Julie Collins (Franklin, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Ageing and Seniors) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On behalf of my constituents, last week when we were talking in this place about the impact of the recent Australian bushfires, I talked briefly about the impact on my community, which had bad bushfires just 12 months ago, and how long it takes to recover. Of course, Tasmania has sadly been hit by far too many catastrophic bushfires—the Dunalley bushfires, the '67 bushfires. They impact families and locals not just for days, weeks and months but for years and, indeed, for decades. We need to ensure that all Australians, as they have been retraumatised by these bushfires if they've experienced them before and as they deal with the current bushfires, get the support they need not just in the weeks and months ahead but in the years ahead. This will take years to recover from. It will take a generation for some people to recover from the trauma of what has happened during this bushfire season.

On behalf of my constituents, I want to pass on my sincere condolences to the families and loved ones of the at least 34 Australians who have died during these bushfires. It is a tragedy that so many Australians have been killed during this bushfire season. It's a tragedy for those families that have lost their homes. It's a tragedy for the Australian fauna and flora that have been impacted by these bushfires. Indeed, it is a tragedy for the nation.

We should have been better prepared for these bushfires. That is the truth of it. We were warned. We were warned by former fire chiefs. We were warned by Ross Garnaut more than a decade ago about the impact and future impact of bushfires in this country. We need to be better prepared. The climate is going to be changing more frequently. We are going to have longer bushfire seasons. We are going to have fiercer, more intense fires and we need to be better prepared.

I am concerned about the way that this government has been slow to act. I am concerned that day after day we continue to hear stories about businesses, communities and individuals who can't get access to the support that is supposed to be there for them—for those people who are trying to access Centrelink payments, for those people who are trying to access small business grants and loans, for those people who are trying their very best to survive and to get medical and health care in some of these communities. The stories are endless. We know that this happens after every bushfire but, as I said, we as a nation should have been much better prepared—much better prepared indeed.

I also want to thank the millions of community service workers in community organisations and thank the volunteer firefighters who are out and about. I know that many Tasmanian career firefighters and volunteer firefighters have repaid some of the kindness and support that were shown to our community last year by travelling to the mainland to fight these ferocious fires. I say to all of the volunteer firefighters and firefighters across Australia and all of the emergency service workers, the first responders, the park staff and the forestry workers: thank you for everything you do on behalf of our community every single day during these bushfire seasons and, of course, beyond that.

In recent days, we have of course seen floods in some of the areas that have also been impacted by drought and by bushfires. We are a nation of flood and fire, but this year we've seen much worse and, sadly, I think it's going to get worse again in years to come. We need to be better prepared as a nation. We need our states and territories to work with the Commonwealth and we need the Commonwealth to show some leadership. We need to get much better at this. The government should've been prepared, and it was not. It needs to do better.

Craig Kelly (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Back in 1992, with the help of a very friendly bank manager, I bought my first house, in a suburb called Alfords Point. I was about one house away from a road. There was a house in front of me with an easement up the side, there was a road and there was a bit of a strip and then in front of us there was a national park which went down to the Georges River.

I remember taking my old grandmother there to proudly show her the house that I'd selected and bought, and was going to do up, to see what her opinion was. At the time she was going a bit senile and she would sometimes make some very silly comments. She saw the place and said: 'Oh, you've got to be so careful with bushfires. That bush is so close to you. Your house could be at risk of burning down from a bushfire.' I looked at it, and it was a good sixty or seventy yards away. I thought to myself, as often young blokes do, 'Silly old woman! What would she know?'

In early 1994, about two years later, we had some catastrophic bushfire weather in Sydney. I'd left to go to a wedding, and I can remember the north-westerly wind howling at the church. A message came over the radio that there were fires at Alfords Point and Menai, so I left the wedding and rushed back to my place. I got as far as the shops at Alfords Point. I remember that the police had it blocked off. It looked as though the entire suburb had been burnt down. I can remember it to this day: at that time, the school fence was like half a telegraph pole cut off with a bit of wire wrapped around it—not the large green gates we have today—and those stumps had caught on fire. There was a palm tree on fire in the front of a house just opposite the shops.

A division having been called in the House of Representatives—

Sitting suspended from 17:01 to 17:14

I was reflecting on my first real experiences with bushfires. As I was saying, I'd returned from the church service for a wedding of a mate and got back to the suburb of Alfords Point. As far back as I could get was the shops, which are at the top of a hill. Looking across Alfords Point, it looked as though every single house in the suburb had actually been burned to the ground. I can remember the posts in front of the school, which at the time were half telegraph posts, were actually on fire. There were palm trees on fire in front of houses backing onto the main road. I saw things happen that, in my life, I did not think would be physically possible. I remember that at that moment I thought back to what my grandmother told me. I thought about how little I knew about bushfire and bushfire activity. In that tragic period over those couple of days, over 100 houses were burnt out in the Como, Jannali, Alfords Point, Bangor and Menai region, and one life was tragically lost. I can remember there were houses that were burnt out that, in a million years, you wouldn't think would not be safe from a bushfire.

Since that time, when I realised how little I knew, I've done everything I can to learn about bushfires. Since I was elected to this position, with that area in my electorate—an area so fire prone and with such a history of bushfires—I've done everything I can both to support our local Rural Fire Service and to try to educate the public about how bad and catastrophic bushfires in Australian forests can be. Until I'd seen it with my own eyes, there was nothing I could have read and no photograph or TV image that could have made me appreciate how drastic, catastrophic and dangerous those fires are in the Australian landscape.

When we had those fires starting back in October and November, in one of my last speeches in this place before we broke up before Christmas, when we'd already seen close to 1.65 million hectares burnt out, I said, 'Our history tells us that there could be a lot more to come as this is well short of our record.' And we saw that over those weeks over Christmas and New Year.

We've seen, even amongst the tragedy, the best of Australians. We've seen the magnificent work of our Rural Fire Service. In the electorate of Hughes, we luckily had a very low number of fires in our area compared to previous years. We had one in the royal national park that was actually suspiciously lit right on the turn of the winds on the most catastrophic day. That is still being investigated. The only reason an investigation was made was that, by sheer chance, a Black Hawk helicopter was flying over the national park doing some standard observations and training and it was able to see someone acting suspiciously. The other major fire—when I say 'major fire', it was very insignificant compared to what we've seen—of any significance in the area was at Voyager Point—again, a fire that is under suspicion of arson. The magnificent work that we've seen of the Rural Fire Service, our volunteers and our communities coming together says something very special about our Australian community.

I would have liked to leave my comments on the condolence motion there, but during this condolence motion some members have taken it upon themselves to criticise the government, say the government is somehow to blame and try to use the tragedy of the bushfires to push their climate change agenda. We must deal in facts and we must deal in the science. We know that at the end of last year, 2019, the levels of CO2 in the atmosphere were 0.0411. That's around 411.85 parts per million. What is Australia's contribution? If Australia had adopted some carbon policy in the past, would this have made a difference, as people make out?

We can do the maths. We can go back to December 1999, before the turn of the century, and the fear of the Y2K bug. Every single Australian could have marched up onto high cliffs and jumped lemming-like into the ocean, and we could have had zero emissions of CO2 since 1 January 2000. Instead of the CO2 in the atmosphere being 411.85 parts per million, it would have been 411.2 parts per million. The idea that could have any effect whatsoever on global temperatures and therefore have a knock-on effect on bushfires is just preposterous nonsense. And yet this is what we hear implied indirectly and directly by members of the opposition and some people in the minor parties, as though there's some change that this government could have made to do it.

What we could also have looked at is the argument that maybe that increase of CO2 of 411 parts per million in the atmosphere did have some effect on the fires. There is some truth in that, because we know, if we read the science, that there has been a global greening—an increase in forest cover worldwide—over the last 20 years. The scientists put about 70 per cent of that down to an increase in CO2 in the atmosphere. So yes, it's highly likely that, because of that added CO2, our native bush is growing faster than it otherwise would. That is what the science tells us. Our response to that should be to ensure that we are getting those hazard reduction burns done. A seven-year cycle is recommended to make sure that you have some low-level burning on the inner faces close to communities. No-one says hazard reduction is a panacea or a cure, because we know that, in every single year that passes, the bush grows back and it becomes more hazardous. The leaf litter on the floor increases every single year after the back-burn is done.

Again, if we look through the history of our nation, if we look back to the 1939 bushfires of this nation and read through the royal commission report after it, we can see that the amount of hazard reduction burning being done was ridiculously inadequate in 1939. Then we come to the royal commission after the 2009 bushfires in Victoria. They recommended a minimum of five per cent hazard reduction burns of public land being undertaken every year, and yet in New South Wales and Victoria we've seen less than two per cent. In the Victorian forests, over the last five years something like a million hectares less of forest area is treated by hazard reduction than the royal commission recommended. That is not just my opinion; that is the opinion of some of the most experienced fire professionals and scientists that have researched this over decades.

Professor Robert Scagel, a forest microclimate specialist from British Columbia, said:

Fuel load rules. Spending resources and intellectual capital on climate change considerations are as effective at mitigating bushfires as changing the colour of the paper used in reporting them.

David Packham, one of our senior former CSIRO bushfire researchers, said the fires have nothing to do with climate change and everything to do with fuel loads. It is also arguable that the increased temperature we have seen—a one-degree increase in temperature over the last 100 years—has some effect on the bushfires. That is an arguable case. But, if you look at how we calculate the forest fire index and the mathematical equation for that, a one-degree increase in temperature has a very minor effect on our forest fire index. In fact, a one-degree increase in temperature is offset by a 1½-kilometre-an-hour decrease in wind speed. It is the variability in wind speed and the dryness of the environment that has the major effect on how intensely our forest fires burn.

Some may argue that the dryness of the environment is caused by climate change, and I've often heard that there's a drying environment and that this is climate change. They say, 'This is what the science says.' Well, that is not what the science says. The IPCC, the International Panel on Climate Change, talk about drought and the linkages to CO2, and I will quote directly from their AR5 report. It says:

There is low confidence in attributing changes in drought over global land areas since the mid-20th century to human influence owing to observational uncertainties and difficulties in distinguishing decadal-scale variability in drought from long-term trends.

They also say that there's:

High confidence for droughts during the last millennium of greater magnitude and longer duration than those observed since the beginning of the 20th century in many regions.

So there is no link between drought and climate change. Even a peer-reviewed scientific paper released in August last year said:

… seasonal and annual precipitation over the last century is found to be stationary in most (but not all) regions. These findings suggest that the Australian precipitation has largely remained within the bounds of observed variability …

That's the science, yet we have people out there basically quoting what is nothing other than superstition to try to make a political point, take advantage and exploit these bushfires. That is a disgrace.

These bushfires are one of Australia's truly great tragedies. We owe it to those who lost their lives to make sure that an investigation is carried out so that we can do everything we can to try to minimise the impact of fire in the future. That requires following the science and telling the truth.

Josh Wilson (Fremantle, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for the Environment) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'm glad to join with colleagues across the parliament in reflecting on a terrible and unprecedented summer of bushfires. The summer will be remembered as Australia's first national climate change disaster. It has occurred on a scale never seen before. It has exacted a brutal toll. It reinforces the fact that Australia will be among the countries most acutely affected by the warming of our planet as a result of unchecked greenhouse gas emissions. Our heart goes out to those who have lost loved ones and to those who have seen their homes and farms, their pets and livestock, and their local communities ravaged by fire. We know that this summer isn't over yet. We know that the harm of these catastrophic fire events will be a dark cloud cast forward for years to come, and some of the worst harm and the most painful losses will be with us forever.

