I did not join the fire service to get paid rather to help my local community and I am affraid to say this but some Volunteers have lost the value of community service and are now wanting to get paid for a service which is FREE.
G'day Blinky.
I categorically & absolutely dispute that the service we provide is "free".
Someone, somewhere, somehow, pays to deliver it. Maybe not the recipient,
not the full amount anyway. But someone pays.
At the moment, the cost of emergency response is primarily bourne by
individual volunteers and their employers. Lost pay, lost productivity,
lost goodwill, lost contracts. It is absolutely NOT "free".
Cost of preparedness if bourne by goverment & volunteers. That includes
hardware, running & admin expenses, travel costs & time. These are also
not "free".
Once upon a time, we did this as cash-strapped local communities & had
to chip in or it couldn't happen. We also only were expected to chip in
when it was beyond the ability of individuals or groups to manage the
situation.
The CFS has changed. Training & administrative requirements have multiplied.
Community expectations have changed. We are now regarded as a convenient
source of free labour for a whole range of things that people used to be
expected to do for themselves.
Like the frog in a heating saucepan thing, all this has happened slowly so
that we who are in it have mostly adjusted rather than hopped out. I dare
say a lot of our predecessors who are held as examples, would have told the
Service in no uncertain terms where to shove it had they been dumped ito
what is required of us now.
Might I also point out that in this debate the term "volunteer" is being
used and possibly ab-used - in a particularly narrow sub-definition of its
full meaning - merely to do something without recompense.
The full meaning is one who chooses to do something, as distinct from being
coerced. By way of patriotic example, while all other countries used onscription, our WW1 armed forces were an entirely volunteer force, even
though paid. Since "Volunteer" in this context is not disputed, why should
it be disputed in the case of financial compensation to CFS volunteers or
their employers?
It is my opinion that the term "retained" as applied to MFS & other urban
services relates more to the contract of availability they sign, rather than
their willingness to respond. Very much a contract of casual employment
rather than "will turn up if reasonably able".
The international convention on voluteering says that no volunteer should
be out-of-pocket for doing so.
I willing do this without pay. However, if the community through its
representative government (two jokes there for the price of one) chooses
to offer me a sweetener eg: rebates to ESL and/or car rego, I shan't knock
it back. It is still my FREE choice (I volunteer) to do this. And I won't
be any the less a "volunteer" for that.
That's my three bobs worth anyway.
cheers
AJ