Minister for Emergency Services (New South Wales)

The New South Wales Minister for Emergency Services is a minister within the Government of New South Wales who has the oversight of the emergency service agencies. The portfolio is administered through the Premier's Department, the Department of Communities and Justice and agencies such as Fire and Rescue, Rural Fire Service (RFS) and State Emergency Service (SES).^[1]

Minister for Emergency Services
Incumbent Jihad Dib since 5 April 2023
Premier's Department Department of Communities and Justice
Style	The Honourable
Appointer	Governor of New South Wales
Inaugural holder	Michael Bruxner (as Minister in Charge of National Emergency Services)
Formation	1 February 1939

Agencies

The following agencies are responsible to the Minister for Emergency Services and Resilience:^[1]

• Fire and Rescue
• Rural Fire Service (RFS)
• State Emergency Service (SES)

History

The National Emergency Services Agency commenced operation on 1 February 1939. The agency was formed in response to a request from the Prime Minister that the Australian states devise a scheme for the protection of the civilian population against possible attacks from the air in the event of a national attack.^[2] The first minister Michael Bruxner stated that the objective of the organisation was not just air raids, but to deal with any major catastrophe, such as fires or floods, including the co-ordination of existing organisations such as the Ambulance, the Fire Brigades, the Red Cross, and the Police Department.^[3] The portfolio was abolished after the war.

Minister for National Emergency Services

Minister for National Emergency Services of New South Wales
Minister Michael Bruxner testing air raid sirens
Appointer	Governor of New South Wales
Formation	1 February 1939
First holder	Michael Bruxner
Final holder	Jim McGirr
Abolished	21 September 1949

The Minister for National Emergency Services had two principal activities: a) the provision of measures for the protection of the life and property of the people, such as provision of air raid warnings, lighting control, air raid shelters, protection of vital plant and numerous other schemes to meet emergency conditions; and b) operational activities, including the organisation of personnel trained in specialist duties to cope with the immediate effects of enemy attack.^[2] While the agency was created in 1939 and Michael Bruxner, the Deputy Premier and Minister for Transport, was the first responsible minister,^[2] it was not created as a formal portfolio until the first McKell ministry in 1941.^[4] Bruxner had been a member of the Australian Imperial Force in World War I and had finished that war promoted to lieutenant colonel.^[5][6]

The first task of the department was to prepare a scheme of organisation for the State. The scheme provided for the formation of a Civil Defence Organisation upon a municipal or shire basis. Each municipality or shire became an "Area". A Chief Warden was appointed, to take charge of each Area. The Chief Warden and all of the area staff served in a voluntary capacity.^[2]

The headquarters’ staff, under a director, who was responsible to the minister, were public sector employees. In addition to a secretary and clerical staff, officers included a controller of training, a supervisor of first aid training, liaison officers and an executive officer of the technical committee, who was an officer of the professional staff of the Department of Public Works. Arrangements were made for the establishment of a special control staff at headquarters to assist in the event of an attack. In order that the best technical advice should be available, committees directly responsible to the Director were appointed. The personnel of these committees were also volunteers.^[2]

The National Emergency Act 1941 received assent on 20 March 1941,^[7] and remained in force for the duration of hostilities with Germany and for a period of six months thereafter. The Act provided for preparing and implementing Raid Precautions Schemes and Regulations. The first Raid Precautions Scheme was gazetted on 6 June 1941,^[8] and the first Regulations on 13 June 1941.^[9] The legislation was amended in October 1941,^[10] to bring navigable waters under the scope of the Act.^[2]

Emergency Services

It was recreated in 1982 in the fourth Wran ministry, combined with the portfolio of Police. The emergency services included New South Wales Fire Brigades, Department of Bush Fire Services and the State Emergency Service.^[11] While the Ambulance Service is an emergency service, it has not been part of the responsibilities of this portfolio, instead being the responsibility of the Minister for Health. The portfolio has frequently been held in conjunction with the portfolios of either Police or Corrective Services.

Between 1 May 2020 and 16 December 2022, the minister had the oversight of Resilience NSW, with a focus on disaster management.^[12][13][14] In March 2022 the New South Wales Premier appointed Steph Cooke MP as the Minister for Flood Recovery.^[15][16]

List of ministers

Emergency Services

The following individuals have served as Minister for Emergency Services, or any precedent titles:

