This week we concluded the formal hearing component of our Award Arbitration with final legal submissions being heard over two days on Monday and Tuesday. These final submissions were the opportunity for both sides to summarise and conclude all our final arguments before the full bench begin considering their decision.
The submissions also reflected on the significant body of evidence put before the Commission in this case over the first two weeks of hearing where we had 39 witnesses from the ranks of firefighter right through to Chief Superintendent provide evidence in the support of our claim. To have that many witnesses across such a huge cross section of our membership is testament to the current strength and solidarity of our Union and you, the members.
I know I have said this before but I’ll say it again, I could not be more proud of everyone who has participated in this case, including not only those of you who gave evidence, but everyone who showed up before the IRC either in person or online, those who helped make sure our legal team had all the information they needed and even all of you who contributed to the initial development of our Log of Claims. These contributions by each of you has and will continue to make a difference in our ongoing campaign for fair wages and conditions along with a safer workplace.
We still have one more day of the arbitration left on 14 April where the members of the full bench hearing this case will visit the ESA to get a real and practical demonstration of our work.
The program for the day includes a demonstration of many of our appliances, including specialist appliances, various rescue demonstrations from USAR, vertical rescues and MVAs, as well as an opportunity to view live fire drills and importance of decontamination and smaller skills sets such as RPAS and a fire investigation canine demonstration.
This final day will hopefully bring to life for the full bench many of the claims they will be making a decision on, such as claims for specialist skills allowances and those relating to safety, cancer and decontamination. Once again, many of you will be participating in these demonstrations throughout the day, so I’d like to thank you in advance for your involvement.
Following this final day at the ESA the hearing will be adjourned while we wait on a decision, which we anticipate may take some months. As soon as we have any further updates we will let you all know.
