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Legislative Council - Fifty-Second Parliament, Second Session (52-2)
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SELECT COMMITTEE ON COMMUNITY SAFETY AND EMERGENCY SERVICES IN SOUTH AUSTRALIA

The Hon. R.L. BROKENSHIRE (16:29): I am pleased to be able to talk to the report of the Select Committee on Community Safety and Emergency Services in South Australia and I move:

That the report of the select committee be noted.

I want to place on the public record through Hansard my sincere appreciation to the Hons John Dawkins, Jing Lee, my friend Kyam Maher and Tammy Franks MLCs. Mr Dickson was a very good, hardworking secretary who has had a lot on his plate, and I particularly appreciate the work he has been doing with the committee, and Dr Bailey was a very capable research officer for what I believe colleagues will agree is a comprehensive and well-written report.

It has been 13 months since we moved the motion to establish the committee. I think the timing of the committee has been good. It ties in with the Hon. Tammy Franks' amendments to a piece of legislation that was sorted out properly here in this house today. The question will be: what is the mean-spirited government going to do when it comes to looking after volunteers? That leads me into the first key finding of the final report; that is, serious neglect of the volunteering sector's funding by this government.

The second finding is to review the effectiveness and efficiency of the emergency services levy. Whilst I think it is fair to say that all the evidence endorsed and supported the concept of the emergency services levy, I will place on the public record what has, sadly, happened. Such an important issue, back in about 1997, 1998 or 1999, should have been bipartisan to ensure proper funding, but politics got in the way.

As a result, what we have seen over a period of time, and the evidence has been given to the committee, is that the intent of the levy was right, even though people do not like levies, but the value it was capable of providing to both the volunteer and paid services has been eroded to the point now where the evidence given by all the chief fire officers, the police commissioner, the head of the South Australian Ambulance Service and then other volunteer organisations like Surf Life Saving, marine rescue and others is that budgets across the emergency services—and we all know that police have to manage, in the forward estimates, approximately $150 million worth of budget savings—are such that it is just not providing the money. I would like the government to say what they are going to do to address this very serious financial shortfall in emergency services.

The third dot point is the controversial creation of the Community Safety Directorate—a directorate that, without consultation, was formed with all of the safety agencies. The evidence of the heads of the agencies was clear: they had no idea what was happening. It happened very quickly. The former minister (the Hon. Jennifer Rankine) set this up so quickly that there were not, in the opinion of the committee and certainly my opinion, proper processes to ensure that there were benefits of the Community Safety Directorate.

In fact, the committee also found that the directorate was established without following the proper process of consultation and also, importantly, not respecting the charter obligations upon the government to consult with volunteer organisations, because that charter said that there would be consultation with the volunteers. We found out in the evidence that the minister went ahead and set up this Community Safety Directorate without any consultation that we could get evidence of.

In consequence, the committee has recommended that the charter be legislated in the same way as the two health charters are legislated. The one tick I would give the minister for the Community Safety Directorate was that she actually employed a head who has got a lot of capabilities, and now she has got that head trying to manage all of the problems that we have been seeing in the Department for Education and Child Development. Apart from that, the rest of the decisions around it were just appalling, given the fact that no-one knew what the directorate was about. There was no consultation; in fact, there was some direction given by the minister that certain agencies had to provide staff and budget to fund the directorate because, even though it was approved, I am sure, by cabinet, there was no money coming with it, so it had to be found from other cash-strapped areas of government.

One of the other recommendations is that the directorate be merged back into the South Australian Fire and Emergency Commission. Frankly, I think for all intents and purposes that has happened. I think there were ministers and certainly a lot of the good hardworking backbenchers in the government who felt that the directorate was the wrong way to proceed. I think it has actually just slipped away in any case since the pressure has been brought to bear from the select committee. If it is still around—and I do not know whether it is or who works there and so on—the committee is recommending that the Community Safety Directorate just be merged back into the South Australian Fire and Emergency Commission (SAFECOM).

