Wednesday, 1 April 2026

 Melina BATH (Eastern Victoria) (10:00): I move:

That this house –

(1)   notes that –

(a) the Allan Labor government has refused to release Victoria’s full bushfire risk management report, 2024–25;

(b) localised fuel-driven bushfire risk information for the 2025–26 season has been withheld;

(c) these actions raise significant concerns regarding the government’s transparency and Victoria’s bushfire preparedness;

(d) Forest Fire Management Victoria (FFMVic) withdrew up to 290 G-Wagons and 59 Unimogs prior to the 2025–26 bushfire season, reducing rapid-response capacity;

(2)   in accordance with standing order 10.01, requires the Leader of the Government to table in the Council, within 10 weeks of the house agreeing to this resolution, all documents held by the Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action (DEECA), FFMVic or the responsible ministers relating to Victoria’s bushfire management, including but not limited to –

(a) Victoria’s complete bushfire risk management report, 2024–25;

(b) all summer bushfire outlook reports prepared by FFMVic, DEECA or ministerial offices for the current 2025–26 bushfire season;

(c) correspondence and briefings between DEECA, FFMVic and relevant ministers and their offices relating to the 2025–26 bushfire season, including fuel-driven bushfire risks at the state, regional, and district levels; and

(d) documents and briefings between DEECA, FFMVic and relevant ministers and their offices relating to the withdrawal of the G-Wagon and Unimog vehicles due to structural and safety defects, including repair timelines and operational impacts.

This is a short-form documents motion, and it relates to Victoria’s full bushfire risk management report for 2024–25, localised fuel-driven bushfire risk information for the 2025–26 season and information about the government’s Forest Fire Management Victoria fleet that was grounded at the end of last year – 290 G-Wagons and 59 Unimogs.

This year we have seen a most significant bushfire once again. We have seen 1590 buildings, dwellings, outbuildings, sheds – included in that are 340 homes where people lived and loved their families – gone in these bushfires. We have seen 23,000 stock killed, incinerated in the bushfires, and we have seen almost half a million hectares of land burnt. What we have not seen from this government – and this is not asking for anything unusual whatsoever – is the Allan government releasing its full bushfire risk management report for 2024–25.

This document sets out Victoria’s bushfire risk profile, and it is fundamental to understanding how the state is prepared. Instead the government has just provided a snapshot, and a snapshot is not good enough. If this government has nothing to hide, then the normal procedure should have been followed. The snapshot relies heavily on aggregated statewide figures, not the local on-the-ground data and detail that communities need. Communities like Natimuk, Harcourt, Longwood – I could go on – Yarck, Alexandra and Walwa up into the north-east could have benefited from this information. When we see this information, then we can have an understanding. Without it experts cannot properly scrutinise the data, communities cannot understand their true level of risk and Parliament cannot hold this government to account.

Normally the report is released at the beginning of the fire season. That is all. It is a procedure, and it was not done. Delaying is withholding information, and that is completely unacceptable. The fuel-driven risk information has been withheld. This is a really important one for those who very much need to understand this. The government has released information at a regional level, so it puts it out for a blanket region but it does not drill down into the district level. The government has got their Safer Together policy – 70 per cent residual risk. I could go on for hours, but I do not have that time. They have given it at a blanket regional level. People want to understand it for their locations, their districts. The government has not produced that as yet for the fire season, and it is just absolutely, completely unacceptable.

Let me give you an example. The Gippsland region is vast and diverse, as we know. It encompasses coastal and agricultural areas, forests and major industrial hubs. For the average regional area there appears to be a moderate bushfire risk per the government’s status at the moment. In the past we have seen that the Latrobe Valley has had a particularly high residual bushfire risk, but that is not clear for this year. The government is not being transparent about this. We have got the Thomson Dam, which provides 50 per cent of Melbourne’s water, while Moondarra supports the Latrobe Valley and surrounding industry and is a major part of the food processing operations, and we have seen a lot of industry there. People cannot see what their residual risk is. Does it matter? Not to some, but to others it is incredibly important to understand where districts sit and what those risks are. This government needs to produce what it should normally produce. I had the opportunity of meeting Minister Dimopoulos the other day. I had a list and said to him, ‘These things should just be normal procedure, which the government is not addressing.’ Not only has he heard from me; he is hearing from this Parliament in a normal documents motion that that should be put out into the community.

