Heads shouldn't roll over SW fire: Barnett

Mistakes were made but heads shouldn’t roll over a prescribed burn that went wrong and destroyed 40 properties in the Margaret River region, Premier Colin Barnett says.

The WA cabinet was this week briefed on an inquiry into the fire by former Australian Federal Police Commissioner Mick Keelty whose report will be tabled next week.

The November 23-24 blaze last year erupted when a prescribed burn by Department of Environment and Conservation flared out of control in a national park, about 280km south of Perth.

Next week’s report will be Mr Keelty’s second into a WA bushfire, after he delivered one on the Perth Hills fire that destroyed more than 70 homes in February last year.

That inquiry cost WA’s Fire and Emergency Services Authority chief Jo Harrison-Ward her job and led to a shake-up of the agency and fire management in the State.

Mr Barnett today said he did not think the Margaret River inquiry would result in heads rolling at DEC or in large compensation payments having to be made.

But the Government did face big decisions about fire management in the State, he said.

“Mistakes were made and maybe the weather conditions were underestimated but it also is very clear that we need to maintain prescribed burning in Western Australia.”

Mr Barnett said the growth of population along the south-west coast posed a different sort of challenge for fire managers with houses built in and around fire-prone areas.

“There you get away from a situation of simply trying to control a fire to one of having to save lives and rescue people.”

Mr Barnett praised the efforts of professional and volunteer firefighters in preventing loss of life or further losses of houses in the Margaret River region.