I think it's interesting following this thread to see that the number of people commenting on the "powers that be" taking over and placing excessive demands on volunteers etc. As a recent addition to the volunteer world of CFA, I was really impressed with the attention to training and more so safety. We have a policy of safety first with everything that we do which I think is great! And after the disaster of the Linton fires (several firies killed) here in Vic back in the nineties, even the guys who had been in the CFA for 30+ years had to be "re-trained" and certified. Now this was a major pain in the proverbial for them, but it meant an even playing field as far as SOPs were concerned and therefore if Joe Blow from elsewhere was on a different truck with a different crew, if the proverbial hit the fan everyone would know exactly what to do. :)
I think it is human nature to whinge a bit about all and sundry, but as Munga said, not only are we losing Vols in droves, it is hard to recruit more. I am not sure if it is a cultural thing (let's face it, Australians by nature are very community focused and keen to help out!!!). I am just a firefighter, not an officer, no other roles and responsibilities other than train and put the wet stuff on the red stuff, but that can mean on an 'average' week about 10hours of time and when it gets busy - double that! I know that our Captain and many of the officers regularly put 20-30 hours in a week, plus making calls on their personal phones, petrol etc going to meetings or whatever. This is substantial when you have family, work etc commitments.
Out of interest what sort of hours do people give to their volunteer work on average in a week???
:rantoff:
