Christopher Back (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

The Senate Select Committee on Agricultural and Related Industries presented its report on the incidence and severity of bushfires across Australia on 13 August, which of course coincided with the federal election campaign. I am concerned that the recommendations of that report may be lost, and it is for that purpose I am addressing the chamber. The report did not deal with the recommendations of the Victorian royal commission, and its presentation was deliberately delayed until that had happened. I commend the report and its recommendations to the Senate, particularly at this time, being the onset of this coming summer’s fire season and given the very heavy winter and spring rain conditions you have had, particularly in the eastern states. These are matters of relevance to us.

It is well recognised that under the Constitution land, and therefore fire management, is the responsibility of the states. However, the federal government contributes significantly in terms of personnel, funding and resources, and there is an expectation by the wider community that the Australian government will have a role in bushfire mitigation, response and recovery. As we know, bushfires are the only natural disasters which we can act to prevent or minimise, and that is the purpose of the report. Before I go into recommendations of the report, I want to acknowledge the excellent work of the secretariat in assisting in this particular inquiry. I wish to record the unanimous support of all those who participated on the committee in its presentation of the report and its recommendations.

Of importance, for the first time the report summarises in one document a complete list of those agencies, state-by-state, which have responsibility in this area, and it also details local and federal government responsibility. Equally of importance is an appendix which summarises the recommendations and actions taken as a result of previous inquiries into major bushfires in Australia, and I commend that to the Senate. It is my intention—in line with the commitment which I gave in my first speech in the Senate of March 2009, when I said that it is incumbent on us to review past recommendations by authoritative sources and to assess how effectively they have been implemented—to make this the subject of an annual obligation on my part.

The first of the recommendations which I commend to the Senate is the development by the Commonwealth of examination of new arrangements for involvement in, development of and implementation of national policy on bushfire management. I certainly believe that a national bushfire agency should be developed, answerable to the community through a parliamentary secretary position. I speak of wildfire prevention, and the committee observed that there are three broad themes on this, which we discussed. The first was preventing fire ignition, the second was reducing the intensity of bushfires by lowering combustible fuel levels and the third was improving measures to protect life and assets in built up areas and, of course, the natural environment. I will refer only briefly to arson. We understand that between a quarter and half of all fires in this country are caused by arson. Also, we understand that it is a relatively easy crime to commit and very easy to conceal. Our committee recommended that a standing committee on national arson be commissioned to meet every two years with the state and territory ministers and those responsible.

The second and more important recommendation to which I wish to refer in prevention is the ageing power infrastructure around Australian states and territories. The committee noted that a preventable cause of ignition is faulty power lines. Only last summer in Western Australia we had a major bushfire affecting the town of Toodyay and its environs, and of course we had the Black Saturday fires in February 2009 in which power lines have at least been implicated. There are claims of a long history in this area. Recognising the size and scale of investment, the committee has made two recommendations. The first is that the Productivity Commission undertakes an examination of bushfire risk from ageing power infrastructure, including an assessment of both replacement costs and the likely suppression costs from bushfires caused by defective power lines. Following that, and related to it, the second recommendation is that the Commonwealth examines options for funding of replacement of power infrastructure which presents an unacceptable risk to the Australian community. We know that the power infrastructure is owned respectively by the private sector, corporatised agencies of governments and government departments, so it is an ever-increasingly complex area. I believe that it is essential that the Commonwealth has a role in terms of examining and looking at options for funding to replace because of the risk of mitigation.

Fuel reduction measures occupied much of the committee’s time and that of the people who were kind enough to both present and put in submissions. There are three major components that combine to determine fire behaviour, being, firstly, combustible fuel levels; secondly, the topography of the country; and, thirdly, weather conditions. Of these, it is obvious that the only one that we can be involved in is fuel levels. Humans cannot control temperature. We cannot control wind conditions or humidity on the day, but certainly, by prior and good prevention, we can control fuel levels. This was best put to the committee by noted CSIRO scientist Phil Cheney when he said, ‘The only thing that you can manage is the fuel.’

There is widespread concern within the community that too little fuel reduction is being undertaken by some of those responsible; certainly, whilst there is not unanimous support for prescribed burning as a practical means of fuel reduction, nevertheless that is the overwhelming view. The committee certainly believes that once and for all the arguments surrounding prescribed burning and its impact on fuel reduction should be the subject of research supported by the Commonwealth. So, therefore, we have recommended that further research into prescribed burning and its effectiveness and into alternatives for bushfire mitigation be examined as a result of our findings.

We have gone further and recommended that the Commonwealth seek agreement from the states and territories to enable it to evaluate the adequacy of fuel reduction programs applied by public land managers, that the states and territories agree that the auditing be undertaken against their own stated objectives and, finally, that that information be published so that everybody in the Australian community with a concern will know what the results of that work have been. We went a stage further in our unanimous recommendations, and that was that we recommend that Commonwealth funding for bushfire suppression be made conditional on state and territory fire agencies agreeing to the Commonwealth evaluating and auditing their fuel reduction programs.

This is not an attempt by the Commonwealth to involve itself in the day-to-day activities associated with fire suppression. From my experience running the Bush Fires Board in Western Australia I am convinced that the closer to the community requiring protection that work is done the better. But the time has long passed for us just to stand by and watch that inevitable cycle, to which I have referred in the past, called DEAD: ‘disaster’ followed by ‘enquiry’ followed by ‘apathy’ followed by another ‘disaster’. The only difference around the Australian states has been the interval of time between each of those disasters. We have not moved forward on this issue here in Australia, and it is time that the Commonwealth took a lead. It is time that the Commonwealth gets the agreement of the states and territories to examine their programs, to audit and evaluate and to report on them. The incentive must surely be that we consider funding by the Commonwealth to be contingent on it; otherwise, we will merely find ourselves in the position where we are funding failure, where we do nothing ‘until such time’ as a disaster occurs.

I turn now to research, education and training. Concern has been expressed to the committee that future land and fire managers are graduating from university programs around Australia with little, if any, practical fire ground training or skills. This will be highlighted even further into the future as experienced foresters and other fire managers retire. The committee has recommended that the Commonwealth assist the states with bushfire training for land managers and for volunteers by coordinating curriculum development and the delivery of a national bushfire accreditation course, and I believe—I repeat—that personnel should not be eligible to graduate from land or fire management programs from our tertiary institutions and those of higher education until they can demonstrate through active fire ground experience that they have the necessary skills, firstly, in bushfire mitigation and, secondly, in that of incident control and management systems.

The committee has recognised the work of the Bushfire CRC and has recognised the ongoing funding but emphasises the need that when the CRC comes to its conclusion the Commonwealth establishes a new permanent bushfire research institute in Australia, and we have recommended accordingly. Australia leads the world in bushfire suppression studies and research. The work undertaken as a result of the Victorian fires has been exemplary—it was coordinated by the Bushfire CRC—and we do not want to see it lost.

I conclude with the committee’s reflection on the severity of major bushfires in Australia with particular regard to loss of life, to horrific injuries and to the impact on both the built and natural assets of this country. With this in mind—and I think it is the most telling of all—we have recommended that the Productivity Commission be tasked to assess the economic effects of major bushfires on the Australian economy, to determine the cost effectiveness of prescribed burning and to consider all aspects of bushfire mitigation. Again I commend the report of the select committee into the severity of bushfires across Australia to the Senate. I thank the secretariat and I thank my committee colleagues for the spirit in which that was undertaken, those who made submissions and those who presented before the committee.