Jill Hall (Shortland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On Thursday, 17 October, Shortland electorate was ravaged by bushfires. People from the Central Coast were evacuated to Doyalson RSL and Swansea RSL. I thank the Rural Fire Service for the fantastic job that they did in protecting the homes of people in that area. There are many people in the Central Coast part of my electorate who live in relocatable home parks. Those people are elderly and they live amongst the bush. They would have been in great difficulties without the service of the Rural Fire Service, without the generous donations from Coles and Woolworths and without the staff at Doyalson RSL and Swansea RSL who worked through the night to provide accommodation for the people who were involved in the fires. I thank the RSPCA for the fine work that they did with the animals who were injured and I thank everybody who added support. I would like to put in a special word in for the Medicare Local, which helped those people who had left their medications behind to be able to obtain vital, life-saving medication. I encourage everyone to have in place a fire evacuation plan if they live in an area that is likely to be hit by fires.