In the Victorian Parliament this week the Andrews Labor Government had to make changes to legislation in order to fix holes in its new fire services reforms in relation to new Fire Rescue Victoria (FRV) fire districts.

The Government sought to amend the Forests Act to allow Forest Fire Management Victoria (FFMV) firefighters to fight fires and carry out fire management activities in new FRV fire districts, and to provide immunity to these forest firefighters when doing so.

Labor confirmed that forest firefighters are responsible for fire prevention and fire suppression in State forests, National Parks and on protected public land, but conceded that under current legislation they don’t have the authorisation or appropriate legal protections to operate in a new FRV fire district, which has left them severely exposed should any fire spread from public land.

This is a major oversight by Labor after ramming through controversial fire services reforms that are just a few months into operation and has left forest firefighters and country communities exposed.

Perhaps Labor is worried FRV personnel won’t be available or able to get out to country areas quickly enough. That gives little comfort to local country communities that have had an FRV fire district imposed on them and have unacceptably put FFMV firefighters at risk.

This is particularly troubling as Victoria is heading into another fire season. Local communities may wonder if this is the real reason that a lack of preventative planned burns are occurring.

Labor has confirmed that Fire Rescue Victoria (FRV) and the United Firefighters Union (UFU) are in active negotiations with the Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning for an MOU.

The Liberal Nationals moved an amendment to require these agreements and arrangements to be made public on the Government’s website to improve accountability and transparency, but Labor denied any ability to debate this in the Parliament’s lower house.