In Western Australia, we've been fortunate so far in avoiding large-scale threats to populated areas, although we've not been free from the impact of bushfire. WA's unique south-west biodiversity hotspot has been scorched by repeat fires in areas like the Stirling Range National Park and the Fitzgerald Biosphere. Three fires since 2015 in the Cape Arid National Park have put the western ground parrot at severe risk. In my own electorate of Fremantle, there have been several fires in urban bush reserves. On 3 January, a fire that started in Atwell jumped the Kwinana Freeway, causing a halt to both traffic and train services and threatening homes. On the same day, a fire in Spearwood was brought under control before it could harm local neighbourhoods or spread into the precious Manning Park reserve. In December, there was a fire that started overnight in Sir Frederick Samson Park, an important Bush Forever reserve in the middle of a suburban community. But, for most of the summer, we've watched the events on the eastern seaboard with concern and heartache for our fellow Australians, for friends and family and for the livestock and native fauna, especially endangered species and threatened ecosystems.

I want to acknowledge the more than 300 men and women from WA, including members of the Jandakot and South Coogee fire brigades in my electorate, who flew east to be part of the incredible effort by professional and volunteer firefighters to battle the fires and save lives. I want to acknowledge the contribution that many Western Australians have made through donations to the relief and recovery effort. I say to them: if you haven't done so already, can you please make a donation in the time to come. Thanks should go to the City of Cockburn, which has donated $15,000 to fire affected communities in New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia, and to the City of Fremantle, which donated $10,000 to the Freo Fire Fund, established through the wonderful Fremantle Foundation after a suggestion by long-time and irrepressible community activist Robby Lang.

On the Friday before last, I attended the first of two Fire Aid concerts at the Fremantle Arts Centre, organised by Phil Stevens, featuring The Waifs, John Butler, San Cisco, Stella Donnelly and Carla Geneve. Every input to the event was provided free so that all ticket proceeds could go where they're needed. That totalled more than $650,000—as the concert poster said, 'From WA, with love.'

Around the world, people have watched the fires in Australia with heartfelt sympathy and with sober recognition of what climate change means for us all. For a few days in the middle of January, I had the privilege of visiting Bangladesh with a number of parliamentary colleagues thanks to Save the Children's Regional Leadership Initiative. The focus of the trip was Australia's development assistance projects aimed at saving lives, reducing poverty and increasing education and gender equality, especially in ultrapoor communities where people survive on less than US$1 a day and generally on fewer than two meals a day.

As we grapple with the brewing impacts of climate change in Australia, it's sobering to consider what faces a nation like Bangladesh. It's especially sobering to consider the one million Rohingya refugees from Myanmar who exist in makeshift camps in one of the most cyclone-prone areas on the planet. But, notwithstanding the gravity of the challenges they face, the very first thing the members of the Bangladesh parliament wanted to do was to express condolence for the bushfires in Australia. They also expressed hope that the international community would get serious about reducing carbon emissions, and they made the point that there are no climate change deniers in Bangladesh.

In terms of the environmental impact of these fires, let's not underestimate the extraordinary harm that's been done to the continent whose stewardship is our responsibility. Before we take stock of what's just occurred, we should note that we are already in the grip of an acute biodiversity crisis. It's no exaggeration to describe it as an extinction crisis.

Much has been made of the letter to the Prime Minister from the former fire chiefs. But there was another letter to the Prime Minister, from 248 scientists, in October last year, which in respect of the extinction crisis said:

Our current laws are failing because they are too weak, have inadequate review and approval processes, and are not overseen by an effective compliance regime.

To date, what we have heard from the government, including from the Minister for the Environment, is that the focus should be on slashing so-called green tape. That's code—and it's not a very complicated code—for weakening environmental protections. How perverse would it be if our response to the devastation of this season's bushfires would be to further deplete our already fragile biodiversity? We need an environment policy with a clear priority of steeply improving environmental outcomes, not further bending our landscape and its creatures into profit-yielding stress positions.

When this fire season is over, we must consider the inadequacy of our environmental protection framework in addition to the inadequate preparations for community safety. As we turn our attention to the process of recovery and see homes and communities rebuilt and find solace in landscapes that shift slowly from black to green, let's not be blind to the permanent harm that has occurred. In some cases, areas that have been forests will no longer be forests. The ecology will be fundamentally changed. What was there before will not grow back. It's likely that some endangered species have already been pushed to extinction.

I said at the outset that this summer will be remembered as Australia's first national climate change disaster. But we shouldn't regard it as a wake-up call, because that call has been made in various forms for years. The only question is: when are we going to answer that repeated and urgent call to get serious about climate change? When, as a developed, adaptable, outward-looking and ingenious nation that also happens to be one of the highest carbon emitters on the planet on a per capita basis, are we going to get our act together? And when, for the sake of our citizens' safety and the sake of our health, our environment and our economy, are we going to heed and follow the science, address the harm that is already upon us and stop that harm getting much worse by taking action in Australia and by being a concerted, leading, wholehearted participant in global action?

Stephen Jones (Whitlam, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Over this summer, the 'black summer', we've faced bushfires on a scale never seen before. On the South Coast, it's been known as the 'forever fire'. It's estimated that more than 17 million hectares have burnt across the nation. More than 33 people, tragically, have died. In New South Wales, over 2,400 houses have been destroyed. It's estimated that one billion animals have perished, with many more species expected to be now endangered after habitat loss. The fact is: it's not yet over. We welcome the rains; the rains have put out a lot of the fires in my area. But it's not yet over—the fires are still burning down the far South Coast.

Locally, Deputy Captain Geoff Keaton, 32, and firefighter Andrew O'Dwyer, 36, died when their truck rolled after a tree fell onto the cabin of the truck that they were driving, near Buxton. They'd fought the Green Wattle Creek blaze. It took two months to contain. These two men were not alone, sadly. They were joined by seven other firefighters on other firegrounds who made the ultimate sacrifice while protecting people's lives and people's homes. I pay my respects and offer my condolences to their families and colleagues, some of whom I've met, and to all of those men and women who lost their lives over this fire season.

