Prescribed Burns

The Hon. T.J. STEPHENS (15:22): Supplementary question: while you are touching on Belair, minister, was Belair National Park included in the 20 delayed burns that have been scheduled for autumn this year, and when is the next burn-off scheduled for Belair National Park? Is it scheduled for completion in spring 2017 or in autumn 2018? If you could bring that back that would be great.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER (Minister for Sustainability, Environment and Conservation, Minister for Water and the River Murray, Minister for Climate Change) (15:22): I will be very pleased to do so, but I will say, for the understanding of the house and the honourable member, that we burn in Belair almost every year, when conditions permit. Being such a large site, we burn sections of Belair every year so that we have a continual downward pressure on the fuel load in the park. We don't burn the whole park in one year, but actually do small sections of it on a continuous basis, essentially.

I come back to the situation that Belair, being one of our high-risk areas so close to built-up areas, is an area where we take a lot of time to get the planning right. We will only burn when the weather conditions are right, so it will be as less a risk to the population as possible. We have to balance up the desirability of reducing fuel loads in preparation for summer bushfire seasons, which will always happen, with the risk associated with getting an escape from a burn. Sometimes escapes can mean that we get a much bigger burn in the park, but that is not desirable either because we want to be able to control those burns to a very fine level.

Belair is burnt on a regular basis throughout the cycle, and we do small sections every year, every season, weather conditions permitting. But, I will bring back the history of the burns in Belair for perhaps the last five years or so, for the honourable member, and our projections over the next 12 months.