Most Auckland Local members will by now have had the opportunity to read the above Region Update from FRM Butt.
The Auckland Local Committee is disappointed that the FRM has chosen to personalise his attack on the Local, to the Local President. He must appreciate that the views expressed in Notices to Union Members are the view of the Local, not the personal view of any one individual.
It is interesting that he is now proposing some sort of operational criteria for non operational positions such as Regional Training Manager and Fire Risk Management. What this criteria will be is vague as this time, however, the Local hopes that it will not be simply that the appointee has ridden on a fire appliance as this, we believe, would negate any possible benefit to our members, which a sensible level of requirement for operational experience may bring to these roles.
The Auckland Local still disagrees with FRM Butt's decision to appoint a non operational person to this critical role and it would appear that no matter how much he expresses confidence in this individual, he also has doubts, otherwise why would he suggest that any future appointments will have the requirement for operational command experience.
The Local congratulates FRM Butt on his resolve to have the data that was missing from I/CAD urgently entered. It is just a pity that the omissions had to be pointed out by the Auckland Local and not by the staff responsible for the data entry and that some of it has taken up to 12 years since the start of the planning phase of the project to get the data entered. Unfortunately, our information received today shows that the data entered in such haste is still incorrect. An example of this is that the Fire Zones for the Puhoi Tunnels have 4 different plans; a risk plan, a tactical plan and two I/CAD Response Plans. Unfortunately, for the New Zealand public, all of the plans are different and all give different responses.
We are forced to ask FRM Butt, which of the plans is correct?
Another glaring error in the latest data fed in haste to the I/CAD system is that the Northern Gateway toll road is now SH 17 and the Hibiscus Coast Highway is now SH1. This must be news to Transit New Zealand and all the local residents. Wises website has these roads labelled correctly but the NZFS multi million dollar computer system does not.
FRM Butt also states, that the South Eastern Highway is "sectionalised in the same fashion as the motorways". This is absolutely wrong. All the other motorways, except the Northern Gateway and the South Eastern Highway, have their Fire Zones sectionalised which allows the Communication Centre to dispatch the correct appliances from the right direction. We believe FRM Butt should be enquiring from whoever is advising him, why he is being fed incorrect data, which makes him look less than competent.
The Auckland Local is still actively pursuing the significant errors within the I/CAD system and members will be kept informed of the progress.
