Well, Mr Speaker, the meeting you refer to was not a meeting that I attended. Mr Speaker …
The meeting that you also said was requested and was well publicised, related to former fire chiefs. I engage with current fire chiefs, Mr Speaker.
And the current fire chiefs have provided the advice going into this fire season was the same fire advice that was provided by Emergency Management Australia, when I asked Emergency Management Australia to come and brief cabinet well, well before the fire season, Mr Speaker.
Last year, to advise us what was necessary and to ensure we were compliant and we were taking action to ensure the commonwealth’s position was in the best position it could be to support state and territory authorities as they moved through this devastating fire season.
That included the additional funding that we announced that I referred to earlier in response to the member for Gilmore’s question, to provide the additional support for the aerial bombers.
It ensured in November the government undertook a trial program for the compulsory callout of reserves to ensure in the event we would move to that situation it would be done seamlessly.
This has been one of the most significant responses of the government to ensure we went from a situation of around 895 defence force personnel on the ground in December, to 6,500 and more on the ground in January.
That changed because the government changed the disposition of the commonwealth’s deployment of defence forces on the ground. Not to respond to requests, but to take this to the extreme of the constitutionality, Mr Speaker.
The extreme of constitutionality to respond, Mr Speaker, to the situation that emerged that week, where on the Thursday it was the first day the national state of disaster was declared in Victoria. That hadn’t occurred before.
That happened on the Thursday. There was the compulsory callout on the Saturday and the preparations for that compulsory callout were already under way when Victoria made that declaration.
Mr Speaker, those opposite in the questions today are seeking to politicise this disaster and it’s very disappointing.
