President Harry S Truman had a sign on his desk that read ‘The buck stops here’. A testament to his willingness to take responsibility for all the bad things that happened on his watch.
The present level of devastation and distress caused through drought, water and now bushfires has seen an outpouring of blame or buck passing to others that never seems to abate. No one is taking responsibility. No one is putting themself to the sword. Politicians are ducking and weaving to avoid assuming any level of responsibility for our unpreparedness, always finding someone else to blame.
People in the media and community are finding fault with the management level of fire load reduction while the authorities argue there was and there is mitigation why more was not done. Others see no issue with climate change while many, backed by scientists, do.
Few people with losses have accepted that they may ultimately be the ones responsible for not being sufficiently prepared for a fire of this magnitude. Have they taken adequate precautions against fire, gutters cleaned, sprinklers installed on roofs, mulch removed away from buildings, building too close to dense scrub, long grass slashed around houses, ember protection provided on eaves and under houses, inflamables moved away the house, the list goes on. A fireproof house is by definition, fireproof.
So where exactly does the buck stop? Truman as leader of his country saw it was him. Should we be expecting the same?
Political divisions has the country not looking at reasonable solutions but we are given to blaming others, past and current administrations, for the state of failure much of our country has fallen to.
Disasters are not something that governments are usually adept at managing. Within the state and even federally, there are plans and scenarios put into place to prevent them, however, the mechanism to actually manage them when it does happen is dysfunctional.
A case in point is the outpouring of charitable giving, cash or kind that has taken place. The State Governments are scrambling to manage a cash assistance program. At the same time, the Federal Government has punched out a number of random initiatives that have the appearance of political face saving but by current reports are not meeting their objectives. People in need remain in dire circumstances.
People in the affected areas need shelter, they need access to funds to start rebuilding, they need food and water supplies, businesses need support to rebuild and provide access to the supplies. They need stock feed and water. Machinery needs to clear away the rubble and devastation, the people need social, medical and psychological support. They need it now, not in some distant future when the bureaucracy has managed to catch up to events in the field.
We will recover but at what cost to community and how long will it take?
As one who has worked on large recovery programs in major international disasters over a couple of decades, it needs a strong hand, not just at implementing the measure but at coordinating all of the individual activities that are taking place to ensure that a satisfactory balance can be achieved.
Disasters happen and there is a place for a national disaster strategy to be put into place. Where within a day or so, while the disaster is still unfolding, we have the capability to coordinate locally, regionally, statewide and nationally, all of the various stages of relief and recovery that might be required.
The political and social ramifications of this particular disaster will have a profound effect on the community for many years to come unless true leadership comes to the fore.
