VFBV

Joint Operations Committee 2 Minute Briefing 

Issue 6, 11 August 2013

Quick snapshot of the priority issues and actions worked through at the most recent Joint Committee meeting between CFA and VFBV. (Meeting held 11/08/2013)

2012/13 FIRE DANGER PERIOD OPERATIONAL REVIEW

Delegates have persistently been critical of the 2012/13 Operational review process that was used during this year’s post season reviews, with many reports of volunteers not knowing about, or having access to last season’s debrief process, resulting in a very top heavy and disjointed review and action planning. The Joint Committee has made a major breakthrough, with CFA agreeing to implement a comprehensive centralized system that will be open to all CFA members that will aim to capture, log, track and report on progress against items raised throughout the season, as opposed to waiting until the end of the season for formal reviews.

-

A local referral process is being built into the process to ensure issues have the opportunity to be resolved at the lowest appropriate level before being escalated. This should go a long way towards providing volunteers with an adequate opportunity to raise issues of concern experienced on operational deployments & on the fire ground while it is fresh on their minds, whilst also providing much needed transparency and line of sight from the grass roots to incident managers during post season reviews. Regular reporting back to the Joint Committee of issues being raised will also provide the opportunity for the committee to spot trends and common themes. It is hoped that this new process will ultimately provide much needed evidence to influence future joint agency reform agenda’s to ensure systemic issues being raised by volunteers are given adequate attention. Further details of the system will be provided by CFA after initial testing is complete, and the committee commends CFA on progressing this much anticipated initiative.

VOLUNTEER UTILIZATION ON SPECIALIST APPLIANCES

The committee went through a preliminary report on the number of volunteers who are trained and qualified to use the various range of specialist appliances within the fleet. The reports have overwhelmingly confirmed our view that volunteers are experiencing difficulty gaining access to the training necessary to operate these appliances and are often overlooked in their response and operation.  The committee is now progressing work on a report that will be submitted to the Chief Officer to make him aware of the problem and our concerns, and recommend a suite of treatments that will not only look at increasing volunteer access to training on these appliances, but will also look at increasing the opportunities for volunteers to actually use those skills once they have them. The vehicles being included in the review are Technical Rescue (including rope and trench), Teleboom’s, Bronto Aerial Ladders, and Aerial Pumpers. The review will also look at the general up skilling of volunteers at Integrated brigade locations in order to assess adequate access to training for Heavy Hazmats, Heavy Pumpers and other vehicles to ensure response plans are holistic and use all available resources available within brigades.

REVERSE SECTION 29’s

The Committee is progressing work on introducing a new component to Brigade Section 29’s which will allow brigades to report on the level of support provided by CFA and what support they think is needed to meet their requirements. Section 29’s have historically been used as a mechanism to report on brigade preparedness and efficiency, but has lacked the ability for the brigade to assess and report on whether they are getting the support or resources from CFA that they actually require to meet those targets and objectives. The revised Section 29 will be piloted in two Districts this year, with the intent to seek the Chief Officers endorsement for state wide roll-out during the 2014/15 financial year.