LAST week, a bill to establish a Fire and Emergency Services Volunteer Charter was introduced into state parliament, aiming to give Country Fire Service volunteer members, among others, more say in key issues affecting their organisations.
The move was a stark reminder that the input these volunteers have on major CFS decisions, and the thanks they get for being involved, are vastly disproportionate to how much they risk every year.
With summer approaching, these volunteers will regularly be called on to protect their communities from the horrors of fire. Time after time they will respond, putting their lives on the line and leaving their own houses unprotected as they go.
While most CFS call-outs end successfully and without injury, there is no denying the risks involved. They are real and they are unpredictable.
These volunteers are effectively on-call 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Be it a header fire, a blaze sparked by lightning or a car accident, they’ll be there.
In smaller regional centres, CFS volunteers can be some of the first on the scene of an accident. Seeing a fatality or a seriously injured driver can be a harrowing experience – traumatic enough without considering the strong possibility those involved could be the friends or family of volunteers on the scene.
And spare a thought for those left at home worrying when a loved one spends days away fighting a fire – the hours seem longer than usual and it’s impossible to relax until they walk back through the door.
These experiences are comparable with those encountered by firefighters in the Metropolitan Fire Brigade, although the chances of attending a scene to find a familiar face is reduced in the city.
But there are two major differences. A MFS firefighter has set shift times and clearly defined hours when their time is their own. They also receive a set salary – listed on the MFS website as $1356 a week when allocated to a shift – reflecting their skill-set and high-risk work environment.
Contrast this with country firefighters, who receive no payment and are still slapped with Emergency Services Levy bills each year. How can volunteers be asked to fund emergency services, when in country areas, they are the emergency services?
When they are prepared to pay the ultimate price to protect their communities, how can anyone justify asking for more?
