Fireys slap ‘slack’ claim Report says more bosses will make staff work harder

THE Northern Territory Fire Service could spend more than half a million dollars of taxpayer money to employ more senior supervisors, after an external reviewer suggested the service needed a “cultural shift”.

In a set of recommendations given to chief executive Reece Kershaw, the reviewer, a former fire commissioner from NSW, suggested there needed to be a shift to ensure fireys were working hard.

To do this, he recommend- ed putting another senior supervisor on each shift – a job that fireys say would pay about $130,000. Four supervisors would be needed to cover all the shifts.

The recommendations have Territory firefighters livid, as they say they were not consulted about their implementation.

According to the fireys, the reviewer only spoke to senior officials before submitting his recommendations. Firefighters were able to submit responses via email.

While Mr Kershaw met with union representatives and delegate firefighters last week, the union said he did not mention enacting the recommendations.

However, in a letter to all firefighters this week, he implied the recommendations would be put into place quickly.

“There’s been zero consul- tation with the union,” one firefighter said.

It is understood the first full disclosure of the recommendations was sent on Friday.

The firefighter said the supervisor roles were unnecessary as they came from the idea that the workforce was doing the same level of work normally that they did during a work ban.

“But because we were in the emergency service, we weren’t allowed to do work bans,” the firey said. “We did everything we were supposed to do during industrial action but we did it in a multi-coloured shirt because that was the only thing we were allowed to change.

“There is no culture of slacking off.”

Some of the recommendations have received positive responses from fireys – suggestions such as upgrading IT systems, lowering overtime hours and promoting leadership development were all welcomed. An NT Police, Fire and Emergency Services spokeswoman said the reason there was no consultation about all of the recommendations was they hadn’t been finalised when Mr Kershaw met with United Voice.

“Some of the recommendations were outlined during the meeting,” she said.

“Mr Kershaw told United Voice that NTFRES would work with the union around implementing the recommendations.”