Page 1992 - Week 06 - Thursday, 9 June 2016
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Mr Smyth raised concerns about term limits. He made the observation that it is desirable to have people with experience of significant fire events on the Bushfire Council. I agree with that, but what I do not agree with is that you can be appointed to a government council potentially for life. It is reasonable to have term limits for appointments to important statutory bodies. It provides for renewal, it provides for reinvigoration and it provides for a diversity of views and perspectives.
The government’s policy is to provide for term limits of no more than eight years for any one person in any one period as a member of a government statutory body. That is the equivalent of two terms of this place. I think it is a reasonable proposition. It is even more reasonable when we have regard to the fact that people can be appointed again, having not been on the body for a reasonable period, that is, four years.
The Bushfire Council is not an operational body. It does not have responsibility for operations. We heard the commentary from the shadow minister earlier tonight harking back to when the Bushfire Council did have those responsibilities. But that has not been the case since self-government, and to suggest that somehow we should go back to that arrangement is harking back to some bygone glory day which I do not think really has any substance in reality.
The important thing is that we have people with the experience and expertise to provide good advice to the government on bushfire-related policy and planning matters, and that we have people with the necessary experience and expertise to lead what is no longer the ACT Bushfire Service, as it was then, but the ACT Rural Fire Service and all of the responsibilities it now has in a contemporary governance framework.
I am confident that these changes to term limits allow for reasonable renewal, allow new members to bring fresh insights, ideas and approaches, while still maintaining the capacity to have people on the body who have extensive experience, knowledge and wisdom regarding large-scale fire events. The two are not mutually incompatible.
I want to turn to some of the other provisions in the bill that deal with the process involved with determining the future of the built-up area and the rural area. It is clear to me that there are good grounds to review the arrangements for both the built-up area and the rural area in terms of the geographic application of these zones. I would like to make it very clear that the ESA Commissioner has given a commitment, at my request, that subject to this bill being enacted the ESA will commence a process to review the boundaries of the built-up area, with the aim of ensuring that a negotiated notifiable instrument and maps are in effect prior to the commencement of the next bushfire season on 1 October this year.
As part of this consultation process the ESA Commissioner will convene more frequent meetings of the Emergency Services Operational Review Group meeting—ESORG—to facilitate the progress of the new notifiable instrument and maps. The purpose of the declaration of a bushfire abatement zone sits clearly under a bushfire prevention aegis. These amendments maintain the importance of creating a special area around the city to clarify fire planning and prevention measures for land
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