I place on the record that we did, after approval from the majority of the Legislative Council, invite minister Rankine to attend to help us understand what this directorate was all about, so as to be fair—and I do like to be fair, sir—and give minister Rankine an opportunity to explain her side because there had been scathing comments on her initiative. I just wanted some fairness in the whole thing as well but sadly, for whatever reason, minister Rankine declined the request and so we were not able to give her fair and democratic opportunities to explain what may have been a brilliant initiative, although we could not see that it was in any respect.

Another key point was to promote volunteering with an advertising campaign. There is no doubt that right across the emergency services, there is real pressure on the incredibly hardworking volunteers. This is not a problem of this government alone, I acknowledge. This is a problem that has been building for some time. Part of it is our ageing population, part of it is the pressure on families to be working harder, and part of it, frankly, is probably that we need to start to nurture again the wonderful South Australian ethos of volunteering.

Notwithstanding the fact that I acknowledge within the findings that it is not a fault or problem only of this government, the fact is that this Labor government is in office, so they need to try to address what can be done to get new volunteers into the emergency services in the future. Hopefully, as a result of this report, both the government and the opposition, as we lead up to the election, will come out with a response to the recommendations of the committee.

I turn now to the next dot point which is 'give presumptive cancer WorkCover compensation reforms to CFS firefighters', as the government's current bill only covers MFS firefighters. We have debated it this morning. I place on the record, so that those reading this can see, that the majority of the Legislative Council did support the Hon. Tammy Franks' amendment and therefore also the recommendation that I am talking about now from the select committee. Before the other house, the government has to make a decision on whether they are going to accept the amendment or possibly not have the bill. It would be very sad if they do not have the bill because we want to see Country Fire Service volunteers and paid Metropolitan Fire Service firefighters getting proper WorkCover compensation where cancer has clearly occurred as a result of their work.

The next point is that the committee has recommended an audit of all state government land used by volunteer safety services—for example, the CFS or SES halls or stations—and that consideration be given to gifting, or providing at reduced peppercorn rental, that land to those organisations. They are asking for that.

The next dot point in the key findings is to consider providing rebates to councils which do not feel that they can charge full commercial rent on volunteer safety land. When the emergency services levy act came in, it was clear that the day-to-day responsibility and funding were going to be removed from the council, as the councils would then be funded through the emergency services levy. Some councils have been generous. I would encourage councils to do that if that is their intent, but for other councils it is having a financial impact. We ask that consideration be given to providing rebates to councils, as they do not feel that they can charge full commercial rent on volunteer safety agencies' land.

The last key dot point is to consider including St John Ambulance into eligibility to receive emergency services levy support if other services' funding also has increased. The committee acknowledges that St John Ambulance cannot be included in eligibility for funding at the detriment to further reductions in the budget of other emergency services. However, we are saying that, whilst there needs to be an increase in their budgets for the reasons I have briefly outlined in my remarks, St John Ambulance should be part of it. I strongly agree with this. I happened to see the mobile headquarters for St John coming through our district only a couple of days ago, after it had been down at Schoolies Week. That is just the sort of example—

The Hon. D.W. Ridgway: You were there?

The Hon. R.L. BROKENSHIRE: I'm not a schoolie anymore.

Members interjecting:

The Hon. R.L. BROKENSHIRE: I do want to get back to the subject matter, and that is that St John also does a magnificent job, and it should be involved in the funding within the emergency services levy.

Finally, I want to put on the public record that the Cherryville community appreciates the work of the Hon. David Ridgway, who did move an amendment to get us working a little bit harder when it comes to this select committee. The Hon. David Ridgway was very concerned about the incident at Cherryville in May this year, so he moved an amendment to request that we also look at Cherryville.

Members went to Cherryville to meet with both the CFS and landholders. In fact, thanks to the Hon. John Dawkins, we also invited members of the Natural Resources Committee. A good friend of mine and everyone in this house, Robyn Geraghty MP, came with us on behalf of the Natural Resources Committee because that committee was also doing an inquiry into that area. As I said, we met with the CFS and we met with community members, and we did a site visit.

The Legislative Council asked the committee to consider a reference on this matter. The key finding from this reference was that we believe that there were deficiencies in both weather reporting and fire danger matrices; they were the primary reasons the Cherryville bushfire was not contained earlier. The committee requests that the agencies have a look at the processes around weather reporting and fire danger matrices.

