Australia has been burning over the past 4 months. Hundreds of fires across most of our ‘states’.

Over Christmas and New Year things became catastrophic.

Our Prime Minister was on holiday in Hawaii (much needed apparently). He was roundly and rightly (in my view) criticised for this. Leadership requires sacrifice and it requires in the case of the Prime Minister, putting your country first.

When our Prime Minister returned several of the hundreds of fires had turned into megafires.This was not a description I’d ever heard before and quite frankly don’t want to hear ever again. Alas, I think I will and here’s why.

As all Australians and a large part of the rest of the world watched millions of hectares of our country burning the best our Prime Minister could do when he returned was say ‘We are ready to support whenever we’re asked.’

At the time I thought, ‘What the f*#k does this mean? Why doesn’t he just take action, show some leadership and make decisions.

I was angry with him for not doing so and segued his Hawaiian holiday into a sort of nonchalant attitude.

Turns out:

I was a bit hash.

I was wrong.

That here in Australia we’ve got a HUGE problem and it’s going nothing to do with our Prime Minister.

It’s got everything to do with how our country is structured. Like the USA Australia is a ‘federation of states’ where states have certain constitutionally derived powers as does the ‘federal’ government.

That the states have responsibility for, among other things:

Many states haven’t been taking their responsibilities in these areas seriously enough. Why do I say this? Keep reading.

Our Prime Minister called up the Army Reserve on xxx January after (effectively) pleading with the various state Premiers to ‘ask’ him to help. The Australian Constitution is such that the Prime Minister is not able to intervene in a ‘state’ matter unless requested.

Most Australians were looking on in horror at the unfolding conflagrations wondering what in the hell was going on.

We're now in mid-January. The fires are still burning but there’s some rain (thunderstorms and rain). We’ve still got hundreds of fires, some mega ones and what are our state Premiers doing? Playing politics.

Over the past five days I've read in disbelief the statements from most state Premiers about how they won't work constructively with the Federal Government on a national fire/climate change/mitigation strategy.

The Victorian Premier, Daniel Andrews, has called is own Inquiry. And then he made this obsequious and quite frankly arrogant statement:

We would, of course, welcome Defence support and input, as we have in  previous instances where it was warranted and at the request of the state government. We would like this practice to continue.’

GREAT, Daniel Andrews. If you’d taken action way earlier and engaged the Federal Government way earlier, several Victorians would not have lost their lives, hundreds of homes would not have been lost, thousands of hectares would not have been scored, millions of animals would not have been incinerated.

The NSW Premier, Gladys Berejiklian has stated that she will follow 'her' experts not Morrison's (our Prime Minister). To be exact she said:

‘NSW is always guided by the experts. It’s not for politicians to decide how we manage hazard reduction or back burning operations. If we determine we   need to change the laws (state laws by the way) in relation to land clearing the certainly we’ll consider those,’

Sorry Gladys, this simply doesn’t cut it. No leadership, obfuscation at a time when real leadership is required.

The Queensland Premier, Annastacia Palaszczuk, wants to shove it into a working group that’s called the Council of Australian Governments (COAG). COAG is a black hole, it was meant to be a mechanism for Australia to start reforming its Federal/State relations. Her best contribution to the Prime Minister’s suggestion of a Royal Commission (which I am not a fan of) follows:

‘We would like to know more information from the Prime Minister and it would seem to be a natural thing to discuss at COAG.’

The West Australian Premier, Mark McGowan follows the state premier line:

‘We would, of course, welcome Defence (read Federal Government) support and input….at the request of the state government. We would like this practice to continue.’

As Australia was burning our Prime Minister ‘pushed the very edge of extreme constitutional territory’ by calling up 3,000 army reservists and his direction for the Chief of the Defence Force to act regardless of whether a state asked for help.

THIS is the MOST telling insight of all in my view.

What state Premier actually asked for Federal assistance and if they did, when did they ask?

If they didn’t ASK, why didn’t they and if they did why did they wait so long?

How many people, homes, properties, national parks, grazing land, livelihoods had to be incinerated before they would deign to act and ‘ask’ for Federal assistance?

I’ll be asking this question and pursing the answers in the months and years ahead.

It’s completely disheartening for the average Australian to see this Federal/State divide.

They can’t even agree on having a national review of why the country is burning.

The states are concerned about ‘losing’ some of their powers. And then there’s their concern about the potential scrutiny of their management (clearly mis-management) of fuel loads and hazard reduction burns.

I have a message to share with all State Premiers and our Prime Minister.

Our country is on fire, will have more fires, more drought and more floods and you can't find a way to be leaders. . . the lot of you.

I despair at your short-sighted, self-aggrandising, narrow thinking. You are all responsible for the disasters that are the current bush fire season. Stop passing the buck. We don’t need a Royal Commission, this cannot be consigned to the black hole of COAG. Get together and deliver solutions and outcomes before the end of 2020.

People's lives, our flora, fauna and future depend on it.

By the way there’s a Federal election in 2022…next year. That should focus your minds.

 

 

 

 

 

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