CFA-Guardian angels of our state

[Slinger]

Keep up the good fight CFA. Boo to interfering govts and unions.

Yeah boo to the union that exposed the lies & dangerous conditions re: fiskville.
Cheers to the CFA board that consistently lied & exposed CFA & MFB firefighters to an incredibly unsafe workplace.

 

[Rosy]

Yeah boo to the union that exposed the lies & dangerous conditions re: fiskville.
Cheers to the CFA board that consistently lied & exposed CFA & MFB firefighters to an incredibly unsafe workplace.

None of that is the responsibility of the volunteers who give so much to keep us safe. Too much politics and not enough common sense now.

 

[Slinger]

None of that is the responsibility of the volunteers who give so much to keep us safe. Too much politics and not enough common sense now.

Agreed.

But the EBA for professional firefighters isn't the responsibility or business of the volunteers either.

 

[mk33]

that is allegedly not true. hence my point.

It is true, my father is the secretary of a rural CFA brigade and as has seen the demands of the UFU. The seven union fire fighters is definately correct.

 

[mk33]

Agreed.

But the EBA for professional firefighters isn't the responsibility or business of the volunteers either.

It is when the demands of the UFU are to take over positions that are held and not allow volunteers to fight a fire until 7 union fire fighters are there.

 

[Slinger]

It is when the demands of the UFU are to take over positions that are held and not allow volunteers to fight a fire until 7 union fire fighters are there.

You're misinformed- one of many it seems.

Volunteer firefighters DO NOT have to wait for career firefighters before fighting a fire.

 

[Ian4]

http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/cfa-crisis-premier-daniel-andrews-stands-firm-20160607-gpd7y1.html

Daniel Andrews is standing by his controversial industrial agreement with the firefighters union, leaving him on a collision course with the CFA and volunteers.

Rather than substantially overhauling the deal, Mr Andrews will instead rely on Emergency Management Commissioner Craig Lapsley to ease volunteer and CFA concerns, with only minor changes flagged.

On Monday, following more than a day of negotiations with Emergency Services Minister Jane Garrett, who was on the brink of resigning, it was announced that more work would be done to provide clarity on the most contentious issues in the proposed work and pay deal.

The pay deal, which won the backing of the Fair Work Commission last week, has infuriated the CFA board and some volunteers who fear a union takeover. The CFA board is adamant the deal in its current form is unlawful and unworkable.

Ahead of a United Firefighters Union rally at parliament on Tuesday, Mr Andrews said Mr Lapsley's role in overseeing and enforcing the agreement would be clarified this week.

He also flagged further announcements regarding the bitter dispute.

"We believe that the concerns the CFA has raised can be addressed and fully addressed by the monitoring framework that we are putting in place," Mr Andrews said.

He said it was important that the agreement was resolved so that reform could be undertaken in the CFA, including tackling issues raised by the Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission .

"We should never lose sight of the fact that all parties agreed to put these seemingly intractable issues, this long running and bitter dispute, before the independent umpire … it [has] come back with a set of recommendations," Mr Andrews said.

Special Minister of State, and the Premier's right-hand man, Gavin Jennings said the government believed the recommendations of Fair Work formed "the sound basis" for an agreement and called on the CFA to better understand what the implementation actually meant rather than "locking into positions that may be six months out of date".

"Any reasonable concern that the CFA have raised previously have been considered by the independent umpire, they've made recommendations," Mr Jennings said.

Ms Garrett said the focus for all in government was to resolve the dispute, saying she was "confident" that there could be movement from all parties on the contentious issues.

"It certainly will require all the parties to make sure that whatever the outcome of this, it is respectful of both career and volunteer firefighters," Ms Garrett said.

"We are listening to those concerns. This is a big issue because the CFA is such a central part of Victoria."

Minister for Women Fiona Richardson said more work needed to be done addressing questions raised by the Equal Rights and Human Rights Commission.

Opposition Leader Matthew Guy, who has promised to raise issues regarding the Fair Work process in Parliament, called on the government to recruit former Premier Steve Bracks to fix the mess.

Treasurer Tim Pallas said the dispute had for months been plagued by misinformation - including from the CFA board - about the impact on volunteers, signalling the government would be discussing those concerns in coming days.

Asked if the CFA board had misrepresented the agreement, Mr Pallas said he believed it had - particularly with claims that the role of volunteers would be undermined.

"Characterisation of key parts of the agreement have been nothing short of scandalous in some respects," Mr Pallas said.

