Legislative Council, Tuesday 8 April 2025

Ms FORREST question to LEADER of the GOVERNMENT in the LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL, Mrs HISCUTT

It would seem there was great interest in this and a bit of a flurry of activity after I sent my question through a little while ago. Anyway, you never know what helps to progress things, do you? With regard to emergency events including fire, flood and storm in regional and isolated areas of Tasmania:

(1) Is the local lead volunteer fire and/or SES officer permitted to engage with local media in the absence of a senior career officer when local people and property are at imminent risk to inform the local community of immediate risks; and

(2) Are lead volunteer fire and/or SES officers permitted to communicate in such circumstances in other states and/or territories?

ANSWER

Mr President, it is a very interesting question.

(1) The Tasmanian Emergency Management Arrangements (TEMA) - we will not call it TEMA, because that is another place, isn't it? We will call it TEMA - was established under the Emergency Management Act of 2006. It provides for the governance, legal and administrative framework that applies to emergency management in Tasmania. TEMA outlines the arrangements and approved mechanisms for public information and warnings during response. A key feature of response is the provision of timely warnings, calls to action and information to enable the community to protect themselves. In a response context, the incident controller is responsible for ensuring the timely issuance of warnings and the public information and warnings - the PI & W.

The cell is an essential component of an incident management team. The PI & W is provided with intelligence from the ground and other information that is used to inform the warning or the call to action relevant to the prevailing circumstances and applied to an identified geographical area that may be or is being impacted by an incident.

The warnings are issued via TasALERT. Operational related public information is also prepared and released by the PI & W and should be regarded as the approved primary source of truth. The ABC local radio is the Tasmanian emergency broadcaster that relays information prepared by the PI & W team and approved by the incident controller.

(2) Given the arrangements outlined above and the criticality of timely warnings or calls to action and operational-related public information, it is not a function or responsibility of local volunteer members to prepare or disseminate public information to the local community within Tasmania or to other jurisdictions, nor are local volunteer members approved to do so.

However, the local lead volunteer fire and/or SES officer is permitted to provide updates on the situation so long as the information being used is consistent with previously approved messaging. Local volunteer members are also permitted to comment on the response so long as messaging is consistent with the previously approved messaging.