Page 58 - Week 01 - Wednesday, 28 February 2007

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have put in place new mapping. We have upgraded fire trails. We have agreements with New South Wales. We have undertaken community education through the bushfire wise and the farm fire wise programs. We have distributed public information. We have implemented a standard early warning system for the territory. We have put in place full-time media communication and liaison so that information is distributed quickly and promptly. We have established a new incident control centre at the RFS headquarters at Fairbairn. We have developed the bushfire operational plan and the strategic bushfire management plan. All of these things have been done since 2003. They are significant achievements and they have made a significant difference.

When you look at the government’s response, it is easy to pick out the issue about what the administrative arrangements for the ESA should be. But look at the heart of the matter. Look at the issues that really matter. Look at the coroner’s recommendations about preventing this sort of situation from occurring again. Those recommendations concern fire fuel management, communications, incident management, coordination and early warning. All those recommendations were agreed—and agreed unequivocally—by the government and, almost to a point, implemented fully by the government.

That is the government’s approach. That is our commitment. That is the way we will continue to tackle this issue into the future.

MR SESELJA (Molonglo) (3.01): Mr Speaker, we all remember these words: “If you want to blame somebody, blame me.” We remember them well. At the time, like many Canberrans, even though I was not in this place at the time, I was impressed that at the height of one of Canberra’s darkest days we had our leader taking responsibility—so it seemed.

And did not Jon Stanhope do well out of this apparent acceptance of responsibility? In many areas he was feted as a hero by the newspapers. In the Daily Telegraph, he became Mr 84 Per Cent. When I was with family and friends, many would speak positively about the Chief Minister because he had taken responsibility. I remember that the article about Mr 84 Per Cent said that ALP sources said that his heroic efforts in helping to save the life of a drowning helicopter pilot and his strength during the bushfire crisis, coupled with his straight-up leadership style, had wooed voters. He did well out of this.

It is a pity he did not really mean it. It is a pity it was all just empty rhetoric. We are now told by the Chief Minister, Jon Stanhope, that when he said “Blame me”, what he actually meant was “Do not blame me.” In his statement in response to the coroner’s report, the Chief Minister said that these words were not an acknowledgment of either personal or governmental shortcomings in response to the fires. Really? What were they then?

Ordinarily, when I hear someone take the blame for something, I understand it to mean that they acknowledge that in one way or another they have failed to do what they were supposed to do, that they have demonstrated some shortcomings. This is what the community thought at the time. They were misled, Mr Speaker—misled by this empty rhetoric.


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