Victoria's controversial fire reforms are at the mercy of crossbench MPs with a parliamentary committee still at odds over a plan to merge two emergency service agencies.
The upper house Committee on Fire Services' report recommended MPs reject the plan to merge the Country Fire Authority and Metropolitan Fire Brigade, and start the reform process from scratch.
The Andrews Labor government still hopes to push through the bill, but the opposition wants to take it to the next election - which is 14 months away.
Friday's report, endorsed by coalition and Shooters, Fishers and Farmers members, rejected the plan to merge all paid firefighters into the new Fire Rescue Victoria, and create a volunteer-only CFA.
"Due to the lack of implementation, operational and funding certainty, failure to undertake consultation, and consequential polarisation of fire service volunteers and staff, the bill should be withdrawn," the report reads.
Labor needs three of the five upper house crossbench MPs to agree to the changes to pass the bill, with the two Shooters, Fishers and Farmers MPs signalling they will vote against it.
The government has taken a conciliatory approach since the report was released, pledging to work with all parties to get it passed.
"This is a set of reforms that go well beyond industrial matters, these are profound reforms to make sure we've got the best organisational framework to keep communities across Victoria safe," Premier Daniel Andrews said.
But opposition leader Matthew Guy says it should all be scrapped and put to the people at the November 2018 election.
The report also demanded presumptive cancer compensation legislation, which will give firefighters with specific cancers a right to a payout, be separated out from the fire reform bill.
The cancer laws were controversially included in the restructure bill in an attempt to wedge the opposition into voting for it.
The committee also heard allegations the premier's department interfered with submissions from public sector employees, and Emergency Services Minister James Merlino used his ministerial power to stop the committee seeing a draft review of the fire services' culture.
A dissenting report from Labor and Green MPs said evidence showed the current system is out of date.
The government needs the changes to pass in order to break a pay dispute that has seen a minister resign, a fire board sacked and the federal law changes introduced to protect the role of emergency volunteers.
Share
