Tuesday, 3 October 2023

Bushfire preparedness

Tim BULL (Gippsland East) (19:05): (343) My adjournment tonight is to the Minister for Emergency Services, and the action that I seek is for the Victorian fire rating system to be made available to the public year-round. I will tell you what happened on Tuesday 19 September, just a fortnight ago, when the temperature exceeded 35 degrees in my electorate of East Gippsland: with hot northerly winds during the day, fires raged in the landscape right on the Victoria–New South Wales border. In New South Wales the fire danger rating was publicly listed as catastrophic, the highest rating that can be given, but over the line, the Black–Allan line, in Victoria there was no public fire rating at all. We would have a significant fire later in the day in East Gippsland, but many asked and I asked: how can it be catastrophic in one state and just over the border, with the exact same temperature and the exact same conditions, there is no rating at all? I made inquiry about this, and I was advised that the difference was that the contract arrangements between the New South Wales government and the Bureau of Meteorology kick in earlier there than they do in Victoria, meaning the bureau does not complete assessing the rating in Victoria until October, but New South Wales has an earlier arrangement. Can you believe the stupidity of that.

So I ask the minister that, when the stakes are so high, the public be made aware of these ratings earlier. I believe in Victoria all the criteria matched a rating of severe, but because those contractual arrangements were not in place it was not released publicly and it was not made official. I believe as a result the date is being brought forward from when it normally starts, 1 November, to 1 October, and we are now receiving this service this year. But it needs to be brought in year-round or at least be brought forward to the start of September if we are going to experience those conditions in September, because not having that system in place to make the public aware and warn the public is simply not good enough.