Eighteen years ago, many of us saw first-hand how catastrophic weather events created uncontrollable fires around Canberra. The disaster unfolding on the NSW South Coast and in east Gippsland and South Australia are more of the same.
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I write a column, "The Good Oil" column on the Local Government Focus website, and in 2003 I commented on that year's Canberra bushfires. Here are some excerpts:
"There is utter devastation. The Chief Minister said we would have needed 800 fire trucks to save the city, and I believe him. As I write, the cost estimates are $100 million, but this must surely climb. The national capital will never be quite the same again.
"This bushfire, and its forerunner 12 months ago, are clear signs that the current environmental policy settings are unsustainable. There is a major message for any local government area that has forest adjoining urban areas.
"The emotional and psychological impact has been enormous. It will pave the way for bold new steps and major land use changes.
"Recriminations are pointless without solutions. Given that fire safety is a local issue, could a group of councils take the lead by suggesting to the Commonwealth and states that they buy three Erickson Skycranes ("Elvis"-style choppers), or refit RAAF Chinook helicopters? If they baulk, there is no reason why local government couldn't do it in tandem with a decent company, provided long-term contracts with the fire authorities were in place. The need is to have sufficient capability to deploy resources anywhere at short notice."
I was obviously a little too optimistic back in 2003.
Firstly, there have been no bold new steps in dealing with bushfires.
Secondly, major land use changes haven't happened - backburning is not common, and the Victorian government's ban on the logging of native forests must add to the fuel loads.
Thirdly, three Elvis helicopters will not be enough to deal with the nationwide fires we now face on a continuing basis.
Former fire chiefs warned last March that our firefighting capacity will fall short unless we buy our own fleet of water-bombing aircraft rather than borrowing them from overseas, because monster blazes burning simultaneously across the globe are becoming the norm. However, the federal government reportedly said that purchasing a national firefighting air fleet would be too expensive, and current leasing arrangements are working. Well let's follow this through.
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Say we bought a dozen Elvis helicopters, based at three or so locations around the nation, with the ability for all of them fly to hotspots at short notice and work in tandem with ground crews. They're about $40 million each, so that's $480 million plus running costs. In the scheme of things, that's not a lot of money to address a real threat.
Indeed, late last year a Rear-Admiral confided to Senate estimates that, in addressing an imaginary threat, our 12 new French submarines will cost an eye-watering $225 billion over their lifetime. The explanation was that the original $50 billion construction cost had blown out, and then there's maintenance on top.
No one has since challenged that figure. What didn't get reported was that, back in the day, there were six Oberon-class subs, followed by six Collins-class subs. So why do we now need 12 subs? A Defence insider earlier commented to me that subs are basically deterrents and you only need two or three in service to get that effect.
The wash-up is that $225 billion is a lot of schools, hospitals, sealed roads, water pipelines, dams, port facilities and Elvis helicopters. And $1 billion would have kept our car industry going. It simply proves that Defence is untouchable - and Abbott, Bomber Beazley and Rudd were all cut from the same cloth. Like a bunch of lemmings, we accepted their wisdom.
Anyway, the likely way forward on the bushfire issue is a string of inquiries. However, surely we must embolden the states to maintain a national consciousness and sense of urgency on the issue. If Defence officials and defence contractors can get ridiculous results from cabinet, let's encourage the states to develop a sensible proposal to COAG - perhaps the shared funding of considerably more firefighting aircraft, the training of military personnel, and some financial support for volunteer firefighters. And let's not have any bullshit about now not being the time to discuss these things.
- Rod Brown is a former senior government official in the industry, regional development and construction fields. He now runs the Cockatoo Network and is a federally registered lobbyist.
