Ken Hughey: Orana Wildlife Park board member defends accusations of poor animal welfare standards

Orana Wildlife Park says it told MPI about all its animal deaths, after claims of poor welfare standards. 

More than 20 current and former staff have detailed multiple animal deaths to 1News, some which went unreported.

MPI is doing a rapid assessment of the zoo's conditions - due back tomorrow - but say it wasn't told about any deaths.

Board member Ken Hughey says all deaths were notified, and they've taken measures since.

"Those sort of deaths, often with the benefit of hindsight, may be preventable. We absolutely accept that, and we learn as we go - we are a learning-based organisation."

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Now, the Irana Wildlife Trust Board has hit back against
the claims that some animals that are run a wildlife
park have been poorly treated. You will be aware of.
In the last few days, former staff at the zoo
have raised concerns about a number of animal deaths and injuries.
Gary Or from MPI spoke to us yesterday. He told
us that the park hasn't always been totally upfront with
them about the animal deaths.

Speaker 2 (00:19):
The matters that have been raised have not previously come
to our attentions from the zoo, which ones in relation
to the giraffes, the gorilla and the auto that were
raised in the television story.

Speaker 1 (00:33):
Emeritus Professor Ken Hue is on the board of the
Irana Wildlife Trusting with us.

Speaker 3 (00:37):
Now, Hey, Ken, hi, Heather?

Speaker 1 (00:39):
Is that fair? Did you not tell them about all
the deaths?

Speaker 3 (00:42):
No, it's not fair, Heather. In fact, we have told
them about all of those deaths. We report annually to
MPI and we do that as part of pre preparation
for their annual order, and every one of those deaths
was recorded. I have had that confirmed me me personally today.

Speaker 1 (01:01):
Who confirmed it to you?

Speaker 3 (01:03):
That was confirmed by one of our senior staff. I
don't want to name names at the moment. You can
understand why, but I am absolutely confident that we have
reported those deaths to MPI.

Speaker 1 (01:13):
Why would MPI say you haven't.

Speaker 3 (01:16):
I think what happens is there's probably several parts to MPI.
They're a very very large organization, so we don't report
to the compliance part. And so you were talking to
Gary from compliance. We report to another segment of the
organization that's in a big leader or a big spreadsheet,
and it's possible he did not see them there or

(01:37):
he was not told about them, but certainly I have
checked and they are reported.

Speaker 1 (01:42):
Ken, are you totally confident that every single one of
these deaths are not deaths that were preventable or as
a result of negligence from staff or yourselves.

Speaker 3 (01:52):
Well, to me, there's I guess two main types of
death that occur at Arana. There's the accidental death, where
things occur which at the time might have been out
of our control, but with the benefit of hindsight and learning,
we may have prevented. So a good example of that
might be the recorded death of an otter that drowned,

(02:16):
and we know from our learning and review from that
experience that there is something that we could have done
with the gorilla under the water, and we have taken
remedial measures. So those sort of deaths, often with the
benefit of hindsight, may be preventable. We absolutely accept that
and we learn as we go. We are a learning
based organization. Then there's the other deaths through illness. Now

(02:40):
some of those deaths may or may not be preventable. Actually,
as you know, we have over a thousand animals there.
Many get sick from time to time and we treat
many many of them absolutely successfully, but some do die. Mahli,
the gorilla it died. We tried really hard to treat
Mahe properly and we used all of the best available

(03:03):
evidence at the time. What we didn't know was that
Mahale had a bacterial infection which was absolutely one hundred
percent new to science. We could not treat Mahali at
the time because we did not know that was the situation.
So there are always those sorts of incidents, and we
work really hard because animal welfare is absolutely paramount to irana.

Speaker 1 (03:25):
Are you guys getting blowback.

Speaker 3 (03:29):
Yes, we are, and you know it's hard to take
and we've got nothing to hide that. We work really
hard with MPI, with the general public, and with all
of our sponsors and others to do a really fantastic job.
And as a member of the board, I have absolute
confidence in senior management and staff of Irana to do

(03:50):
the right thing. And so, yes, we are getting some pushback.
We accept that, and what we're doing is being absolutely
open with what's happened in the past. We've always been open,
but we're just reiterating the process that we put it
put in place to make sure, to the best of
our ability that unavoidable deaths are avoided.

Speaker 1 (04:10):
Ken, thank you for your time. I appreciate you coming
to have a chat to us as Ken Hue a
run a Wildlife Trust board member. For more from Hither
Duplessy Allen Drive, listen live to news talks.

Speaker 2 (04:19):
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