines and his office, whilst we are not always in agreement on issues, there are good lines of communication. Steve Dimopoulos will become Minister for the Environment and Minister for Outdoor Recreation. He will retain his role as Minister for Tourism, Sport and Major Events. The Outdoor Recreation portfolio was created late last year and was welcomed by the hunting community. Unfortunately, the portfolio has been practically neglected by its inaugural Minister (Sonya Kilkenny), and engagement with key stakeholders have been close to non-existent. SSAA Victoria has already reached out to Minister Dimopoulos’ staff to congratulate him on his appointment and to arrange a meeting. We are optimistic that his appointment, and him also holding the Environment portfolio (that crosses over significantly with Outdoor Recreation) is an early indication that the new Premier has taken seriously the significant advocacy on outdoor recreation issues that has occurred over recent months.

2023 SSAA Victoria Board Election results announced

The 2023 SSAA Victoria board election results were announced today at the Association’s Annual General Meeting. Nine candidates contested the election for four available positions on the board. The Association’s Junior Vice President Josh Knight was returned to the board, as was former President Denis Moroney and longstanding board member Henry Rogers. Anthony Jackson was elected to fill the fourth available position. Anthony is a lifetime competition shooter and hunter and has represented Victoria in national shooting events and hunted across Australia. Anthony served in the Army for twenty-one years and retired as a Lieutenant Colonel. He then went on to a corporate career that included graduating from the Australian Institute of Company Directors’ Course, being a Group General Manager with a global business and being a management consultant with Accenture and IBM. Andrew Hepner retired from the board at this election. Andrew first joined the board in 2012 and has been a SSAA Victoria member since 1984, a stalwart of the Big Game Rifle Club and on the Eagle Park Advisory Committee since its formation. The Association thanks all candidates, both successful and unsuccessful.

The silenced majority

Notwithstanding widespread media reporting characterising the recommendation of the Select Committee into Native Bird Hunting as being to “end the annual native bird hunting season”, that is an exercise in selective semantics more so than it is an exercise in reality. The real story is that five of the nine committee members delivered written minority reports that unambiguously call for native bird hunting in Victoria to continue. The most extraordinary and compelling of those minority reports came from Government MP Sheena Watt. Ms Watt’s report is extraordinary for two reasons. The first reason is that it is extremely rare in Australian democracies for MPs to break ranks with their parties; when they do, it is never without ramifications, and it is invariably an act of conscience and moral integrity. The second reason is that, in this case, the cause of dissent is a female indigenous MP highlighting that, on matters important to indigenous Victorians, her non-indigenous colleagues have failed to listen to the indigenous community. As Ms Watt so eloquently put it, “I felt it necessary to make recommendations that speak to a commitment to self-determination and that highlight the cultural practices important to the path to Treaty that this state boldly embarked upon, in this, a most pivotal year for First Nations Peoples in Victoria”. If adopted, the (so-called) majority report recommendations would carve out an exemption for Traditional Owners to continue hunting. This recommendation contradicts the advice and the evidence of traditional owners (both pro and anti-hunting) throughout the Select Committee inquiry. That recommendation has been met with scorn by those traditional owners. Dja Dja Wurrung group CEO and First People’s Assembly member Rodney Carter told the inquiry, “I think – with the brilliant respect that the state has afforded First Nations people – that my descendants and I will enjoy hunting for all time. If the inquiry and the government can somewhat see it in their mind to afford other Victorians the opportunity – and visitors to our homelands – to be able to enjoy something similar, I think truly it can be managed”. Anti-hunting activist, executive member of the Victorian Traditional Owner Land Justice Group and First People’s Assembly member Gary Murray was equally concerned with the recommendation singling out indigenous Victorians. Ms Watt’s report makes seven considered recommendations for the Government that, as she puts it, "embody the wishes of Victorians, especially those in regional communities, and centralise the importance of traditional cultural practices to the identity of First Nations Victorians”. If implemented, some of Ms Watt’s recommendations would be incredibly challenging for the hunting community. We accept, however, that they are the result of a genuine, considered and balanced weighing of the evidence that was put before the inquiry. Ms Watt is the only indigenous MP in the Victorian Parliament. In her dissenting report, she compellingly provided her Government with a path forward for duck hunting in Victoria. The challenge for the Victorian Government in this instance is not the absence of an indigenous voice on the issue; it has a strong and articulate one of those. The Government’s challenge is doing what its non-indigenous MPs on the inquiry either could or would not: opening up non-indigenous ears to listen to that voice when it speaks.

Stars of the future battle it out at inter-school Biathlon

On Friday, 19 May, seventy-four students from five schools gathered at the SSAA Wodonga biathlon site for the 2023 inter-school Biathlon. Students from Catholic College Wodonga, Galen Catholic College Wangaratta, Scots School Albury, Trinity Anglican College Thurgoona and Victoria Lutheran College Wodonga competed across four categories, with shooting events including accuracy fly shooting, metallic silhouettes and biathlon laser rifle. The main Biathlon event was held on Wodonga's .22 multipurpose range, and competitors were broken into squads with SSAA Wodonga support at each shooting station. This yrease in female participation saw the addition of a senior female category. The results are: Junior female: 1st Trinity Anglican College, 2nd Catholic College Wodonga, 3rd Scots School Albury Junior male: 1st Scots School Albury, 2nd Victory Lutheran College, 3rd Victory Lutheran College Senior Female: 1st Scots School Albury, 2nd Trinity Anglican College, 3rd Trinity Anglican College Senior Male: 1st Scots School Albury, 2nd Trinity Anglican College, 3rd Trinity Anglican College

SSAA Biathlon would like to thank its sponsors; SSAA Victoria, Nioa, Elk's Hunting & Fishing Albury, Bluey's Bait & Tackle Wodonga, and Cross-Country Skier Wodonga.

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