‘Blame the climate bogeyman for NSW fires’

Matt Kean is accused of blaming the ‘bogeyman’ of climate change for the NSW bushfire crisis.

NSW Environment Minister Matt Kean. Picture: AAP

NSW Environment Minister Matt Kean has been accused of blaming the “bogeyman” of climate change for the state’s devastating bushfire crisis to distract from his department’s “shortcoming in managing the land”.

Mr Kean broke with his federal Coalition colleagues, arguing the ­nation needed to urgently reduce its carbon emissions before catastrophic bushfire seasons ­became the norm.

“If this is not a catalyst for change, then I don’t know what is,” he said on Tuesday. “This is not normal and doing nothing is not a solution. We need to reduce our carbon emissions immediately, and we need to adapt our practices to deal with this kind of weather ­becoming the new normal.”

His comments attracted a fierce reaction, with critics claiming Mr Kean’s own department — which oversees the ­National Parks and Wildlife Service — had failed to properly prepare for the crisis and that there were more practical pro­cedures that needed to be put in place before politicising the issue and making it about carbon emissions.

NSW Water Minister Melinda Pavey also accused her government colleague of playing politics with an issue that had seen six people killed and more than 720 homes destroyed.

“Everyone on the ground knows that this is simply caused by a lack of rain,” Ms Pavey said.

“We have seen major events like this before. We have had ­extreme drought. In 1974, we had fires that consumed twice the landmass than what we are experiencing here at the moment.”

Federal Resources Minister Matt Canavan said it was clear his NSW counterparts had simply failed in their obligations to manage the land. “Blind Freddy can see that Australia has a high risk of bushfires,” he said.

“Whatever the scientific debate, the risk of bushfire in Aus­tralia is high and we should do what we can to mitigate that risk.

“I don’t think the NSW government can change the temperature of the globe anytime soon, but they can reduce fuel loads and reduce the risk of a fire starting and spreading. Too often state governments are using the bogeyman of climate change to distract from their shortcomings in managing our land.”

Troy Wright, assistant general secretary of the Public Service ­Association, the union representing NPWS workers, said the real problem in handling bushfires was ongoing budget cuts. “The ­intensity and impact of these fires have been increased by significant cutbacks to the operational ­capacity of the NPWS 18 months ago,” he said. “There has been a 35 per cent cut to fire-trained positions in National Parks.”

Mr Wright said in the 2016-17 budget, $121m was cut from NSW national parks and that it had been further depleted by $80m this year.

“Apart from last financial year, National Parks haven’t been able to reach its annual hazard reduction target since 2016,” he said.

A spokesman for Mr Kean said NPWS staff were responsible for 75 per cent of hazard reduction burning conducted in NSW.

In 2012-13, the service was involved in 208,000ha of hazard reduction; that dropped to 88,136ha in 2016-17, with 95,589ha burnt in 2017-18.

However, the government said the amount of backburns had increased in 2018-19, with “NPWS undertaking 137,500ha of prescribed burns, which is above its target of 135,000ha.”