WORKERS REHABILITATION AND COMPENSATION (PROTECTION FOR FIREFIGHTERS) AMENDMENT BILL

Committee Stage

In committee.

Clause 1.

The Hon. K.J. MAHER: I rise to inform the honourable member who moved the bill of the government's view. Speaking in committee, I do not want to repeat what the government has already put forward in the second reading stage of this bill. However, I would like to say that, as honourable members would be aware, the Premier announced in November last year that South Australia would give additional protection to firefighters exposed to high risk cancers.

We know that firefighters are often exposed to dangerous chemicals and fire hazards in the course of their daily employment and that this exposure gives a greater risk of certain types of cancers. With regard to this bill, the honourable member would be aware of the work being undertaken through the Australian Firefighters' Health Study by Monash University. The study seeks to scientifically determine whether volunteer firefighters are at a higher risk of cancer than the general working public. The government will be providing support for this study, and strongly supports the work being done. The government expects this study will be completed in 2014, and we will consider the outcomes as a government in a diligent and thorough manner. Until we have the scientific evidence on this particular issue before us, the government cannot support the bill.

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS: I spoke at length a long time ago now, in the second reading stage of the debate, and indicated that the Liberal Party was prepared to support the second reading whilst reserving its position for the committee stage and the third reading because there needed to be further consultation with individual stakeholders about what is a complicated issue. Since that original debate, I no longer have responsibility for workers rehabilitation and compensation and, within the Liberal Party, Mitch Williams, the member for MacKillop, has taken over responsibility for that. He has now taken a position to our party room which has been endorsed in the last week, that is, the member for MacKillop has advised that the Liberal Party's position is that we will support this bill that has been moved by the Hon. Tammy Franks.

The member for MacKillop has outlined in his advice to me that the Tasmanian government has recently introduced a similar bill which includes their volunteer fire service. The member for MacKillop has also advised me that the Western Australian Liberal government made an election commitment to introduce similar legislation, although, as of last week evidently, that had not yet progressed through the Western Australian parliament. Nevertheless, the intention has been stated in Western Australia by a Liberal government, and the Tasmanian government is obviously a state Labor government as well. So this is a difficult issue and there are a variety of views, and that variety of views was mirrored within the Liberal Party party room as well, but the decision of the parliamentary party is to support the legislation and, as I said, the member for MacKillop has had carriage of the legislation for that party. I indicate that we will be supporting the committee stage and the passage at the third reading.

The Hon. R.L. BROKENSHIRE: As I indicated from day one to the Hon. Tammy Franks, Family First supports this. We would have moved a similar bill had the Hon. Tammy Franks not done that, and we congratulate her on doing it. It is paramount that volunteer firefighters are protected and treated in exactly the same way as paid firefighters, and they should be looked after if anything unfortunate occurs to their health as a result of them volunteering to protect life and property. So, we support the bill and look forward to its rapid passage through this house and the House of Assembly.

The Hon. J.A. DARLEY: I indicate that I will be supporting this bill.

The Hon. K.L. VINCENT: As Dignity for Disability has also said since day one, we will be supporting this bill. I have been very pleased to attend media conferences and other forums with Ms Franks indicating that support and it certainly has not changed. As I said in my second reading speech, there is a very simply reason for that: when the fires can discriminate between who is and who is not a volunteer firefighter then we have the right to. But, until then, we have a duty as members of parliament to protect all firefighters equally and, so, we support this bill very strongly indeed.

The Hon. K.J. MAHER: I thank the Hon. Rob Lucas for letting us know that the Liberal Party room supports this bill, so I take it that it is the case that the Liberal Party party room supports what this bill is seeking to do. I would not mind asking the Hon. Rob Lucas then, if the current bill fails and if it is the Liberal Party party room's view that they support what this bill seeks to do, and if they are elected in 2014, will they introduce a similar bill or the same bill, to do what this bill is doing?

The ACTING CHAIR (The Hon. G.A. Kandelaars): It is up to the Hon. Rob Lucas if he chooses to answer that.

The Hon. K.J. MAHER: The Hon. Rob Lucas can answer, if he wishes to. He has an opportunity to put on the record whether the Liberal Party would introduce a bill to do this if it was elected. So, I invite him to put it on the record. If he refuses to say that is what the Liberal Party will do that is fair enough. It is up to him.

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS: I would ask the member to speak to the shadow minister responsible.

The Hon. T.A. FRANKS: Unusually, because we stalled this bill at the second reading debate and then waited some time before resuming with the benefit of further information being provided and also, obviously, some considerable lobbying, I indicate that every single member of parliament, with the exception of the Weatherill government members, supports this bill. They support a bill which not only affords recognition to those who are in the MFS—and we still do not know whether the government's announcement actually did include retained firefighters, so I will consider that it only included full-time ongoing permanent firefighters in the MFS—but they also support retained firefighters and volunteer firefighters and they recognise the science of some decades from around the world which shows the causal link between firefighting and these particular cancers.

