Agriculture Minister, David Littleproud, missed the boat with his predictable, unfortunate and disappointing decision not to impose the ban on live sheep exports most Australians had been hoping for on Thursday.
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He has, despite his sound and fury when first shown the footage of sheep suffering terribly during a voyage to the Middle East last year, come out with more of the same.
He is no more of a reformer or animal welfare advocate than his predecessor, and live export cheer leader, Barnaby Joyce.
Promises by Mr Littleproud of a reduction in the number of sheep being crammed aboard the stinking, heaving, manure-raddled stock transports and pledges to "improve" their non-existent ventilation are a token attempt to persuade the public heat stress, and a record of mass deaths that spans almost 40 years, is being addressed.
The same is true of promises of more "independent observers" and a stiffening of the penalties to be imposed on companies, company directors and others who flout the regulations in order to maximise profits.
What is the good of a potential $4.2 million fine on a company or a 10 year jail term for a company director if the legislation is never invoked?
Mr Littleproud was silent on whether or not anybody had ever been jailed or slapped with a punitive fine under the existing legislation during his statements on Thursday.
There is, as yet, no indication anybody will ever be brought to book for the agonised deaths of up to 3,000 sheep aboard the Awassi Express in August last year that prompted the latest review.
Australia currently exports about 1.9 million sheep a year, well down on 7.1 million exported during the hey day of the trade in 1988. And, while many producers, particularly in the west, are heavily dependent on that market it represents a relatively small proportion of sheep industry turnover overall.
While Mr Littleproud, departmental staffers and grower representatives are more than happy to cite statistic after statistic and study after study in defence of what is, for most Australians, the indefensible, the reality is this trade can't be regulated.
New Zealand admitted that when it moved to ban exports 15 years ago.
The late Jim Anderton, the former NZ agriculture minister who extended the ban to cattle in 2007, said the decision had been a "no brainer".
"It was an appallingly bad trade," he said in 2011. "You're exporting jobs at the same time and you're doing away with any possibility of high added value processing (in your own country)."
The best Mr Littleproud was able to come up with to justify the continuation of the trade on Thursday was that if Australia didn't stay the course then client nations would source live exports from countries who would bungle the shipping process to an even greater extent than we have managed to do. That's hardly a compelling argument.
Why can we not phase in a ban on this cruel and barbaric trade in conjunction with well-funded transition arrangements to support producers and other stakeholders during the period of change?
The world definitely won't end. The New Zealanders proved that.