Australia is better prepared for the current disaster season, with the Albanese Government delivering all Commonwealth-led recommendations from the Royal Commission into National Natural Disaster Arrangements.
In response to the extreme bushfire season of 2019-2020, the Royal Commission made 15 recommendations that were to be led by the Australian Government.
Those recommendations have now been completed.
Minister for Emergency Management, Murray Watt said widespread natural hazards have continued to impact communities since the 2019/20 Black Summer bushfires, including floods throughout much of last year and now bushfires in the later half of this year.
"The Albanese Government is committed to ensuring the nation as a whole is better prepared, and able to respond and withstand future natural hazard events," Minister Watt said.
"The Royal Commission made it clear that state and territory governments should continue to have primary responsibility and accountability for emergency management within their boundaries, but also directed important action to be taken by the Australian Government.
"When we were elected in 2022 we were passionate about learning the past lessons and getting the recommendations finalised so that communities were better prepared for disasters than they had been in the past.
"These recommendations include a range of improvements which deliver better collaboration between governments and agencies, better access to resources and streamlining support."
"Completing these recommendations puts Australia in a much strong position for the 2023/24 Higher Risk Weather Season."
Good progress has also been made on implementing the remaining 65 recommendations, most of which are the responsibility of state and territory governments, either independently or in partnership with the Australian Government.
Key measures that the Federal Government has implemented in response to the Royal Commission's recommendations include the:
- Establishment of the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) as a single, enduring agency;
- Creation of the flagship Disaster Ready Fund (DRF) that provides up to $1 billion over five years, from 1 July 2023, to improve Australia's disaster resilience and bolster Australia's ability to reduce disaster risk by investing in important disaster mitigation projects;
- Establishment of the Office of Supply Chain Resilience (OSCR) to identify and monitor critical supply chain vulnerabilities that could impact Australia's national interest;
- Establishment of the National Emergency Management Stockpile (NEMS) capability to assist in building greater supply chain resilience and ensuring the supply of essential emergency goods in times of disasters;
- Delivery of the National Joint Common Operating Picture (NJCOP) in November 2021, which provides a shared and common understanding both nationally, and across borders during crisis events;
- Significant upgrade of the Australian Government National Situation Room (NSR) to improve national coordination of disaster management;
- Establishment of the National Coordination Mechanism (NCM) to support national situational awareness and coordination of effective consequence management of complex crises;
- Establishment of the Australian Fire Danger Rating System (AFDRS) on 1 September 2022, to improve fire agencies' ability to consistently communicate the fire threat across Australia, and provide a national decision-making framework that supports operational planning, response and consistent community messaging;
- Establishment of the National Emergency Declaration (NED) Act 2020, which provides a legislative framework to enable the Governor-General to declare a national emergency on the Prime Minister's Advice;
- Establishment of the Independent Review into Commonwealth Disaster Funding, including building additional resilience into Commonwealth programs;
- Commissioning of the Independent Review of National Natural Disaster Governance Arrangements to better prepare governments for the demands of increasing future natural disasters;
- Review of Disaster Recovery Funding Arrangements, (DRFA) to streamline and build additional resilience into joint Commonwealth-State recovery programs.
- Establishment of a Not-for-profit and Philanthropic Roundtable consisting of charities, non-government organisations and volunteer groups with a role in disaster recovery;
- Establishment of the Australian Climate Service (ACS) on 1 July 2021 to support better decision-making through improved climate, disaster risk and impact information, services and tools; and
- Development of the Australian Warning System (AWS), to provide nationally consistent warnings for emergencies like bushfire, flood, storm, extreme heat and severe weather.
An interim report on the progress against the Commission's recommendations, published earlier in the year, is available on the NEMA website at: Royal Commission into National Natural Disaster Arrangements.
