 Many years ago when I was less gray here and a bit fitter, I used to be a competition runner in Tasmania and that's big in Victoria, so my first taste of Victoria as a very young firefighter I guess was when we used to come across and run in the state championships and I actually thought then we are a great organization, how big it is they seem to have everything that opens and shuts and it was just almost a bit starry I'd come in from a small state, a small service to go and have a look at a big service and that's I guess I've always from that point had an eye on CFA just a straight name and title here Gavin Freeman on the deputy chief officer responsible for urban portfolio within CFA it was a bit of a long road for me to get to CFA I started my fire service career way back in 1985 with the Tasmania Fire Service as a recruit I came from a farming background in Tasmania and that was what I thought when I left school at 15 that I'd be a farmer for the rest of my life never panned out that way while I enjoyed that time I realised pretty quickly that the family farm wasn't going to support an extra income at that point so I started looking for jobs in 19 I picked up a career or job with the Tasmania Fire Service which rapidly became my career I spent 32 years in Tasmania and worked in a range of areas from firefighter on station, station officer, district officer and ultimately working as the deputy chief for Tasmania Fire Service for the last seven years after that I decided I needed a different challenge a different change over the time in Tasmania I'd done some sort of tournaments one to Victoria to the Fire Service Commissioner then I'd been fortunate enough to deploy to North America a couple of times into most states in Australia so I knew there was a world outside of Tasmania and six months before I started with CFA I had an opportunity to undertake as a conman in the Northern Territory which really reinforced for me that it was time for a change and I had something else to offer and when the position came up with the Country Fire Authority I jumped at it and was fortunate enough to be offered a job so it's almost been 12 months now in September it'll be 12 months since I've been with CFA and it's it's fine I'm loving every minute of it and absolutely no regrets about making the move when I first started in a role the chief officer said to me you know you've only got a couple of priorities learn learn what your portfolio is all about learn to and understand CFA and get ready for the fire season because it was September so we're about to launch into our summer season so pretty simple and clear priorities were set from the chief and I had a preconceived idea of what the urban portfolio would entail but things like the Coast Guard perhaps the emerging medical response and the operational comm side of the business that we've picked up on top of the more obvious areas of urban probably weren't on my radar but it's great I've spent some time with the people that lead those areas and they're doing a fantastic job and they've really been helpful to help me understand what's required of those areas and it's fantastic to be able to try and provide as much support as I can to keep those areas moving and it's been a little bit dynamic when I started there was only one other substantive deputy chief officer and a couple of vacancies those vacancies have now been filled so we now have a team of deputy chief officers all permanently in position working with Chief Officer Warrington to really drive CFA forward so that's been one big change we've moved from what was a little bit of period of uncertainty to now getting sustainability and now it challenges to transfer that down into the regions and down to the districts over the years through my connections across the country got to know quite a lot of the leadership team within CFA and I have enormous respect for them for past leaders that I knew and the current leadership team so all of those things lined up and then the position came up and I've got to clear my hand completely my wife's family come from Victoria so that was also another driver to be able to come come back home and on top of that our daughters are a police sergeant here in Melbourne so we actually have more family connections to Victoria than we do in Tasmania at this point so it was a logical step really it just seemed to be the natural thing to do come to a fantastic organization a new challenging job and be able to link it back up with family at the same time was just winds all around so when I walked in day one well I had to meet a lot of new people and learn a new organization I was very confident that that was going to come quickly and I was right very quickly I realized that all of the people in CFA are fantastic people they weren't being distracted by anything else they were just focused on delivering a service to the Victorian community and I still see that today so you know fire fire agency people across the world are fantastic people at heart and the CFA people are no different they're great and it's just I'm looking forward to meeting more of them one of the big challenges for me of course is exactly that Victoria and CFA such a large large state a lot of brigades and a lot of people to get around and every day I'm almost meeting somebody new and I expect that to continue for a little while but I hope to get around the state much more in the next few months now that I've been able to settle in and learn about what my job role is to get out and actually learn what the real challenges and the real issues are for the people that make it happen for us the Urban Portfolio is quite diverse clearly we have responsibility to maintain CFA's urban service delivery so response to emergencies in in the build-up areas of country Victoria and that includes obviously preparing for brigades for structural fires includes all the rescue disciplines road crash rescue a technical