Firefighter Francis cops flak
Joe Francis' role as a volunteer firefighter was starting to affect his ability to do his job as Emergency Services Minister, the Opposition claimed yesterday.
Mr Francis joined his local Jandakot volunteer brigade five years before becoming the minister in August 2013.
He was one of more than 200 career and volunteer firefighters who fought the massive Bullsbrook blaze throughout the night on January 10.
The next day, Environment Minister Albert Jacob appeared before the cameras at the residents' evacuation centre while Mr Francis recovered.
Shadow emergency services minister Margaret Quirk said she was concerned Mr Francis had not been "available to make decisions that might have been needed to be made in an official capacity". It should not have been left to Mr Jacob to field questions on why a total fire ban had not been in place.
"He (Mr Francis) gets paid to do a job and if he's making himself unavailable, however worthy the unavailability is, then that's an issue and he needs to manage that," Ms Quirk said.
She said she was not calling on Mr Francis to give up volunteering but to consider other roles within the brigade that would not make him unavailable for prolonged periods or take him to mobile phone "blackspots".
Mr Francis said if it was good enough for Prime Minister Tony Abbott to be a volunteer firefighter, it was good enough for him.
"Never expect people, especially volunteers, to be prepared to do something you're not prepared to do yourself," he said.