To our firefighters of both Fire and Rescue New South Wales and our volunteer brigade, the Rural Fire Service, together with all of those emergency responders from the ambulance, the police, the SES, the Australian Defence Force, local hospital staff and more—all the volunteer organisations, the Red Cross and St Vincent de Paul: you're a real credit to our nation and our community. To you I say: you can be very proud of what you've done. You can be very proud of what you continue to do. And you have the deepest thanks from our entire community.

I do want to champion and give special thanks to our local RFS volunteers—firstly, to the Southern Highlands district crew. They've been on fire operations since August 2019. They've been deployed across New South Wales, to towns such as Glen Innes, Tenterfield, Drake, Grafton, Coffs Harbour and Casino. They've been here in Canberra, and over in Wauchope, Hawkesbury and Braidwood. They've also been deployed to the Gold Coast hinterland. Since the end of October, crews have worked in the Green Wattle Creek fire, protecting the local towns of Warragamba, Silverdale, Oakdale, The Oaks, Orangeville, Werombi, Lakesland, Thirlmere, Coridjah, Buxton, Balmoral, Hill Top, Tahmoor, Bargo, Yanderra, Yerrinbool, Mount Jellore, High Range, Wombeyan and Taralga. We rattle the names off, but each and every one of those was an incident where the fires crews' lives were at stake and they were fighting to save local communities and to try to halt the rapid spread of these terrible fires.

Since the first week of January, when the Currowan fires breached the Shoalhaven River just south of us, they have been working on the Morton fire, protecting Meryla, Bundanoon, Penrose, Wingello and Tallong. In some places they couldn't prevent the loss of property and wildlife. In other places, they have been successful. This particular district has over 1,000 volunteer members. I've met with many of them. I can say: at this end of the fire season, they're well and truly buggered.

Down on the coast where I live, in the Illawarra district, the RFS has been in the field since September. Crews from the Illawarra have deployed over 145 strike teams, which are fire trucks with four to five firefighters each. The district has around 3,000 volunteers in total. They started the fire season off in Queensland and in Northern New South Wales, before moving to the Gospers Mountain blaze and the Hawkesbury, then the Green Wattle Creek and the Morton blazes in the highlands, then the Currowan fire down the coast, before moving on to where they were last week, in Queanbeyan and in Canberra and on the far South Coast.

The sacrifice made and the risks that these men and women and their families have faced are profound, and the toll on our communities if they had not been fighting for us is unimaginable. Towns would have been lost. Literally thousands of homes and many tens of thousands of lives have been saved because of their efforts to contain, control and extinguish these fires. Our community thanks you because you are the rarest of things—unassuming heroes.

During the recent blazes, the Dunmore RFS made headlines when a fire truck was overrun by wildfire in just three minutes in Tomerong in early January—a flashover. I spoke to two of the crew who were involved in that after the incident. They were still visibly shaken by what they'd experienced. They activated their cabin sprays and took defensive measures. Luckily, they all survived and within 10 minutes—remarkably—they were out there defending the property that they'd gone down that track to defend. This is the sort of heroism that we're all in awe of.

A division having been called in the House of Representatives—

Sitting suspended from 17:41 to 17 : 52

Milton Dick (Oxley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to enter the debate today and to add my support for the condolence motion moved by the Prime Minister and seconded by the Leader of the Opposition. As we know, this summer has been one of the toughest that many Australians can remember for a very, very long time. Right across our country, from my home state of Queensland down through the southern states and all the way across to the west, people's lives and towns and our native animals have been destroyed by the bushfires and drought which continue to ravage our nation. This has been the most challenging time that many Australians will face in their lifetime. I, along with many of my colleagues on both sides of the House, today rise to pay my respects, to acknowledge those who have had their lives taken, those who have had their livelihoods destroyed and the extremely brave men and women who have worked tirelessly to protect as much as they could.

Almost every day over the long, hot summer, we have seen footage and heard stories about things that we couldn't have fathomed would be happening to our beautiful country. The skies glowed red and the air filled with smoke as we all could hear the deafening roar of the flames on our televisions, across our news channels, and the high-pitched sounds of the sirens of the emergency services, who were putting their own lives in danger to protect others. Sadly more than 30 people have lost their lives this summer due to the catastrophic bushfires. We send our condolences to the families and friends of those taken too soon. Included among them are a number of emergency service personnel who made the greatest sacrifice to save others. There can be no question that they did exactly that. Their lives were not taken in vain, as we know for certain that they helped to protect thousands of hectares of land as well as buildings, animals and, indeed, fellow Australians who remained safe because of their brave acts.

I especially want to acknowledge and mention the three American firefighters who were killed when their C-130 water-bombing aircraft crashed in the Snowy Monaro region. These were three family men who were simply doing what mates do when they hear the call for help: they roll up their sleeves and get to work. This is exactly what Australians did during the toughest of times. They came together, got around each other and supported their communities in their darkest hour.

It is a staggering figure: more than 2,000 homes have been lost and more than 11 million hectares of bush, forest and parks across Australia has been burned. In South Australia alone, it is estimated that around 25,000 koalas were killed when flames devastated Kangaroo Island on 9 January. Here in the capital of Australia, Canberra, we've seen some of the worst smoke pollution, with air quality rated the third-worst of all major global cities on 3 January and plumes of smoke travelling more than 7,000 miles across the Pacific. My home state of Queensland has also been significantly impacted by the bushfires over the summer. Since August Queensland has experienced more than 3,000 bushfires, over 250,000 hectares have been burnt and more than 50 homes have been lost. This number would have been far greater if not for the amazing efforts of emergency services personnel, the leadership of local governments and of course the Queensland government.

Whilst it would be impossible to be there 100 per cent for every situation, the Queensland government and local governments have been working hard to ensure that our state is as well-prepared as possible for bushfire seasons. This includes holding more than 60 open days at fire stations last year to better prepare communities for bushfires, on top of the million hectares that were control-burned last year to manage the fire risk. On behalf of the community—indeed all Queenslanders—I want to pass on my thanks to the Premier of Queensland, the mayors affected in local government, the state ministers and, of course, the Queensland Disaster Management group and local disaster management groups across all of our regions.