"For too long we have let the conversation on this focus around the nonsense that is being generated in the media for self-serving purposes. It is about time that there was a very clear response from government and there will be."


Police Minister Lisa Neville insisted the decision to take more time did not represent a backdown by the Mr Andrews. She said the government was merely testing if the Fair Work Commission's recommendations were correct.

"The CFA board sent this off to the Fair Work Commission [and] they have come back with a recommendation and we are testing to make sure that our understanding of those recommendations are right. That is all that is happening in this case," she said.

so much for the herald sun claiming Andrews has been 'utterly humiliated.'

 

[mk33]

The Age is just ALP and Union proganda bullsh*t so no credibility with their bias.

 

[Slinger]

The Age is just ALP and Union proganda bullsh*t so no credibility with their bias.

Ha!

Better stick to a high quality, unbiased rag like the Herald Sun.

 

[IanG]

Philosophically I have an issue with a union running an organisation they are supposed to represent part of the workforce of. Management and workers reps should be independent of each other.

 

[Ian4]

The Age is just ALP and Union proganda bullsh*t so no credibility with their bias.

we can argue til the cows come home about which rag is more biased, but i'm inclined to have more faith in what Tim Pallas said than believe the crap the Murdoch media says. but lets wait until this all comes out before judging, shall we?

case in point: the so-called electoral rorts the Murdoch media claimed labour undertook at the state election turned out to be nothing. typical of them to hide it 10 or pages in todays paper after all the front page headlines over the past year.

 

[Baloo]

What happened to days when RFC were mighty, the Saints constant wooden spooners, The Herald Sun was the working mans paper and the Age was for the Toffs ?

 

[Rosy]

The MOTH was first to the fire shed this summer. Drove the tanker to a reported house fire. They had to just twiddle their thumbs and watch a neighbours house burn to the ground. They weren't allowed to put water on till some official arrived. The last thing volunteers need is union red tape. Can easily see the same thing happening while volunteers stand around waiting for the required number of profesionals to show up.

 

[poppa x]

The MOTH was first to the fire shed this summer. Drove the tanker to a reported house fire. They had to just twiddle their thumbs and watch a neighbours house burn to the ground. They weren't allowed to put water on till some official arrived. The last thing volunteers need is union red tape. Can easily see the same thing happening while volunteers stand around waiting for the required number of profesionals to show up.

Correct Rosy.
I'll give you a real world example.
I own property in Daylesford.
The closest "professional" fire station is in Ballarat - 30 minutes away.
There is only one road between Daylesford and Ballarat.
If a fire breaks out, the Daylesford CFA are rwuired to wait 30 minutes for the Ballarat Union people to arrive.
But what if the only road is closed due to fire?
And how much damage is done in 30 minutes?

 

[Slinger]

Rosy & poppa x- you're both wrong.

I don't care how many times people want to say it, volunteer firefighters are not required to wait for career firefighters before attacking a fire.

They're not now, and they won't be when the new EBA is signed off.

 

[WesternTiger]

Rosy & poppa x- you're both wrong.

I don't care how many times people want to say it, volunteer firefighters are not required to wait for career firefighters before attacking a fire.

They're not now, and they won't be when the new EBA is signed off.

Slinger my understanding is seven career firefighters must attend each incident. Has nothing to do with the when and who fights the fire.

Have no time for Peter Marshall but the career firefighters speak very highly of him.

 

[Rosy]

Rosy & poppa x- you're both wrong.

I don't care how many times people want to say it, volunteer firefighters are not required to wait for career firefighters before attacking a fire.

They're not now, and they won't be when the new EBA is signed off.

What I wrote is fact. The incident happened and the less red tape for volunteets the safer we feel.

 

[mk33]

Slinger my understanding is seven career firefighters must attend each incident. Has nothing to do with the when and who fights the fire.
.

It is correct that is what has being put forward to the CFA brigades of that the UFU wants. Slinger is wrong.

 

[Baloo]

Tried reading about this from various sources. What I can gather is that this rule is only for joint stations where they have CFA and career firefighters in one station (don't know how many of them there are). Also, it mentions "dispatched" but the interpretation of that seems ambiguous. i.e. must they arrive on the scene or just be dispatched there before the volunteers take action.

Really doesn't make any sense for anyone to have volunteers just sitting there waiting, doing nothing, until career firemen arrive. Can't see the logic in that for either side.

 

[poppa x]

I think there are about 2,000 profesional (union) fire fighters.
And there are about 60,000 CFA Volunteers.

Not sure what this means in terms of fighting rural fires.