Page 85 - Week 01 - Wednesday, 28 February 2007
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Mr Speaker, if you did believe that the fuel build-up was to a point that prevention was not possible, what would you do? Surely you would redouble your efforts in preparation to fight fires, maintain fire trails, ensure warning systems were working, ensure equipment was available and working, and ensure that the people—individuals, the chain of command and the communications systems—were ready to fight the fires when they broke out.
Jon Stanhope presided over a government that created the conditions in which a disastrous fire was a major risk and then did not extinguish those fires when it was possible to do so in the early days of 8 and 9 January. As my colleagues have demonstrated, it is not good enough to say, “I was just acting on advice.” The advice was bad, and he is responsible for the bad advice as well.
I have seen the videos and photographic evidence tendered to the coroner about the extent of the fires on 8 January. We also know that, given the heavy dew fall and the low winds overnight, some of those fires went out, only to be rekindled the next day as the temperature and the wind rose. We can see from the photograph on page 23 of the McLeod report that the Stockyard Spur fire on 9 January was nothing more than a wisp of smoke.
These fires were not as the Chief Minister portrayed them. This morning he said that they were simply an act of God. The lightning strikes were an act of God, but the management after that was not an act of God. These fires had stalked us for over a week and our Chief Minister, who was the minister for the environment, should have known what was happening, and he should have told us.
In January 2003, Jon Stanhope was the minister for the environment, one of two ministers in this government responsible for bushfire fuel management. This process of bushfire fuel management was a matter of long standing. It had been operating in various forms for at least five years before then. Yet in August 2003 the Chief Minister told this place that he had never really thought about the levels of fuel and it had never really crossed his mind that these fires could come to town.
I think, Mr Speaker, that you can only say that this comes straight from the Alan Bond school of evasion and memory loss. I have had approaches from the community as to what Jon Stanhope was doing at the time. Was he too busy to talk to the same men that I took time to talk to? Did he cocoon himself from inconvenient truths? How could he say, with a straight face, that it had never crossed his mind that these fires could come to our suburbs? Either Jon Stanhope knew more about the progress of the fire than he has ever let on or he did nothing to find out what was going on. Either Jon Stanhope was asleep on his watch or he turned a blind eye. We can see that from the coroner’s account on page 233 of volume I, which reads:
Although Mr Lucas-Smith said that the members of the ACT Cabinet were “very interested” in the threat the fires posed—
this is about the cabinet briefing—
he did not recall a great deal of questioning during the briefing.
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