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We, the undersigned organisations, call on the Victorian Allan Government to establish a Volunteer Remote Area Firefighting Team open to urban Victorians to join.

To:

The Hon. Jacinta Allan, Premier of Victoria

The Hon. Vicki Ward, Minister for Emergency Services

The Hon. Steve Dimopoulos, Minister for the Environment, Tourism and Outdoor Recreation

As Victoria shivers through a good, old fashioned winter, it might be a strange time to be thinking about fire. But next fire season will be with us soon enough, and there are some lessons for us from the horror summer currently being experienced in the northern hemisphere.

A 1.5 million hectare bushfire is raging in Siberia, and Alaska is burning. So are large parts of Turkey. The ‘heat dome’ that brought record breaking temperatures to the Pacific North West of North America has been followed by a fire season comparable with what we experienced over the terrible summer of 2019/20. California is experiencing a fire season that started in their winter. In January, Issac Sanchez, of Cal Fire Sacramento said “we’re not seeing ‘fire season’ any more. It’s just one big fire year, where we can be prepared for and expect a large destructive fire at any point.”

The School Strike 4 Climate Action movement has called a day of action on Friday 29 November to show solidarity with those affected by the unprecedented bushfires in NSW and Queensland. The event will call for governments to ramp up efforts to tackle the climate crisis. With Prime Minister Scott Morrison refusing to act, greater leadership is needed from Premier Dan Andrews and the Victorian Labor government.

Here's a message from Alice, a school striker from Melbourne: 

It’s Alice here from School Strike 4 Climate. I’m a 17 year old from Melbourne and, like you, have been watching on in horror as fires have been blazing across NSW, Queensland and more recently in Victoria and South Australia. Fires that are ravaging homes, livelihoods, country and, tragically, taking lives.

These fires are not normal. Over one million hectares have already burnt across the nation and summer is yet to come. Climate change is on our doorstep. It’s affecting our communities, here and now, and yet so many still choose to ignore what is right in front of them.

Deputy Premier and Emergency Services Minister James Merlino has told a parliamentary inquiry that climate change is putting an increasing strain on Victoria's emergency services such as firefighting. 

"Climate change is real and it's having an impact on our emergency services," Mr Merlino said.

In statements to the Public Accounts and Estimates Committee, the Minister noted that Victoria's bushfire season is starting earlier, lasting longer, and becoming more intense from climate change. These factors are making it challenging to manage the aviation fleet of large tankers that are also used in the northern hemisphere. 

Friends of the Earth commend the Deputy Premier for his frank comments about the real impacts of climate change. 

"It's refreshing to hear Deputy Premier James Merlino's honest comments about the impacts of climate change," said Leigh Ewbank, Friends of the Earth's Act on Climate coordinator.  

"Mr Merlino's comments underscore the need for urgent action to tackle climate change."