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

At this time of year in southern Australia, in a Mediterranean climate dominated by long, hot summers, we have the annual circumstance, as we all know, of bushfires. We saw them in the areas to the west of Sydney in the month of October, when the Blue Mountains were the subject of conflagration. We now see the same circumstances in Victoria, as we do in South Australia and Western Australia. Indeed, it is only 12 months ago that we endured the fires in Tasmania.

It is almost five years to the day that I gave my first speech here in the Senate. I reflected at that time on the superb efforts of our bushfire fighters and support groups recognised in the then recent tragic events in Victoria. They of course were the Black Saturday fires in February 2009. I also went on to say at that time, because history only repeats itself, that the information available to me from my Western Australian associates who visited and attended at the Victorian fires—as you know, Mr Acting Deputy President Bernardi, I was the chief executive of the Bush Fires Board of Western Australia at one stage and I had the opportunity to speak to the firefighters who went to Victoria to assist—was that, whilst the conditions on the day were unprecedented, what was most alarming were the high levels of fuel or flammable material that the firefighters confronted, and I want to address that this evening. In that first speech, I made the observation:

This is not the last we will hear of this issue in this place.

I also said:

We in the Senate have an obligation to the Australian community to ensure that those charged with the responsibility to protect life and property have the tools, the legislative capacity and the will to so do.

This evening, I am trying to honour that commitment.

I had the privilege of working with the Australian Permanent Mission to the United Nations over the last few months, between September and December, and I was disappointed to hear a regrettable statement by the UN climate chief, Christiana Figueres. She made the observation that, in her opinion, the wildfires around Sydney, Australia, were the result of climate change. At that time, I made it my business through the Australian mission in New York to approach climate change officers at the UN to seek a meeting, which subsequently we had, in which I was able to share with them that the fires to the west of Sydney, the Blue Mountains fires, were indeed not associated with climate change; they were part of the normal process that we see when the management of lands in bushfire prone areas is less than what is required. I had the opportunity to meet with those people and share with them the sorts of circumstances that we experience in Australia.

What is disappointing is that year after year we seem to reflect on the same issues, yet we are back here in the February of the following year reflecting on the fact that we have not achieved any success in bushfire management or control. The point to be made is that Australia's eucalypt forests accumulate dry matter at a higher rate than they decompose it. In our Western Australian Jarrah forests—and they are probably typical of most eucalypt-dominated forests—that accumulation year to year is of the order of one tonne per hectare of flammable material on the forest floor. It does not take anything more than simple mathematics to realise that, for each year an area is left with no protection and with no attempt made to remove that fuel, we are going to see an accumulation of fuel.

I return to the Victorian situation. From our own experience over many years in Western Australia, we would say that about five to eight tonnes per hectare is the upper safe limit at which we would send in firefighters to an area to protect it. Indeed, our recent experience with water-bombing aircraft is that its greatest effectiveness is when the fuel is at around five to eight tonnes per hectare. In the Victorian circumstance, they were often looking at 50 to 80 tonnes per hectare, and even more. I have made the observation in the past in this place that I was sure the fuel on the forest floor in the Blue Mountains region of New South Wales would have been at a level at which, if a decent conflagration had got underway, they would have had great difficulty in controlling it. Indeed, from afar, with all of the reading and the watching that I did, it certainly seemed to be the case.

I make the point again that the fire triangle is simple. It requires oxygen, it requires a source of ignition and it requires fuel. We know very well that oxygen in the air is always going to be with us. We know that we are seeing increasing levels of deliberate lighting of fires by children and by adults, and so a source of ignition is readily at hand. All that is left is fuel. We can control the level of fuel that is likely to be involved in bushfires. It is probably the only natural disaster that we can control. We cannot prevent cyclones, we cannot prevent floods, but we can protect the community against the impact of devastating fires.

I have made the comment before in this place that those of us associated in the fire world talk of the DEAD cycle: disaster followed by enquiry, followed by apathy, followed by the next disaster. The only time differential around Australia is the length of time between each of those two disasters, and we are seeing it yet again. We are faced with a dilemma or a prospect in our Mediterranean climate, which is dominated by long, hot dry summers and a build-up of fuel on the floors of forests and other areas, with one of two circumstances. We can have low intensity, cool season controlled fuel reduction burns at relatively frequent intervals—that is probably about five to eight years, depending on the locality, and at a time when humidity levels are high; in other words, when we can control fires—or we can have highly dangerous, uncontrolled wild fires when there is a dry season, with hot winds and low humidity. Let me give you an example from only the last few days in my own home city of Perth. On 4 February we were faced with very similar circumstances to the north and to the south of the city. In one particular area there were devastating fires, with houses being burnt and people being put at risk, yet to the north of the city, in the city of Wanneroo, the chief fire operations officer had identified an area where fuel levels had been too high over the last couple of years. He had attended to fuel reduction burning at a safe time in the year. On the same day that the areas to the south of Perth, around the areas of Banjup, were the subject of such severe bushfires, Wanneroo had a very minor fire which was controlled by one brigade in a matter of a few minutes. This points to the fact that we do have tools at our disposal which we can utilise in these circumstances.

It was in August 2010 that we reported to the Senate on the incidence and severity of bushfires across Australia. Remembering, realising, accepting and not wanting to change the fact that land management, including bushfire control, is the province of the states and the territories, the Commonwealth will always be involved when it comes to major disasters of the type we are talking about. The points and the recommendations that we made in that report pointed to the involvement of the Commonwealth and to the need for prevention rather than suppression.

What we have seen in the last few years has been an increasing expenditure in fire suppression. When it comes to the use of aircraft, I can say with some pride that it was whilst I was chief executive of the Bush Fires Board in Western Australia that we introduced water-bombing aircraft. Unfortunately, the fear is that so much expenditure is now being placed on fire suppression that we are failing to look at the measures and the mechanisms of fire prevention. There are those who do not accept the argument of fuel reduction burning. Whilst time does not permit me to go through the many recommendations that we made in that report, one of the recommendations was that we undertake a good, long, strong, independent study so that we can resolve the question of fuel reduction burning. The challenge lies with us, and the Senate has got a role to ensure it is undertaken.