Page 3617 - Week 11 - Thursday, 16 November 2006
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each other and with headquarters. Why? It was because the systems you put in place, minister, failed. They did not operate, they did not work, they did not do what you said they would do, and in many cases they still do not do so. So the answer for the minister is to go the slag.
Mr Pratt raised the issue of vehicles. Let’s talk about the first total fire ban day of the fire season. Let’s talk about Molonglo shed, up near your place, Mr Speaker. You would drive past that shed. I am sure you know where it is. It is next to Pegasus. Molonglo has a couple of light units, Molonglo 20 and Molonglo 21. It has got a couple of tankers, Molonglo 10 and Molonglo 11. Yes, they were really lucky, Mr Speaker: they were given a CAFS tanker. It was like a blessing from on high: “Here, my children, have this CAFS tanker.”
The CAFS tanker was stationed there because one of their tankers was broken, had not been operational for some time and was being phased out, and the other one could not be used because it had cracks in the chassis. What was Mr Hargreaves’s answer? What was the government’s answer to this problem? It was to give them a CAFS tanker. There is a small problem in that none of the crew have been trained on how to use the CAFS tanker. Mr Hargreaves’s answer, the government’s answer, was to give them a shining new truck that nobody has actually run through operationally, nobody has been trained on, and send them off into the bush to fight fires. Mr Hargreaves ridicules Mr Pratt and makes a joke about occupational health and safety. What does it say about a government that it is willing to give a tanker to crews that have never been trained on it?
Molonglo has gone out and done some burns lately and has learned how to use the CAFS, but the jury is still out on whether they really are a first response or a defensive vehicle. The water capacity is smaller than normally would be taken into the field on a tanker. Yes, they can spread large amounts of foam in a short period, but they can only be used at certain times. The problem is that the troops were not given the training, the SOPs have not been written and the practice has not been put into place. The government’s answer is to say, “We will just station it there. It will make us look good.” God help the crews if they have to go out.
The first response to cover your bit of turf, Mr Speaker, part of your electorate, was to provide two light units with a capacity of 500 litres per light unit. You can squeeze three people into a cab, so six firefighters and 1,000 litres of water. Six firefighters can empty 1,000 litres of water out of two tanks very quickly. That is this government’s idea of equipping and training volunteer firefighters. That encapsulates it to a tee: two unserviceable trucks and one new truck volunteers have not been trained on. The answer is that they can only take 1,000 litres with them. That is not preparing volunteers.
Mr Hargreaves—through you, Mr Speaker—add that to your statement, “We share the pride.” When you resort to saying, “We are proud of you,” you have serious problems. We are all proud of them. We are proud of the volunteers, the state emergency services and RFS guys. We are very proud of them all the time. The question is: if you are proud of them and if you trust them, why are you buggering things up with their bank accounts? Why aren’t you resolving those sorts of issues quickly, as the
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