rescue discipline such as vertical and trench steep angle rescue we also look after the emergency medical response the EMR component within CFA under the Urban Portfolio also is operational communications which is exactly that all the the CAD the infrastructure the radios and the FSCC's that work in our call centers so we have responsibility for those we also now look after the well-being team within CFA which has some great synergies with the EMR work that we're doing because of the extra exposure additional exposure our frontline responders now get to trauma having the the support services that help them in the well-being team and all the fantastic programs that they run just makes great sense and it seems to be really kicking some some big goals we're winning some getting some good wins in that area we also have responsibility for the rehab teams so they're the teams that respond with our firefighters to do health monitoring blood pressure monitoring and make sure that they're safe if they're going into multiple entries into into fires for example the other component that we pick up which is almost a bit of a anomaly is a Coast Guard CFA have a number of Coast Guard brigades and we work hand in glove with that while the Coast Guard brigades are actually CFA brigades but they also function as a Coast Guard flotilla as well but so where there's a fire on water our CFA Coast Guard brigades will respond to that and we provide support to them the deputy chiefs obviously have a very close relationship with the chief officer chief officer of warrington runs an approach where it's very much team-based clearly the chief has ultimate responsibility for under the act for the operational performance and of the CFA but the deputies in my role are there to support the chief we very much play a support role the chief is the leader of our organisation in terms of service delivery and operations but the deputies are there to make sure that we interact with our people across the ground the chief is one person he can't be everywhere so we see our roles as deputies very much as you to face between the response across the state through the regions and the districts to the chief officer and providing advice and support to the chief to make sure that we continue to keep Victoria safe when I first started there was some frustration from across our volunteer and career workforce around training around low voltage fusion removal and safe working at heights and again had been a lot of good people put in some effort into trying to get that up and running and get a capability improved in that area what we've been able to achieve in the last little while is forward movement on that we've got some training planned now the the programs have been designed and that was through collaboration very closely with DCA Paterson in training and and just you know I take the approach that needs to be a team focus on everything we do and the other deputies have the same approach so since in the last few months I think we've been able to actually get things moving we haven't got all the results we want yet it will take in some cases two to three years to finish things because it is such a big organisation but at least we're heading in the right direction in some of those key areas that perhaps have been gaps or stagnated a little bit in the past so that that being part of that team approach with the leadership team is a really positive thing and I'm relishing that and looking forward to doing more of it but what I can say I'm very proud of is I've been able to provide support to the urban team to finish projects that perhaps I hadn't been able to get done previously and one of those for example is the the the field guide that's a combined publication between MFB and CFA has been ongoing for two and a half years last week it went to the printers so that that's sort of the nice win and fantastic work with the people in the team. Look if I if I could have my time over again and if I could sit down with the 19 year old me that started as a recruit I would probably tell them to make more of the opportunities I mean I've had a fantastic career I've been really fortunate but probably didn't appreciate how fortunate I was in the early stages of my career so just being able to to be part of a fantastic team they're doing a job that we really make a difference to the community and can make a difference to people's lives at the time I've had a great time really enjoying it but I didn't really appreciate how lucky I was to be in a job like this now looking back it's quite obvious to me it's been fantastic but you know if I could just say to anybody that's starting out now remember it's one of the best jobs in the world and you've got the opportunity to really make a difference and enjoy that journey all the way along and take every opportunity that's thrown at you. If I could send just one message out to the wider CFA I mean coming in with relatively fresh set of eyes and one of the newest people in the organization having been here less than a year but I do have a lot of experience in the industry what I can say is that CFA is a fantastic organization it's one of the biggest fire services in the world I think it is one of the best fire services in the world and I think people need to to remember that and and celebrate what they do that's really well I suppose it will be easy to to you know feel down because of the the uncertainty around where CFA will be going forward there's a reform agenda that's out there of course we can't ignore that but CFA people are really doing a fantastic job of keeping the Victorian community safe there will always be a CFA in my view and it will continue to grow from strength to strength so just my message is just don't be hard on yourself recognize what a fantastic job that you do do and how important you are to the Victorian community and focus on that keep doing a great job that's what you're good at