I particularly want to acknowledge the work of Minister David Littleproud, who stepped up, didn't let politics get in the road and delivered for many regional communities. Can I also put on record my thanks and appreciation to previous acting fire commissioner, Mike Wassing, and to the new Queensland Fire Commissioner, Gregory Leach, for their outstanding leadership through these tough times. It is only by the guidance and teamwork of our disaster emergency teams that so much land and indeed people's lives have been able to be saved.

In my electorate of Oxley, it's been great to see the community come together to support those affected by fires. In my remaining remarks today I want to acknowledge just a few of the very special groups, organisations and individuals who came together to support their fellow Australians in need. I would like to acknowledge the Darra Jindalee Catholic Parish, which held a special garage sale just two weeks ago. I want to acknowledge all the volunteers and Khaleel Petrus and his family for all of their hard work. Thank you to the Durack Inala Bowls Club, which ran a megaraffle with all proceeds going to the Lions Foundation bushfire appeal. Thank you to the secretary and tireless worker Jenny Horne. Thank you to the Wolston Park Golf Club, a club I am proud to be a patron of, for raising funds week in, week out.

Thank you, of course, to the community of Forest Lake, where my electorate office is located, who held an amazing Australia Day free barbecue, picnic and bushfire appeal. It was a huge success, with a huge crowd attending to show their support. It was wonderful to see so many people across the Forest Lake community—local community groups, churches, small businesses—all coming together with a shared goal to raise funds for the bushfire appeal. The team exceeded their goal by raising almost $3,000 for the bushfire appeal. Thanks to so many community groups, residents, community leaders. And of course thanks to our local councillor, Charles Strunk, and his Forest Lake ward office for all of their efforts in organising such a special event.

A local restaurant in my community, in Jindalee, La Bonne Saigon, held a charity event. It was organised by the amazing owners Hein Nguyen and her family and by Lisa Scott, the manager, along with a group of talented Vietnamese singers. They joined forces to organise a charity fundraising dinner, with profits going to the bushfire relief appeal.

I also want to acknowledge one of the local councillors in my area, Councillor Angela Owen, the councillor for Calamvale Ward, for coordinating the collection of dignity packs for East Gippsland Rotary Fire Aid. There were 2,306 dignity packs containing approximately $40,000 worth of stock donated and delivered to Bairnsdale, East Gippsland. Thank you to Councillor Angela Owen. Thanks also to the Rotary Club of Forest Lake for coordinating and donating 100 packs and assisting with the delivery of the packs to Toll for transport. This donation is a significant contribution to those families in need.

The Vietnamese Community in Australia, Queensland Chapter, have long had a history of looking after others and giving back to our community. Whether it be people here in Australia or around the world who are affected by natural disaster, such as floods and fire, the Vietnamese Community in Australia, Queensland Chapter, is renowned for being one of the most generous communities in Queensland. They will be holding a special fundraising dinner on 16 February, and I want to make special mention of the vice-president, Teresa Do, for all her efforts organising the event, alongside the president of the chapter, Dr Cuong Trong Bui OAM.

In closing, and on behalf of the people of Oxley, which is a generous community, I send my deepest condolences to all those who have lost loved ones due to the fires, and I send my sincerest thanks on behalf of the Oxley community to all of our emergency personnel, ADF and volunteers who put their lives on the line to keep us safe. Our community, and Australia, owes you a great debt.

Pat Conroy (Shortland, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for International Development and the Pacific) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in support of this motion which mourns the Australians who have lost their lives in this horrific bushfire season and pays tribute to the nation's emergency personnel and volunteers who have worked and continue to work with colleagues from New Zealand, the USA and Canada, amongst other nations, to battle blazes across the country. It's been a fire season of devastation, with 33 lives lost, including nine firefighters, more than 3,000 homes destroyed and 17 million hectares burned, taking with it countless wildlife and livestock. So many of our fellow Australians have lost loved ones, homes and livelihoods.

In my home state of New South Wales, 25 people have tragically lost their lives, including three volunteer firefighters and the three US crew members of a C-130 Large Air Tanker that crashed on 23 January. The number of homes lost in New South Wales stands at 2,418 and is expected to rise as damage assessments continue. More than 5.4 million hectares have been burnt and 18,000 head of livestock are dead. But right across Australia bushfires have taken their toll. In Victoria, three people have lost their lives, and 1½ million hectares have been burnt. The houses destroyed so far number 405, and more than 7,000 head of livestock have been lost. In South Australia, three people have died, 185 homes have been lost and 300,000 hectares have been burnt. In Queensland, 49 homes have been destroyed and more than 2½ million hectares have burnt. In Western Australia, two homes have been lost and 786,000 hectares burnt. In Tasmania, three houses have been lost and more than 36,000 hectares burnt. Fires have raged near the nation's capital as well, burning more than 85,000 hectares of land. Indeed, it was sobering for members of parliament to return to Canberra last week and see the blackened bush and smell the smoky air.

Near my home, in Lake Macquarie, fires have threatened homes and closed roads in Charlestown and Wangi, and the fire at Killingworth affected the M1 motorway. On the Central Coast, Charmhaven was impacted, and the Gospers Mountain fire threatened communities for several weeks. In the Hunter Valley, communities have been threatened by blazes the likes of which firefighters have never seen before. Some of these fires have been large in area. Others have hit hard and with great intensity. In the words of one firefighter: 'Our rule book says we should never take on a flame height in excess of three metres front-on. We didn't have that opportunity at North Rothbury. The flames were three or four times that height, but they were coming straight over Wine Country Drive, directly on top of houses. So we just had to throw the rule book out the window.' This is the challenge that confronted many, many people as they fought these fires.

