Fed: PM remembers day of death and destruction=4

AAP General News (Australia)
02-10-2009
Fed: PM remembers day of death and destruction=4

Mr Rudd said the Australian Defence Force assistance to the relief operation included
a joint task force headed by the army's 4 Brigade commander, Brigadier Michael Arnold,
with more than 450 personnel.

Soldiers were helping police with the search for and recovery of remains while others
have established a tent town for those who have lost their homes.

As well, Defence personnel were operating heavy machinery to carve firebreaks and reopen
roads and trails.

Four armoured personnel carriers were being used for communications while Defence had
been asked to provide aerial imagery of affected areas.

"This will enable identification of all residences affected by fire," he said.

A team of 90 Australian Federal Police (AFP) officers were helping Victorian police
in the investigation of the fires. Among them are 16 specialists in disaster victim identification.

Mr Rudd said he and Families and Community Services Minister Jenny Macklin had conveyed
to the Victorian police that if any further Defence or AFP personnel were required, they
would be made immediately available.

Mr Rudd said the federal government would provide an extra $5 million for emergency
relief from the bushfires in Victoria and floods in Queensland.

Mr Rudd said Australians were left speechless at the thought and possibility that some
of the fires might have been deliberately lit.

"Every member of this house cannot comprehend how anyone could ever do that," he said.

"Something which the nation must now attend to as a matter of grave urgency is the
problem of arson, where it happens, why it happens, what more can be done about it."

Mr Rudd said there was no excuse for it.

"This, as I said yesterday, is simply murder on a grand scale," he said.

"Let us attend to this unfinished business of the nation and come to grips with this evil thing."

Mr Rudd praised emergency services workers.

"We salute each one of them."

He said many people had been traumatised by the bushfires, and promised the government
would try to make sure there were enough counsellors to help all those who faced shattered
lives.

"This is an unspeakable horror for those families, unspeakable."

"The trauma of scarred and blackened vehicles along the road, that I saw yesterday,
to Marysville."

"The physicality and the emotional scar of trauma reaches deep into people."

Mr Rudd said all levels of government should work together, along with communities
and community organisations, to cope with the challenges.

"We do not know what lies ahead," he said.

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KEYWORD: BUSHFIRES VIC RUDD 4 CANBERRA

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