Fire Services Victoria’s wages blowout as volunteers battle for resources

Every Victorian is paying $131 each towards the wages bill of the state’s fire services, as volunteers battle for resources against a cashed-up union.

Fire tax: Emergency Services Minister Jaclyn Symes is the fourth Labor minister to preside over Victoria’s fire services, delivering huge benefits to the United Firefighters Union.

Every Victorian man, woman and child is paying $131.24 each towards the wages bill of the state’s fire services.

While Victoria’s population has grown by 12 per cent since Premier Daniel Andrews came to power in 2014, the fire services’ wage bill has blown out by 75 per cent, from $498m in 2014-15 to $873m in 2020-21.

Fire Rescue Victoria’s 2020-21 annual report, recently tabled in parliament, revealed its wages bill had hit $756m, with the CFA paying its workers $116m. FRV was formed on July 1 last year, after a four-year battle that led the State Government to controversially strip the CFA of 38 stations and merge all of its career staff with the MFB to form the new service.

CFA was then forced to second 228 of its commanders, assistant chief fire officers and instructors back from FRV at a cost to Victorian tax payers of $82.8m or $363,157 each.

FRV has 3570 permanent operational firefighters in total, plus 590 support and administrative staff costing $756m in 2019-20, or an average of about $182,000 each.

Volunteer Fire Brigades Victoria state councillor Bill Maltby, from Castlemaine, said “there’s only one bucket of money and there’s no doubt someone is going to be the loser in this and you would think it’s going to be us”.

The bulk of the wages are go to United Firefighters Union members, to pay their base salaries, $72m overtime bill and generous allowances, which are enshrined in a 777-page enterprise agreement.

The wage surge has in turn bolstered the UFU Victoria’s finances, helping push its total revenue from $5.5m in 2014-15 to just over $7m in 2019-20, as outlined in its declarations to the Australian Electoral Commission as a Labor Party (Victorian Branch) affiliated entity.

The UFU has also embarked on a campaign in the leadup to next year’s November state election to take over even more CFA territory and stations as part of its Ready for Anything campaign, which opponents fear will displace more volunteers and force up FRV costs.

Wages bills have skyrocketed under the current Government with Department of Treasury and Finance annual reports showing its total employee costs have risen 62 per cent from $18 billion in 2014-15 to more than $30 billion.

Opposition Emergency Services Minister Brad Battin said the fire services’ wages blowout ultimately put all Victorians at risk, given the Government had to make a choice between increased wages versus more firefighters, trucks and equipment.

“We know this government is eventually going to run out of money”, Mr Battin said.

CFA volunteers say the greatest risk to them is a wind down of resources as they compete with FRV for government funding.

Mr Maltby said evidence of how costs were being blown out was evident in how FRV was being run, with nearby Bendigo station calling in backup from Sunbury and Broadmeadows, rather the using volunteer brigades.

“The overtime bill is massive,” he said.

Emergency Volunteer Awareness Campaign director Garth Head said the main drivers of the wage surge were enterprise agreements that automatically reclassified fire fighters into higher salary bands, based on time served, plus “an inordinate level of overtime being paid”.

Mr Head said the battle over the Government’s push to restructure the fire services had led to a loss of volunteers, with CFA records showing in 2014-15 there were 35,367 operational volunteers, compared to 29,553 today.

He said the losses were undermining Victoria’s capacity to fight large campaign fires using the surge capacity of volunteers.

“What the government has done is push a lot of experienced and able volunteers out of the way to bring in staff at locations where they’re not needed, putting an end to the old fully integrated model where they worked to support each other,” Mr Head said.

Emergency Services Minister Jaclyn Symes said “Victoria is one of the highest fire risk areas in the world and with fires becoming more frequent and complex, it’s critical our firefighters have the resources they need to do what they do best – save lives.

“We said we’d increase firefighter numbers and that’s exactly what we’ve done, with an additional 450 funded since 2015.

“We make no apologies for ensuring all Victorians are safe and have access to some of the best firefighters in the world.

“Firefighters at FRV work tirelessly 24 hours a day, 365 days a year to keep the community safe – they deserve pay and conditions that support this enormous effort.