Keelty must ask the tough questions
The Department of Environment and Conservation will be under pressure to explain the holes in its account of the November 23 and 24 bushfires that razed 41 properties in Margaret River, with residents fearing the inquiry ordered by the Premier could be little more than a whitewash.
Authorities such as shire president Ray Colyer and Liberal MLC Barry House remained confident this week that former Federal Police commissioner Mick Keelty’s investigation would yield the answers residents demanded at a meeting on Sunday.
“I got the impression (Mr Keelty) had a brief to look at all aspects around the management of this fire,” Mr House said.
“His brief is to map the whole fire, everything to do with the fire including the genesis of the planning and everything that happened on the day.”
Mr Keelty told residents there would be pressure on DEC to give a clear version of events, but he also said the investigation would consider the greater safety risks in not doing any burns at all.
“They’ll be put to the test here, in terms of whether they have done it in the appropriate way,” he said.
However, Mr Keelty repeatedly said the terms of his inquiry were limited in scope and he did not have the power to grant himself a wider frame of reference.
“I can’t empower myself. I can’t give myself a free ticket for inquiry,” Mr Keelty said.
Orchid Ramble resident Garrath Stewart said he was concerned about who set up the terms of reference for the inquiry, as he understood it would be left to DEC and the Fire and Emergency Services Authority to conduct internal reviews of the management of the fire.
“That’s a worry,” he said.
When Mr Keelty was unable to say who in the State Government set the limits on the fire inquiry, he was briefly heckled as audience members grumbled.
“The people in this room and in this district will not be satisfied with an inquiry just into this burn,” conservationist Rick Ensley said.
“It feels very heartless, the terms of reference. They’re narrow. They’re not looking at the picture at all,” resident Clare Johnson said.
Annie Markham described the community feeling as “a huge sense of outrage (and) a breach of trust” that those in charge of the fires were also responsible for them. Mr Keelty conceded he was only looking into the circumstances surrounding burn permit 520, although there were two separate fires on the day of the coastal bushfires.
In a report two weeks ago, Mr House acknowledged he had heard complaints about the way local knowledge and crews were deployed during the emergency.
