Warning on Victoria’s 'catastrophic' bushfire risk as Labor government accused of fuel reduction target failure

The Allan government has been accused of leaving Victoria "not fire prepared" despite warnings of a high-risk summer and fuel loads reaching dangerous levels.

Fire season has started in Victoria and regional MPs are warning a huge unmanaged fuel load could be catastrophic for rural communities.

Victoria currently works to a statewide target to get fuel loads below 70 per cent of their maximum levels with strategies including planned burns, constructing fuel breaks and building early intervention infrastructure.

But Nationals MP Melina Bath has said that the statewide fuel target was “completely flawed”.

The Victorian Bushfire Royal Commission, established in the wake of the Black Saturday bushfires, recommended an annual target of conducting planned burns on a minimum of 5 per cent of public land each year.

One estimate placed the average fuel reduction on public land in the past ten years at 1.4 per cent.

Nationals MP Melina Bath warned high fuel loads could hurt regional areas. Picture: Aaron Francis

Ms Bath said this had left Victoria “not fire prepared”.

“What we’re seeing is that there is high fuel loads. We’ve got the seasonal outlook is saying that we’re going to have a high fire risk summer and yet this government is not preparing for that,” she said.

“There is a swath across the whole of the bottom part of Victoria … where the fuel reduction has not been done.

A release last week from the Country Fire Authority warned that the areas in western Victoria, the Mornington Peninsula, Central Highlands and southwest Gippsland were at an increased fire risk in this year’s warmer-than-average summer.

“The Allan government was warned that this season would be high risk — yet the regions that are most vulnerable to bushfire have received some of the least mitigation work in the state,” Ms Bath said.

“This government has failed regional Victorians.”

Forest Fire Management Victoria (FFMVic) chief fire officer Chris Hardman said last week that while the agency’s fire management strategy did not meet the royal commission’s 5 per cent target it was more “targeted” and “very much focused on maximising the risk reduction”.

Forest Fire Management Victoria Chief Fire Officer Chris Hardman. Picture: Luis Enrique Ascui

“I know there are many people that don’t necessarily agree or conform, to that view, but we use the best science available to us to maximise the risk reduction outcome for communities,” he said.

He said that in 2016 a new review was conducted and found that having a hectare target was “counterintuitive” and did not necessarily lead to risk reduction.

“So what we do now is we, on the computer, we ignite 72,000 fires on the computer across the state. We run those fires, and then we, plan where the planned burns should go to maximise the risk reduction outcome.”

“It’s not a big number in terms of the five per cent … but it’s very much targeted and it’s very much focused on maximising the risk reduction.”

The warning from the Nationals came the same day as bushfires raged out of control near Bendigo, with residents told to enact their fire survival plans.

A Victorian government spokesperson said the community remained “well protected” by the state’s fire agencies.

“Victoria has a program of activities to keep fuel-driven bushfire risk below 70 per cent. Planned burning and other actions including mulching, mowing, slashing and spraying help us to consistently keep fuel-driven bushfire risk below this level on public land,” they said.

“FFMVic has the capacity to continue undertaking critical bushfire season preparations and respond to bushfire emergencies.”

Originally published as Warning on Victoria’s 'catastrophic' bushfire risk as Labor government accused of fuel reduction target failure