For 150 years, the grounds of historic Inverell homestead Blair Athol, which boasted some of the rarest trees in the region, had been painstakingly maintained.

But in a matter of months late last year, a colony of rapacious bats – up to 100,000 strong – claimed squatter’s rights over the property.

In damage Northern Tablelands MP Adam Marshall likened to a napalm attack, the bats virtually stripped the grounds bare.

The property was officially declared a “bat camp” and B&B owner Kim Kelleher was powerless to stop the winged pests.

It put her business into paralysis and cost her thousands to clean-up.

The bizarre saga became a symbol for how over-regulated our society had become, where a maligned mammal has more rights than a human.

The bats have since left and it appears sanity may be about to return to the issue.

The state government will next week announce an anti-bats package which would give councils new powers to tackle nuisance flying fox colonies.

Those powers aren’t expected to extend to “shoot to kill rights”, as was stated in a Sydney newspaper yesterday, but would allow councils to use sound, light and habitat management to control the bats.

The federal government is also considering a tough new suite of anti-bat laws. 

That three people in New South Wales had to risk their lives this year to the potentially deadly lyssavirus before common sense was restored to the debate is a sad indictment on modern day Australia.

Others, like Queensland boy Lincoln Flynn, weren’t so lucky.

Lincoln is one of three Australians to tragically die after contact with a bat saw them infected with lyssavirus.

That is three lives too many.

Forget the bat-hugging hysteria: public safety should always be our highest priority.