I want to express my and my electorate's gratitude to the brave firefighters who risked their lives to save their fellow humans. Some of these firefighters have been serving for months on deployments throughout Australia. I thank you for your sacrifice and your service. I also recognise and thank the hundreds of maritime workers who were involved in rescuing and supplying their fellow stranded Australians. I give my thanks for the individual and collective acts of generosity we've seen throughout the community; people have donated goods and money.

In my position as shadow minister for international development and the Pacific, I also want to thank the governments of so many Pacific island nations who have sent personnel, typically from their armed forces, to help in this crisis. I thank those Pacific island nations for their generosity. These nations have much less resources than Australia, but individual citizens and governments have dug deep into their pockets to donate to the bushfire appeal. Thank you again for your contribution. I want to thank the ADF for their assistance at this time. I want to thank all the other emergency services personnel who have served and helped in this crisis.

I should also note that it was the local ABC radio that kept people informed of where evacuation centres were, when it was safe to return and what the impact was—and it was the local ABC radio that provided a space for the outpouring of community spirit. We really saw our nation come together, with people throughout the community helping in this crisis.

Next to every loss, as hard as it seems to believe at the time, is a win—a win in protecting homes and property, and a win in saving lives. We have seen incredible scenes this summer of orange skies and roaring flames, and always in the foreground are men and women with hoses in hand fighting to save communities and themselves. It takes incredible determination and courage, in the face of what we have seen this season, to push on and to keep fighting. Yet, that is what we've seen in every state of Australia.

There is no doubt that this bushfire season is a national emergency, one that requires a national response and national leadership. For even those who've not been directly affected by fires have been indirectly affected by smoke, by road closures, by interruptions to their holiday plans and by the water restrictions that have been made necessary by appalling drought. It is vital that we learn from this bushfire season; that we develop a comprehensive national response to meet the physical and mental needs of the communities affected; that we begin a national audit to identify and address the mass destruction of wildlife and habitats, as identified by the shadow minister for the environment, my colleague the member for Griffith; and that we start working on a national plan to provide financial support for volunteer firefighters.

Importantly, we must also sit down with the fire chiefs who warned about this disastrous fire season but were not listened to. We must heed the warnings of scientists who wrote to the Prime Minister earlier this month with a message that there is no strong, resilient Australia without deep cuts to greenhouse gas emissions.

In no way does it diminish our mourning for lost lives or our respect for brave firefighters to talk about climate change as a contributor to this horrific bushfire season. In no way does it diminish our determination to rebuild the communities affected to talk about the mitigation and adaptation that climate change requires us to make. As several hundred scientists wrote to the Prime Minister:

The current emission reduction targets of Australia and the world are insufficient and will commit us to 3°C or more of warming by the end of this century.

They continued:

We call on our leaders to unite to develop non-partisan, long-term policies that will enable the managed transition to net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 that the scientific evidence shows is required to avoid dangerous human-caused climate change.

There is no doubt that human-caused climate change is making fire seasons, and fire itself, worse. We are experiencing more frequent and more extreme fire weather conditions during summer, an earlier start to the fire season and a lengthening of the season into winter.

Fire management is becoming increasingly challenging. We must engage in the desperate task of mitigating our climate emissions. Adaptation will not be enough. If we just settle for adaptation now, what we've experienced through this awful spring and summer, and the winter to come, will not just be the new normal; it will be less than what we experience in the future if we allow global warming to exceed 3 degrees. What we saw this season, unfortunately, is, some would say, the new normal, but it can get worse if we just focus on adaptation. It is in the national interest and it is in the global interest to actually focus on mitigation to restrict global warming to well below two degrees Centigrade. Otherwise, what we've faced this season is a mere precursor to what will occur in the future. And I'm not being alarmist—I'm responding to the best scientific advice on what is occurring and what can occur in the future.

This is not something that our country can ignore. We owe it to the Australians who've lost their lives, to the families who've lost loved ones, to the communities who've lost businesses and livelihoods, and to the men and women who continue to stand firm in the face of the raging infernos we have seen bear down on Australia's summer. We owe it to all Australians to take real action on climate change.

On behalf of the people of Shortland, I pass on my condolences to everyone who has lost a loved one, to everyone who has lost a home or a business and to those mourning the loss of wildlife—one billion lost. And I pass on my great thanks for the sacrifice of the firefighters and other personnel who have helped us in this crisis.

Terri Butler (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for the Environment and Water) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It's a pleasure to follow my friend the member for Shortland, given the very thoughtful condolence speech that he's just made. I want to assure him, and everyone in this parliament, that I and my constituents in the federal electorate of Griffith on Brisbane's south side offer our deepest condolences to those affected by the national bushfire crisis. Of course, we've seen a horror summer, with 33 fatalities as a consequence of the bushfires and more than 3,000 homes lost. Businesses have been affected—some by physical damage, but many, many more by the economic loss that comes with the interruption that we've seen to the tourist season.

I think all Australians, when they saw the images of the children of some of the people who had been lost, would have been overwhelmed by grief, and it's very clear that our entire community has been united in that grief and in that mourning. That's why this condolence motion, an expression of the condolences of the entire Parliament of Australia to the people of Australia for their loss, is so apt.

I really want to thank the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition for deciding to devote the first day of the new year of the parliament to this condolence motion and to addressing the condolences that we all want to express to those who've lost people. With condolence must come gratitude for the sacrifices of the people that we lost over the summer and for the sacrifices of many more, whether they were volunteer firefighters, first responders, paramedics or other health professionals, or people who just stopped what they were doing, got together and made sure that the response was there.

Last week I drove from Canberra to Batemans Bay, where we had our shadow cabinet on Friday. I stopped at Nelligen, which is just outside Batemans Bay, for a burger with the lot. Can I recommend to every Australian: the burger with the lot at the River Cafe at Nelligen is delicious. I say that advisedly because these businesses are suffering. The owner told me a story of how the pub was suffering, how the caravan park had been closed for a very long time and how so many businesses were really suffering as a consequence of the bushfires. He told me his story, and many other people I've spoken to have told stories about how they were personally affected by the fires.

