Red, I can't find it anymore either. Anyhow, the MPA has backed away from the draft claiming it was out of date when released.
Have a look
here for a discussion on the park. Also, there is a
local site providing ongoing coverage of the issue.
I full expect this to bite home for me if Labor are returned at the next election. They will declare the Hawkesbury Shelf MP, stretching from Newcastle to Shoalhaven and lock up all the headlands and inshore reef close to Sydney. The irony here is that they probably won't lock up any estuaries, as they have for Bateman's, because they are so degraded. If the purpose of the park is to protect biodiversity then the first thing they should do is pump funds into rehabilitation. I am one fisher that would support being locked out of an area while it is being rehabilitated. But there will be no money for that, so they'll just lock us out of healthy areas.
BTW, I'm with you when you talk about destructive past practices. Fortunately, regulations have been tightened and most comply. I would not be adverse to seeing further tightening of some bag and size limits, particularly maximum sizes but to lock us out of the majority of productive fishing grounds when stocks are not under threat, when it has been shown the stocks recover in the RFHs and when recreational fishing as currently regulated does not damage biodiversity simply points to an alternative agenda - that of the Animal Rightists and Vegans.
Save the planet - eat a vegan a day