I believe that it was a worthwhile committee. There is a lot of detailed reporting there and the evidence from all the witnesses. I am sure that all members are interested and committed to community safety and emergency services, and I would encourage them to use it as a blueprint in the future as they work through policy and funding for these most important organisations. Finally, I place on the record my appreciation for the work of all the wonderful volunteers and paid officers and for their excellent commitment to protecting lives and property in South Australia.

The Hon. K.J. MAHER (16:44): I echo the last paragraph of the statement about the great work that many, many volunteers do. I would like to thank the members of the committee and the staff for their very diligent work. I particularly thank the Chair, my mate farmer Brokey, hero of the ABC!

Many of the issues raised by this committee are covered in recommendations made by the Holloway review of the Fire and Emergency Services Act. One of the issues covered by the committee that was not raised in that review was about the emergency services levy. I think it is important to note that, since the introduction of the emergency services levy in 1999, the formula for funding has not changed.

I think there was some comment in the report, and others have made, that somehow the formula has changed and people are getting less. The formula has not changed since it was introduced. In fact, some of the groups which called to be included in the emergency services levy funding and are not included really need to look at the design, by whoever was the emergency services minister back then when it was designed, that decided to exclude them from the funding at the time.

Members interjecting:

The Hon. K.J. MAHER: Whoever it was. In relation to the extra area the committee looked at, the Cherryville fires, it was good for someone who is not exceptionally familiar with fire matters to hear various opinions from various witnesses about what could have been done differently at the time.

The use of firebombing aircraft was a significant issue for many witnesses, about what difference that may or may not have made and whether it is best or whether it should be used in conjunction with ground forces. One important thing to note is that the evidence from the department was that the use of such aircraft is made completely independently of financial considerations. If aircraft are needed to be used, they are used, and financial considerations are not taken into account.

The final thing I want to touch on is volunteering. Again, we heard from many very dedicated volunteers who clearly save tens of millions of dollars for the state by giving up their precious time and putting their lives at risk in volunteering in many of these areas. The committee heard that there was a whole range of reasons that volunteering is becoming more difficult. Some of the factors include an ageing population, different life/work balance issues, and a general decline in people's involvement in volunteer organisations in general. I wish to thank all the members for their efforts on this committee and, with that, I close my remarks.

The Hon. J.S.L. DAWKINS (16:47): I rise to speak in regard to this report, and in doing so I speak on behalf of my colleague the Hon. Jing Lee, who is faithful enough to let me speak on her behalf.

We express our support for the recommendations made by the committee, and I certainly enjoyed the work on the committee. As the Hon. Mr Brokenshire mentioned, there was some overlap with the current work of the Natural Resources Committee, which has been doing quite a bit of work in relation to bushfires and the community involvement of our emergency services in relation to that. We will certainly canvass those matters later on this afternoon in relation to another report.

I think the one thing that came out of the evidence for me—and we took evidence from a wide range of groups across the whole band, a wide array of groups in the community safety and emergency services sector—was that there was no evidence of support for, but particularly of any consultation about, the establishment of the community safety directorate.

It seemed as if the creation of the community safety directorate was done on the back of an envelope and following the appointment of other people to other positions in other parts of the government, and I will not go any further with that. But there was no evidence of any consultation with any of the government bodies or even the non-government bodies in that sector. I think that is something that is of great concern and shows that the minister at the time made a kneejerk reaction to not getting her way on an appointment to another position.

I would like to briefly refer to a couple of the recommendations. Recommendation 11 is one that I feel very strongly about, that is, that government agencies work closely with the Bureau of Meteorology and radio stations that broadcast emergency service announcements to ensure the earliest possible determination of and communications about dangerous bushfire conditions. While it could be said that this relates only to our extended reference to look at the Cherryville fire—and I will talk more about that at the moment—I think it does relate to the fact that so many of our emergency service organisations—both funded by the state government or from the non-government sector—are not only involved in the community reaction to major bushfires but also, of course, other associated situations that cause community concern.

