Mr ANDREW: My question without notice is to the Minister for Fire and Disaster Recovery and
Minister for Corrective Services. The full complement of volunteers at Clairview Rural Fire Brigade have
expressed an intention to resign, leaving local residents and the 26,000-odd vehicles that pass through
the area each week without a dedicated fire service. What alternative approach will the minister be
taking to ensure that Clairview and other remote towns like it continue to receive a 24-hour, onsite fire
response service should any mass exodus of volunteers happen in the future?
Ms BOYD: I thank the member for the question. I might start by answering the last part of that
question first and then go back to Clairview. This gives me a good opportunity to talk about QFES’s
recruitment strategy in terms of volunteerism that we launched in 2018. We have already seen that
make a tremendous difference in terms of the volunteers that we have in place. One of the really
important parts of that strategy is the ability to have targeted recruitment in specific areas where we
need to attract new members, so we are definitely doing that and we are seeing it working right across
the state.
In terms of the Rural Fire Service, right now we have 27,200 volunteers making up the volunteer
workforce across our 1,400 rural fire brigades as of 29 February this year. We are supporting those
volunteers on the front line with a funding injection in this last budget alone of a 40 per cent uplift for
those volunteers. I am not sure of the specifics that are going on in the brigade that the member for
Mirani has mentioned here today—it is certainly not something he has mentioned to me in the past—
but I am more than eager to talk to him about what those specifics are so we can work together with
those volunteers into the future.
One of the things that the Miles government does is we value the contribution that those
volunteers make to their communities each and every day. They are on call 24/7. They are the first line
of defence for their communities. They do an outstanding job. We are going to continue to invest in
them today and into the future. If there is anything going on within that brigade, which I suspect may be
the case, I am happy as the minister to meet with them and their local MP and work through those
issues specifically.
We are not only ensuring that we are growing our volunteer base in rural fire; we are ensuring as
well that we are giving them the funding, the support, the training and the equipment they need to be
able to provide the best service to their community. Whether it is educating their community around the
risks that are associated with bushfires, working with landholders around that mitigation burning or
fighting those really dangerous fires on the ground, we are keen to continue to invest in our volunteers
and support them into the future because we know that our community needs it. We are a government
that is committed to ensuring that our community is kept safe right across the state of Queensland.
We will continue to work with the member. I am happy to meet with him today. If he wants to
meet with me today, I will make that time available to talk about that brigade specifically. We will
continue to ensure that rural fire brigades right across our state have the funding and support they need
into the future.