The Berrimah Fire Station was non-operational on Friday and the firefighter’s union has said staff shortages have meant there is no capacity to fight a fire in a high-rise city building, but Chief Fire Officer Mark Spain has said the station was operational with some fire trucks moved to the Palmerston station to deal with potential bush fires.
It comes after Mr Spain closed the Humpty Doo Fire Station for the day on Monday because fire fighters had refused to work overtime.
In mid-June the NT Independent reported sources, including United Workers Union NT secretary Ms Early, said the main Darwin city fire station at Stuart Park was without a fire truck that morning, putting the CBD at “huge risk” because of an inability to fight fires in apartments and large buildings.
Mr Spain told Kate Woolf on Mix 104.9 on Friday morning Northern Territory Fire and Rescue Service had to “relocate assets due to risk relief requirements”.
“All fire stations are open. However, there has been a reduction in capacity at Berrimah Fire Station in order to provide capacity to Palmerston and have to do due to the increased wildfire activity this week,” he said.
One firefighter source, who also wished to remain anonymous, said the station had been closed, but when it started being reported on radio in the morning, Mr Spain moved staff back there so he could say it was open.
“That seemed to be the action they took. It was very poorly communicated so its hard to say,” they said.
“Executive are playing games with peoples lives. When a government body starts justifying reduced safety measures, they are pitting dollars against the lives of the public we are paid to protect. They cease being a leader and become a bureaucrat.”
Ms Early said firefighters were told at 7.45am that Berrimah Fire station would be closing, but there were three firefighters stationed there without a station officer leaving “no real capacity”.
“They are only there to give the chief fire officer a story to tell. This is a slight of hand. A magician’s trick,” she said.
“Berrimah station has been closed as a cost-cutting exercise plain and simple. The were eight-plus overtime shifts required to be filled today and instead of calling members in to fill them, management sent the two rostered members at Berrimah to Humpty Doo and Palmerston to fill shortfalls that required overtime there, and shut the station without exhausting all options to fill it.”
She said they also moved a third member off the high-rise ladder truck called Bronto, which is used to fight high-rise building fires, to backfill another overtime position.
The Bronto has the longest hydraulically operated ladder in Darwin, so firefighters were unable to respond to fires in apartments and large commercial buildings, Ms Early and other sources said.
“No matter how they want to spin it, the safety of firefighters and more importantly the general public has been put at risk to save money,” Ms Early said.
“The greater Darwin area is understaffed with a reduced capacity to respond to incidents due to cost cutting by NTPFES. This conduct from the Chief Fire Officer is reckless and clearly demonstrates that the fire service is in crisis and needs immediate review.”
What other firefighters say about the ongoing overtime issues
One firefighter source – who wanted to remain anonymous – said Mr Spain was doing his best and had been let down with resourcing by the NTFES chief executive Jamie Chalker and former minister Nicole Manison.
They said rostering was a complicated system that would be hard to explain to the general public, with limits on how many hours firefighters could work and qualifications needed for different roles.
They could not get enough staff to do overtime to cover the shifts despite many calls being made, but some firefighters were not called because they were needed to work tonight, they said.
“Essentially firefighters can’t work more than 24 hours consecutively, and the people Spain did not contact were needed to help maintain stations tonight. It would cause a cascading effect,” they said.
“The union are also accusing them of trying to save money. That is absolutely not true as they will pay the overtime no problem, it’s just that no one is accepting it.
“And it is forcing Spain to implement a strategy to maintain some ability of keeping things viable for the next shift, without being forced to make them work beyond twenty four hours.
“All firefighters were advised that Berrimah Station is closed. The teacher strike’s has caused a lot of members to stay home,” one said.
“Firefighters who were stationed there have been diverted to Humpty Doo. The trucks won’t drive themselves and the only other thing he may have done is put firefighters there who are out of competency.
“Mr Spain has relocated two specialist appliances to Berrimah. Technically it’s not closed, but it is not fully operational either. It is technically still offline as these appliances are robbing capability from another district. Its a convoluted web of lies and slight of hand.
“Mr Spain decided not to follow his own policy and did not call all available firefighters to work today. In fact his own policy declares all firefighters can work, but there is a process to follow. He stopped following the process when it reached a point of costing him money.”
Another firefighting source agreed there were staff that could have come in but were not contacted.
“There were firefighters available to work on overtime but were not offered to cover the shortfalls,” they said.
“Don’t be misled by reports there were no firefighters available or it was due to childcare for teachers’ strike.
“There were 22 off-duty firefighters who were not asked to fill the shortfalls today. Nice that he (Spain) released a statement and was not willing to speak live.”
NTFES were contacted for comment but did not respond.
Overtime a controversial issue for NT Fire Services
In late May, Ms Early called on Jamie Chalker to resign as the NT Fire and Rescue Service boss – he is also the Police Commissioner – after she and some firefighters claimed he had used a speech to new recruits on April 20 to call firefighters greedy for claiming overtime and threatening to “go after” a senior fire officer who was also a union delegate.
Six short videos of the speech filmed by media officer Elle Arnold were obtained by the NT Independent through an FOI application, which showed Mr Chalker speaking to recruits during a wide-ranging and disjointed speech about his intention to put an end to union “bullies” who “carry rank in the fire service” bullying fire staff, high overtime expense claims, the ongoing EBA negotiations, training reforms, the impressive length of the Stuart Highway, the NT’s economic prospects and the Beetaloo Basin, amongst other seemingly random topics.
The comments on the released videos were similar to the claims made by the United Workers Union NT, but not in the exact phrasing claimed. It also could not be verified if other comments were made that were not included in the video segments provided.
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