Then we have the Unimogs and the information around the Unimogs and G-Wagons. These are front fire line vehicles. Again, the whole response about purchasing them back in 2017–18, their inclusion, their loading up of extra requirements and the cracking of the chassis – when did the government know about this? How did the government know about this? It took them offline and begged South Australia for other vehicles at the start of the fire season to come through. This house, my communities and our regional communities deserve to know what their status is. It actually got to the point where 300 vehicles were moved out of service. We deserve to see these things. Community deserves to see these things. As a normal practice, I ask this house to support the documents motion.

 Sheena WATT (Northern Metropolitan) (10:06): Thank you for the opportunity to speak on this short-form documents motion before us. It is true that bushfire seasons are getting longer and they are getting more dangerous – it is a fact. Also amongst those facts is an increased danger in the length of these seasons as a direct result of climate change. Victoria is ready not just for fires but in the lead-up to more volatile bushfire seasons. The 2024–25 bushfire risk management report proves just this. As per convention, the government will not oppose this documents motion before us. One of the main aspects of the report is how it emphasises that governments and communities are working together to be safer from bushfires. Collaboration across communities is what these communities need, certainly not misinformation and politicking.

I have been very fortunate over the last few months now to witness the work that incredibly valuable community organisations have done in these parts – organisations like ARC Justice, who operate community legal centres across bushfire-affected areas in central and northern Victoria. The breadth and the scope of their work have been truly remarkable. They help people who have lost their homes into housing. They have helped folks with insurance claims. They work with community groups that know firsthand the underlying damage that bushfires can do to communities.

Earlier this week I launched the Campaspe climate partnership collaboration action plan, funded by the Albanese Labor government, ARC Justice, along with the Jesuit Social Services Centre for Just Places, the Eastern Community Legal Centre and the Federation of Community Legal Centres. They have worked together with local communities to make sure that the Campaspe region is more climate ready and more ready for devastating natural disasters that are a direct result of climate change. It is really heartening to affirm that these critical organisations right there in place, in regional Victoria, have a partner in the state government when it comes to climate action, resilience and readiness, and they have a partner when it comes to bushfire risk management, as last year’s report proves. After all, climate preparedness is bushfire preparedness.

This government is committed to bushfire risk management at every step that there is risk. We want to prevent these fires in the first place by enclosing our forests and parks with compliance controls to prevent arson and out-of-control bushfires. We want to prepare for when a bushfire is inevitable by making sure there are established water sources available for the helicopters – a big thanks to the operators of them.

Finally, we need to be able to respond during these volatile bushfires with significant resources for both the air response and ground response. These strategies outlined in the report do prove that at every stage in our process the government is committed to preventing, preparing for and responding to bushfires across our state like the ones we saw over the summer. It was truly sobering, there is no doubt about it, to see the impacts of this summer’s bushfires firsthand. We have heard many speakers from right across this chamber talk about what they have seen and heard, and some have been particularly personally affected. I want to let them know that our thoughts are still with them and we are still committed to working with them.

I remember driving up to Seymour, and I saw the blackened landscape. I saw the recovery centre filled with those that had lost their homes. But there was still an overpowering sense of hope and a slew of community organisations there doing the right thing – organisations like ARC Justice but also those doing really immediate impact work, like Sikh community volunteers who served hundreds of hot meals across bushfire-affected areas. In visiting these communities you can see that Victoria takes steps to prepare for and respond to bushfires, to save the homes, save the businesses and save lives, ultimately. Communities like these need the best resourcing, data-driven bushfire response and on-the-ground support as they are rebuilding and really do not need pointscoring in Parliament in fighting denial and delay. You cannot take bushfire readiness seriously without taking climate change seriously. Despite misinformation that I saw over the season, which was really damaging, really hurtful, the 2024–25 bushfire risk management report shows that our government is doing just that: we are taking it seriously. We are working at every stage of the process to prevent and respond to bushfires. We work in collaboration and consultatively with communities on the ground, with those community groups that I have spoken about and so, so many others. To those affected by bushfire this summer or ever: our government will always support you and your communities when responding to disasters. I reaffirm that we will not oppose this motion.

 Bev McARTHUR (Western Victoria) (10:11): I thank Ms Bath for her motion. The refusal to release the bushfire risk management report and the withdrawal of 290 G-Wagons before the fire season tells you absolutely everything about this government’s priorities. I strongly support this documents motion, and I want to reiterate that this government’s total preoccupation with running a secret society in this state is like the Politburo. You hide behind climate change now as a reason not to provide documents. You have got to provide the information that is available to you to the public. What is there to hide? I have raised fire management repeatedly in this Parliament. Victoria’s fire management is not working. The government abandoned the 2009 Victorian Bushfires Royal Commission targets – targets written in the ashes of 173 lives. Farmers across my electorate tell me the government is the worst neighbour in the state. Crown land is overrun with weeds and excessive fuel loads, with no track maintenance, and when the state is the largest landholder in Victoria, that neglect is a public safety issue.

