The arsonist danger.

The combination of the start of the fire season on the Australian east coast and a long weekend saw three major outbreaks in New South Wales.
Two homes were destroyed north of Newcastle and there were fires in the national parks north and south of Sydney - and the cause of all three fires is highly suspicious.
One natural cause of bush fires is lightning strikes, but in the preceding forty-eight hours there were no dry lightning storms - and in the case of the fire that destroyed homes there were numerous ignition points. The overwhelming verdict from the fire fighters is that this was arson.

Our fire fighting defences have been strengthened in recent years. Fire bombing helicopters have been added to the arsenal and money has been spent on upgrading vehicles and equipment, but the biggest asset is the army of volunteers who give up their time to save lives and property - and their employers who willingly accept their absence from work to provide this valuable service.

The big question is how do we stop people deliberately lighting fires in the bush ?
Penalties have been increased - and if there is a death from a deliberately lit fire the offender could face a murder charge.
There is no obvious remedy that will stop teenagers looking for excitement or the mentally ill with a grievance against society from dropping a match and starting a fire. Unfortunately, many of these people are cunning and have devised instruments that will lay dormant and only ignite long after they have left the scene..

The only defence is to be able to react quickly and extinguish the fire before it becomes a major event - and to do that we need adequate fire trails to get fire crews to the scene quickly.
That seems to run contrary to the policies of the Greens. For some reason their philosophy is to obstruct any action that entails cutting back the bush to make a fire trail navigable - despite the fact that fires damage and destroy the very vegetation they are dedicated to protect.
It is impossible to have a logical argument with people of that persuasion. They have closed minds - and logic does not prevail.
What is needed is for government to be strong minded and ensure that legislation is in place to allow fire trails to be maintained without hindrance by Greenies who set up blockades or resort to delaying legal action.
Just as the strong arm of the law should descend on any arsonists caught, so it should be equally strong on anyone obstructing the fire services from protecting lives and property !