We couldn't help but be moved, could we, Deputy Speaker Gillespie, by the stories of people who, while their own houses were burning, were out there volunteering as firefighters to save their communities and to stand up for their communities. I was really moved by the words of the member for Eden-Monaro, who said that he and his local RSL—he's a veteran, as you know—had invited the fire service volunteers to march together with them on Anzac Day this year. And it's fitting, isn't it? Because I've heard so many people talk about how Gallipoli forged the spirit of a nation a hundred years ago, but I think this summer the sacrifices that have been made, the losses that we've suffered and the incredible spirit that we've seen are also going to be really formative of our identity and our spirit as a nation. So I think it was really apt for the member for Eden-Monaro to talk about firefighters marching on Anzac Day with the local RSL. It was very fitting. I know that so many Australians will be looking for ways to express solidarity, condolence, grief and also hope in coming months, because we've already seen it.

In my electorate on the south side of Brisbane, in Griffith, people were so moved to try to help. The thick smoke haze lay across our city because of the fires—the direct interaction that we had with them, which of course pales in comparison to those who were directly affected by the flames. But it isn't that long since the 2011 floods. We as a city remember what it's like to go through a disaster, to suffer great loss and to suffer the terrible feeling of not knowing what's going to happen—what's going to happen with your house or what's going to happen with your rebuild. I think there's still a feeling of: 'The rest of Australia really pulled through for us back then and we now want to do the same.' We saw the bowls clubs, the pubs, the local craft breweries and the bookshops putting on their own bushfire fundraisers—the pubs with meat trays, for example. I was really overwhelmed by the outpouring of support.

The other thing that's really notable is the amount of grief and distress that this national bushfire crisis has caused people in relation to the loss of some other Australians—the tiny Australians: some of our threatened species. Obviously we've all seen the images of koalas and we've heard the stories of the potoroos and the Kangaroo Island dunnart. There are some less charismatic species as well. I noticed a story that was circulating last week about a fluorescent pink slug. Insects, lizards, fish, vertebrates and invertebrates—all of these different species have been affected. I've had people in tears about these losses as well. Of course our first thoughts are to those who lost their lives in the fires, but so many Australians have been moved to support the wildlife. They've also been moved by the loss of stock. So many people have had to engage in some quite gruesome work because of the loss of stock. I can't even imagine what that would have been like for the people who were suffering through that.

But we've seen some stories of real heroism. We visited the Adelaide Koala Rescue people when they were camped out in the gym of one of the local primary schools, using 100 or so little tents they'd bought from Bunnings Warehouse to house the koalas. We saw the work that people like them were doing, and there's a lot more to be done. One of the academics I spoke to, Chris Dickman from the University of Sydney, gave an attention-grabbing but actually quite conservative estimate of more than one billion animals dying in the fires. That is an estimate. We need to know, firstly, what the scale of the loss is, and, secondly, what needs to be done right now, in a short window of opportunity, to deal with secondary threats: things like feral cats and feral foxes; things that come in once the fires recede and then pose another threat to the species.

I'm really pleased to see that the minister put out a press release today about the Wildlife and Threatened Species Bushfire Recovery Expert Panel identifying 113 species for priority recovery as a consequence of the bushfire crisis. What we need in addition to a mapping exercise—which is excellent; I'm pleased there's a mapping exercise—as soon as it's safe to do so, and in some cases it is safe to do so now, is boots on the ground for a national ecological audit, with scientists undertaking the work that needs to be done. For some species, we have a window of opportunity now to make sure that they're protected. So I encourage the minister to consider Labor's suggestion in that regard. I also want to thank the people who are already doing what they can: the citizen scientists, for example, who are turning their grief and their distress into action, including those using UNSW's iNaturalist app, where it's safe to do so.

But in this condolence motion we are here to mourn. In mourning and in expressing our condolences, we have to acknowledge that the national bushfire crisis has been continuing. We're now facing additional challenges. We had drought in a lot of the fire affected areas—Tenterfield, for example. I visited there last year; they were mid drought and also dealing with the immediate aftermath of serious fire. And now, on top of drought and fire, we have had some significant rain events. So I want to acknowledge the work that is still being done. As I said, I drove to Batemans Bay last week. There are lots of RFS people still working so hard on the recovery, still trying to come to terms with the loss that they've suffered. So, as well as expressing the depth of our grief as a nation and the sincerity of our condolences, we also should thank those people who are continuing, in many cases, to put themselves in harm's way in order to respond to the national bushfire crisis.

Briefly, I want to associate myself with the comments that the member for Shortland made in his capacity as the shadow minister with responsibilities for climate. I endorse those comments, of course. I anticipate that we will all be looking at what can be done to ensure that, in the future, a tragedy on this scale doesn't happen again—to take whatever action we can to honour, through mourning and condolences, the lives lost, and to ensure Australians' safety into the future.

Stephen Jones (Whitlam, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I seek leave to continue my contribution to this debate.

Leave granted.

I spoke earlier about the Dunmore RFS crew, who made headlines when their firetruck was overrun by wildfire within just three minutes, in Tomerang in early January—a flash-over, as it's described. I described how they activated their cabin sprays and took defensive measures, and they survived. Within 10 minutes of that incident, they were out defending the house that they'd gone down that track to look after. It's this kind of heroism that we are all in awe of.

It's why the kids of Fig Tree holiday care gave a hero's welcome to the RFS volunteers. It's why the Wollongong City Council held a parade on Australia Day in honour of the emergency responders. It's why the Mittagong RFS received anonymous letters of thanks from children at a school in Sydney. Another local crew, from Dapto, were even photographed at the Green Wattle Creek blaze, and that photograph was displayed on the Opera House. Our communities' deep-felt thanks cannot be overstated.