I think that recommendation that we get that early advice is very important. In many cases, the declaration of a catastrophic fire day has been done later in the piece on the previous day, and it seems from evidence that we heard that this advice could be put out into the community earlier with the use of Bureau of Meteorology information and by accessing time from those radio stations which broadcast the announcements on the day of a bad bushfire. We think they could do that the day before. That was one recommendation that I was very keen on. Recommendation 13 states:

That the obligation (following the passage of the Fire and Emergency Services (Review) Amendment Bill 2009) for Chief Fire Officers (CFS and MFS), to require State agencies to clean up fire risk on their land, and to make similar requests to Commonwealth agencies, be strongly implemented.

I could not point that out any more strongly if I was asked to, because I think this is very important not only in relation to the Cherryville reference but in relation to any bushfire situation. Certainly those of us who went on the site visit to Cherryville were alerted to the amount of crown land in very close proximity to the Cherryville fire. Some of that crown land was under the control of national parks or DEWNR, but quite a significant amount of it was actually forestry land and, rather remarkably, I suppose, for some of us who like to think we are good at geography, the southern tip of the Mount Crawford Forest comes down to Cherryville.

I have been very strong on this in recent times and I was responsible for changing that act by amendment in 2009 to make sure that the chief fire officers made those requests—they are not able to require the commonwealth agencies, but to make the requests to the commonwealth agencies—to clean up the fire risk because there are many cases where government-owned land can exacerbate a fire situation, particularly in close proximity to housing or closely settled agricultural land.

I have already mentioned the extended reference to the Cherryville fire. It was an extraordinary situation. I think most people were surprised that we would have a fire day like that in May, after the end of the fire ban period and after, as we learnt, the period in which the CFS has an arrangement with the water bomber facilities. On the day of that fire a number of members of parliament were in the APY lands with the Natural Resources Committee. It was actually hotter here in Adelaide than it was in the APY lands and, of course, the conditions were also conducive to a bad fire.

It is a fact that those of us who went on the site visit to Cherryville found it very instructive, as is generally the case—I think seeing is believing. The committee received evidence officially from local residents and CFS staff and volunteers on site about the various aspects of what happened that day and whether water bombers should have been called in earlier and whether that would have assisted the volunteers on the ground in any great respect. There are arguments on both sides of that position.

However, as I have said before in this place, as someone who, as a flat country firefighter went and fought the Ash Wednesday fires in the Adelaide Hills in 1980 and 1983, it is easy to be wise in hindsight. We should always remember that, when criticisms are made of the CFS or other fire services about decisions that are made on the spot, in the heat of the moment, and someone has to make a decision to do something, it is very easy to criticise them after the event. I am not saying that sometimes those decisions should not come under some scrutiny. However, when fighting a fire, particularly in that sort of terrain where the direction of the fire can change instantly and can be life threatening, it must be remembered that decisions have to be made on the spot. We should always remember that.

One of the pieces of evidence that was most instructive to me about the Cherryville fire was delivered to us by Mr Merv Robinson, a volunteer officer with the Yarcowie CFS group. Mr Robinson was directed to our committee by the member for Stuart in another place. Mr Robinson has fought a number of fires in the Mount Remarkable area and, of course, the terrain in that area is very similar to the Mount Lofty Ranges, it is just that there is nothing like the population, as one would understand.

Mr Robinson led a strike team from the Yarcowie group in the Mid North that went down to Cherryville. He gave very valuable evidence, as an independent person, someone who has fought a lot of fires in very difficult terrain, but he did not come to us with some of the local knowledge that might be valuable but sometimes does give you a view on something that might not be as objective as at other times. I do not point that comment at anybody in particular who gave evidence because we had some evidence from local residents and officers of the CFS, staff and volunteers, that was conflicting. I think Mr Robinson put it into perspective as an independent person in the way he saw the events unfold in the less than 24 hours that they were there. I think if anybody in the parliament or outside would like to get some instruction on the events surrounding that fire, it would be interesting to read Mr Robinson's evidence. With those remarks, I commend the report to the council.

Motion carried.

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