There is a dangerous idea in the department that locking up land equals environmental protection. It does not. Good land management requires people, not locking it up. Volunteers, forestry workers and bushwalkers are the bush’s watchful guardians. Remove them and you get unmonitored forests and mounting fuel loads. The cultural burn story says it all. When I raised Indigenous burning practices, the department told me use of traditional techniques would constitute cultural appropriation. We should be prioritising planned burns, not hiding behind indefensible IP arguments. Ending native timber harvesting eliminated a skilled workforce that was always ready and the first to respond to fire. Now the activists have turned on planned burns, with ANU academics producing research claiming prescribed burning worsens bushfires. Activist groups are fundraising for legal challenges. The pattern that destroyed VicForests is being repeated. I was very pleased the Council on 4 February agreed to an inquiry into the 2026 summer fires, with crossbench support – thank you. Over 500 structures were destroyed and 400,000 hectares burnt. Submissions, I tell everybody, are open until 19 April. Get your submission in. I encourage every affected community to have their say. Speak up loudly. Hold this government to account.

I absolutely commend Ms Bath’s motion and thank her for bringing it forward. It is about transparency and preparedness. If the government is confident in its bushfire planning, it should release the documents. Why wouldn’t you? Withholding the full bushfire risk management report and local fuel risk information only raises more concern. The reported withdrawal of the G-Wagons and Unimogs before the fire season adds to that concern. But this issue goes beyond one motion and one fire season. It points to a broader failure in Victoria’s bushfire policy. The government has moved away from active land management and from serious use of planned burning. After the 2009 royal commission Victoria should have learned that fuel loads matter. Planned burning is not the only answer, but it is one of the essential tools of reducing risk. Instead the government has retreated from that practical approach and weakened accountability. I have said that farmers tell us that the government is the worst neighbour. They know that unmanaged land does not become safer just because the government calls it conservation. There is an ideological problem here. Too many in the bureaucracy and activist movement treat human intervention as a bad thing. It is not. Good land management requires active stewardship, reducing fuel, maintaining access and keeping skilled people involved. I absolutely commend this documents motion to the chamber, and of course everybody is supporting it.

 Tom McINTOSH (Eastern Victoria) (10:16): Mrs McArthur is barely two or three days past her preselection, and her full ideological attacks are on display. Let us be very, very clear: what we are discussing here is about keeping communities safe. And Mrs McArthur, some of the language you are using is disrespecting the incredible work that people are doing within Forest Fire Management Victoria (FFMV) and across the CFA to ensure that communities are safe. We have got the Greens on one side saying you cannot roll over a log and disrupt a few bugs, and then you have got the Liberals and the Nationals trying to breed culture wars into this, when what we are trying to ensure –

Melina Bath: On a point of order, President, this is a narrow documents motion. This is not an opportunity to attack the other bench.

The PRESIDENT: Members are entitled to respond to a contribution from a previous speaker.

Tom McINTOSH: I note that Mrs McArthur was straying very far from the motion. I am responding to Mrs McArthur. Our FFMV teams do incredible, incredible work. During the summer I was out at Nowa Nowa as their dozens of new recruits came onto the team there, talking to members who have been working lifelong in those teams, looking at the machinery that they are delivering over the summer. When we had the fires in Dargo out east, I was fortunate to be out with FFMV teams and all the coordinated teams in the incident control centres at both Heyfield and Orbost. The work those teams are doing to prepare for bushfire season, the work they do in response and the hours they put in when fires are occurring are incredible, and they deserve all our respect. Things like the rappel chopper teams that are out jumping on fires immediately, the work they are doing through the middle of the year to make sure we are prepped and the challenges they face in getting the right conditions to be able to do the work to protect communities, Mrs McArthur – that is what this is all about.

That coordination of information between our agencies, CFA and FFMV, is why the government is giving a snapshot before the season and is giving reporting on the work that is occurring, so that whether it is agencies, whether it is members of Parliament briefings that they can receive or whether it is our communities, everyone is really clear and our local governments are able to understand what is happening. They do incredible work responding when incidents occur. They are clear, and they and various agencies can meet with community and talk through work that has been done and risks that present themselves. And then of course there is the work that all of us have in communicating weather conditions as they occur throughout various parts of the season so we can respond appropriately to keep our public bush safe and to keep our private lands, our farms, our communities, our towns, our livestock and our people safe and ensure that lives are not lost.

Motion agreed to.