In fact, the list of cancers that we have are on the smaller side. We have gone on the conservative side with only 12 of the cancers. We have not included lung cancer because we thought that was a bridge too far to try to jump. We have not included many of the cancers that are in fact recognised overseas. What I would say is that overseas in the leading jurisdictions not only have they established that causal link for paid firefighters but also for what they call part-time and volunteer firefighters, who, I might add, are often paid to be volunteers. They recognise it because the science that we need to look at on this issue is the causal link between structural fires, fires with these toxins, and these types of cancers contracted in the work of fighting those fires. It is incredibly brave work, and this past weekend should have brought home to every member of this parliament just how important that work is.

The causal link of the science is what you need to be looking at here because when you look at the Monash survey, yes, they are looking at all the firefighters across the country, and you are looking at rates of cancer. I have never said that firefighters contract cancer at greater rates than the community because you need to take into account the healthy worker effect, the fact that most firefighters are fitter and healthier and less likely to contract cancers than the rest of the population, to start with. It is the act of firefighting and the causal link between the types of fires they fight that has been studied that is what the science the bill we have before us is based on.

The government has announced a scheme where it recognises that science, but it has only recognised it with regard to what it called, very disparagingly, I believe, professional firefighters in this state. It meant full-time permanent MFS when it said that. I would say that every other member of parliament has recognised the professionalism of our CFS and our retained firefighters when they have supported the bill. If the bridge of the science that you had to understand and accept was jumped for somebody who receives a salary on an ongoing basis then why is the science different for somebody who receives either a casual wage or no wage and, in fact, often pays out of their own pocket to help their particular brigade keep going? How is the science different? The science of causality here and the linkages between these types of structural fires and the rates of these particular cancers in firefighters is what you need to look at, not what the Monash survey is studying. I am well familiar with the Monash survey.

I also ask the Weatherill Labor government to explain why its position is now different to the Tasmanian position, which has recognised and announced a scheme for its paid and volunteer firefighters, recognising the science of the causality. They do not need to wait for the Monash survey. The WA government has, as part of the election, announced that it will pursue a similar scheme, it is not waiting for the Monash study.

Will the government be waiting for the Monash study before it implements a scheme, as promised by media release at the MFS 175^th anniversary celebrations last year, for those full-time MFS firefighters by 1 July this year? Are we going to wait until the Monash survey reports back before the government introduces its own announced, promised and pledged scheme? Or is this simply a way of stalling to cover the government's shame that it should have included volunteers in the scheme in the first place and that it did not acknowledge the work of the Greens at a national level and, indeed, at a state level, to raise this issue, as we did behind the scenes when we sought to work with the government.

The government then announced a scheme which was faulty and which did not recognise all firefighters. The government seems to have done it without due regard to the impact it would have or, indeed, the lack of logic that accepting the science for somebody who is paid does not apply to the science for somebody who is not paid to fight the very same fires. This is not just bushfires we are talking about; these are structural fires. It is the type of fire these firefighters fight that we need to look at.

I challenge anyone to say that somebody in Salisbury on the weekend was fighting only bushfires. We know, and the records are well kept, that the incidents that the CFS fight are car fires, structural fires; they are standing shoulder to shoulder with their comrades in the MFS fighting down at the Wingfield industrial dump. They deserve that same respect—to have that science recognised, that the cause of their cancers can be linked to the type of fires they fight, not whether they get money in their pocket at the end of the day for having fought them.

The service the CFS provides you would say is priceless, but it is clearly worth a lot to this state. It has left a bitter taste in the mouth of many that the CFS was not given due recognition when the government made its announcement in relation to the MFS. I call on the government to now give clarity to whether or not its scheme will still be introduced by 1 July this year and whether or not its scheme will cover only permanent full-time firefighters in the MFS or whether it will cover retained firefighters.

I thank every other member of this parliament, with the exception of the Jay Weatherill government, for supporting this bill. I particularly thank the member for Morphett and the member Finniss, who have been very vocal in their support right from day one. Obviously, members of Family First, Dignity for Disability, the Independents—the Hon. Ann Bressington and the Hon. John Darley—have also been very vocal from day one. Another person who has been quite vocal is the member for Frome, Geoff Brock. He will, in fact, be introducing this bill into the lower house should it pass here tonight. I commend him for standing up for his local electorate but also for standing up for volunteers.

It is not lost on me that we have just had Volunteer Week events and that we have just had the volunteers charter re-signed. These are hollow words when you cannot even respect volunteer firefighters who put their life on the line by treating them with the respect they deserve rather than giving them rhetoric and trying to weasel out of your pledge on this issue for the MFS.

Clause passed.

Remaining clauses (2 to 5), schedule and title passed.

Bill reported without amendment.

Third Reading

The Hon. T.A. FRANKS (17:00): I move:

That this bill be now read a third time.

The council divided on the third reading:

Majority of 7 for the ayes.

Third reading thus carried.

Bill passed.