Inevitably, the debate on climate change has been enlivened. But the debate on whether climate change has been a contributor to and a cause of these fires kind of misses the point in some respects. It's undeniable that climate change has been a contributor to these fires. It's undeniable that climate change has been a contributor to the drought, although some do try to deny it. It's undeniable that climate change has been a contributor to the prolonged fire season, restricting the capacity to manage forests, to do hazard reduction and to do controlled burns. It's undeniable that the summer of 2019-20 was the point at which we stopped talking about climate change in the future tense and started talking about it as something that is happening now. The point is that, if we're going to preserve our way of life, we have to change the way we do things. If we don't act, 'forever fires' will be the new normal, and they should not be forever. The urgency of this work does not come at the cost of us thanking, as we are today, those people and groups who have given so much to keep us safe during these blazes.

I want to take this opportunity to thank another group as well. We don't often think of them as lifesavers, but they have been: our local broadcasters. In the Illawarra, the South Coast and the Southern Highlands, we had WIN News Illawarra, the South Coast Register, the Illawarra Mercury, Southern Highland News, 9News Wollongong, 2ST, i98 FM, Wave FM and Power FM all playing a role in informing, reassuring and alerting locals, and telling our stories. I have no doubt that people are alive today because of the information that was being broadcast through these networks. They truly played a critical role, so I take this opportunity to thank them as well.

I want to particularly thank ABC Illawarra and ABC South East. The men and women there have literally kept people alive and safe with up-to-the-minute emergency broadcasts. Your work has been immense and has been of great value to the entire community. It's given us a critical understanding of how we respond to this emergency. Together our local media outlets have all managed to humanise the most brutal disaster we've ever experienced. You made us cry, you made us laugh sometimes, you've kept us safe, and we thank you.

I know the RFS have successfully partnered with local high schools in my area, running a cadets program to ensure that young people are coming up through the ranks of the RFS. This has happened at Dapto High School and Bowral High School, and it's a credit to those teachers who are engaging, to the volunteer RFS and, of course, to those young cadets who are giving all of their efforts.

Ruby and Charlotte Cruden-Taylor in Dapto, local children, held a bake sale and were inundated with support, raising more than $1,000 in three hours. The Illawarra Mercury reported that one customer paid 200 bucks for a doughnut because the funds were going directly to bushfire relief. Local businesses—and I'm thinking of my mate at the Robertson butcher and of the Robertson Hotel, the Robertson Bowling Club and Moonacres Kitchen—are feeding the ADF and emergency responders out of their own pockets, giving up their family income in support of our community and our emergency services. There are countless other examples across the district. Alexander's Cafe mustered donations, and the list goes on. I don't have time to list them all.

A special shout-out to the men and women at the Moss Vale Services Club and the Mittagong RSL who helped operate their facilities as evacuation centres in the Morton and Green Wattle fires. Similarly, the Albion Park and Moss Vale showgrounds became evacuation centres for large animals. The Albion Park Show Society properly prioritised their work as an evacuation centre over hosting the 2020 show, which has been cancelled.

The New South Wales Business Chamber and their Illawarra Business Chamber chapter have been doing a great job in running their campaign Backing the Bush, encouraging local businesses to pledge to hold meetings in bushfire affected areas. So far companies that have signed the pledge include BlueScope, WIN Corporation, IMB Bank, Peoplecare and the University of Wollongong. Local manufacturer and major employer BlueScope has donated a million dollars to the Red Cross. And how could I leave out the Red Cross and St Vincent de Paul for the great job they have done for the district?

Dapto local Leanne Shackell delivered back-to-school backpacks to 165 Batemans Bay children. She received collections organised through Hayes Park Public School parents, UoW staff, local businesses and Dapto locals who heard about it on Facebook.

Wombat Care Bundanoon have been caring for wombats across the highlands. Wombats are well-known for willingly sharing their burrows with their natural enemies, like snakes, during bushfires. There's some speculation on whether they do that or they just head downstairs, but it's a great thing and let the myth survive! I think of this as a metaphor for how so many other Australians have acted, sharing their safe places with others in danger.

I want to give a shout-out to Raptor Care and Conservation at Fitzroy Falls. They've also been playing a role with Australia's magnificent birds of prey. The Dingo Sanctuary at Bargo was repaired by dozens of inmates from the Illawarra Reintegration Centre. Many hundreds of Shoalhaven and Southern Highlands residents sought shelter with family and friends in the Illawarra over the bushfires. Spare rooms and couches were more than just a place to stay; they became the frontline on the home front—a place of refuge for those fleeing the fire, a gesture of solidarity and citizenship for those who could.

I also want to give a shout-out—and I am nearing the end here—in the Southern Highlands to John Waters and friends, who organised the fire aid concert. It was a terrific evening. It was done at the drop of a hat, very shortly. We had thousands of people there. We had about 6,000 people by my count. For my generation, it was great to see Daryl Braithwaite, Leo Sayer and John Paul Young. My kids were not so impressed, but I thought it was a great afternoon out there at Bong Bong Picnic Racecourse!

Over at Berrima, my good mate Richard Lane organised the Wingecarribee Vocal Muster to perform on Australia Day, again recognising and fundraising for the RFS. On the coast, Football For Firies was held—a match between the Wollongong Wolves and Albion Park City—to raise money for the Albion Park RFS. We've had the Illawarra Codes Combined—the Hawks, the Dragons and the Wolves—golf day, raising money for the Salvos and WIRES.

I want to give a special shout-out to my mate the member for Gilmore, Fiona Phillips. She spent her wedding anniversary on the front line, while her husband was in New Zealand on the family holiday that she never got to. She's done a great job. I wind up by saying that there are so many more that I could thank, but, in the time that I have available, from my heart and on behalf of the people of Whitlam, the Illawarra and the South Coast, thanks for all the support we've got. We got through it.

David Gillespie (Lyne, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It being 6.30 pm, the debate is interrupted in accordance with standing order 192(b). The debate is adjourned and the resumption of the debate will be made an order of the day for the next sitting.