Wednesday, 4 February 2026

 Jade BENHAM (Mildura) (09:51): Over the summer communities across the south of my electorate in particular have once again been tested by fire. Today I want to place on the record my deep gratitude to all of the firefighters, volunteers, private landholders with appliances and support crews who stood between devastation and what could have been disaster. On 18 December the Jeffcott fire, which has largely been forgotten, tore through the district of Charlton and Jeffcott impacting 15 farms and destroying one family home along with irreplaceable veterans medals and numerous outbuildings. These are families who have lost so much yet heartbreakingly remain ineligible for assistance because it happened before the 8 and 9 January fires. Why on earth wouldn’t we extend when a disaster is declared and make bushfire recovery for the entire summer? A very wise man told me recently that you will not win these arguments with logic. Their resilience down there, though, has been extraordinary. And then we saw structure fires in Charlton and Sea Lake, where the Sea Lake hairdresser unfortunately and the Bottom Cafe were destroyed. But thankfully the CFA crews – because the FRV aerial pumper in Mildura was still off line – responded swiftly and they saved the Sea Lake Pharmacy, which could have been an absolute disaster. Then of course there were the Big Desert and Hattah-Kulkyne fires.