Title	Minister[16]	Party		Ministry	Term start	Term end	Time in office	Notes
Minister in Charge of National Emergency Services	Michael Bruxner		Country	Mair	1 February 1939	11 February 1941	2 years, 10 days	[17]
	Hubert Primrose		United Australia		11 February 1941	16 May 1941	94 days	[18][19]
Minister for National Emergency Services	Bob Heffron		Labor	McKell (1)	16 May 1941	8 June 1944	3 years, 23 days
	Jack Baddeley			McKell (2) McGirr (1) (2)	8 June 1944	8 September 1949	5 years, 92 days
	James McGirr			McGirr (2)	8 September 1949	21 September 1949	13 days
Minister for Police and Emergency Services	Peter Anderson [a]		Labor	Wran (4) (5) (6) (7)	26 May 1982	6 February 1986	3 years, 256 days
	George Paciullo			Wran (8) Unsworth	6 February 1986	21 March 1988	2 years, 44 days
	Ted Pickering		Liberal	Greiner (1) (2) Fahey (1) (2)	25 March 1988	23 September 1992	4 years, 211 days
Minister for Emergency Services				Fahey (2)	23 September 1992	22 October 1992
	Wayne Merton				22 October 1992	26 May 1993	216 days
	Terry Griffiths [b]			Fahey (3)	26 May 1993	27 June 1994	1 year, 32 days
	Garry West [b]		National		27 June 1994	4 April 1995	281 days
	Bob Debus [c]		Labor	Carr (1)	4 April 1995	1 December 1997	2 years, 241 days
	Brian Langton			Carr (2)	1 December 1997	30 April 1998	150 days
	Bob Debus [d]			Carr (2) (3)	30 April 1998	2 April 2003	4 years, 337 days
	Tony Kelly			Carr (4) Iemma (1)	2 April 2003	2 April 2007	4 years, 0 days
	Nathan Rees			Iemma (2)	2 April 2007	5 September 2008	1 year, 156 days
	Tony Kelly [b]			Rees	8 September 2008	30 January 2009	144 days
	Steve Whan			Rees Keneally	30 January 2009	4 April 2011	2 years, 64 days
Minister for Police and Emergency Services	Mike Gallacher		Liberal	O'Farrell	4 April 2011	2 May 2014	3 years, 28 days
	Stuart Ayres			Baird (1)	6 May 2014	1 April 2015	330 days
Minister for Emergency Services	David Elliott [c]			Baird (2)	2 April 2015	30 January 2017	1 year, 303 days
	Troy Grant		National	Berejiklian (1)	30 January 2017	23 March 2019	2 years, 52 days	[20]
Minister for Police and Emergency Services	David Elliott		Liberal	Berejiklian (2) Perrottet (1)	2 April 2019	21 December 2021	2 years, 263 days	[21][22]
Minister for Emergency Services and Resilience	Steph Cooke		National	Perrottet (2)	21 December 2021	28 March 2023	1 year, 97 days	[23]
Minister for Roads	John Graham		Labor	Minns	28 March 2023	5 April 2023	8 days
Minister for Emergency Services	Jihad Dib				5 April 2023	Incumbent	1 year, 221 days	[24]

Former Ministerial titles

Flood Recovery

The following individuals have served as Minister for Flood Recovery, or any precedent titles:

Title	Minister[16]	Party		Ministry	Term start	Term end	Time in office	Notes
Minister for Flood Recovery	Steph Cooke		National	Perrottet (2)	9 March 2022	5 April 2023	1 year, 27 days	[25]

See also

• List of New South Wales government agencies

Notes

1. Concurrently Minister for Corrective Services between 27 October 1983 and 5 April 1984.
2. Concurrently Minister for Police.
3. Concurrently Minister for Corrective Services.
4. Concurrently Minister for Corrective Services until 12 January 2001.

References

1. "Administrative Arrangements (Public Service agencies and Ministers) Order 2023". legislation.nsw.gov.au. Government of New South Wales. 1 October 2024. Retrieved 3 November 2024.
2. "AGY-640 National Emergency Services, New South Wales". NSW State Records & Archives. Retrieved 26 April 2022.  This article incorporates text available under the CC BY 4.0 license.
3. "Anti-air raid measures". The Sydney Morning Herald. 19 January 1939. p. 12. Retrieved 26 April 2022 – via Trove.
4. "Part 6 Ministries since 1856" (PDF). NSW Parliamentary Record. Parliament of New South Wales. Retrieved 28 December 2020.
5. Aitkin, Don. "Bruxner, Sir Michael Frederick (1882–1970)". Australian Dictionary of Biography. Canberra: National Centre of Biography, Australian National University. ISBN 978-0-522-84459-7. ISSN 1833-7538. OCLC 70677943. Retrieved 5 April 2007.
6. "Emergency service". The Sydney Morning Herald. 2 February 1939. p. 13. Retrieved 28 November 2021 – via Trove.
7. "National Emergency Act 1941 No 1" (PDF). NSW legislation. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
8. "Raid precaution scheme No 1 (74)". Government Gazette of the State of New South Wales. 6 June 1941. p. 2167. Retrieved 28 November 2021 – via Trove.
9. "National Emergency Act, 1941. (76)". Government Gazette of the State of New South Wales. 13 June 1941. p. 2188. Retrieved 28 November 2021 – via National Library of Australia.
10. "National Emergency (Amendment) Act 1941 No 41" (PDF). NSW legislation. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
11. "PFO-22 Police and Emergency Services [I]". NSW State Records & Archives. Retrieved 26 April 2022.  This article incorporates text available under the CC BY 4.0 license.
12. "Administrative Arrangements (Administrative Changes—Resilience NSW) Order 2020". NSW Legislation. 6 April 2020. Retrieved 13 July 2020.
13. "NSW Reconstruction Authority bill passed". NSW Government. 17 November 2022.
14. "NSW government creates Reconstruction Authority for natural disaster management". ABC News. 18 November 2022.
15. "Steph Cooke appointed Minister for Flood Recovery". Clarence Valley Independent. 10 March 2022. Retrieved 24 April 2022.
16. "Part 6 Ministries since 1856" (PDF). NSW Parliamentary Record. Parliament of New South Wales. Retrieved 23 March 2022.
17. "Protection of civilians". The Sydney Morning Herald. 1 February 1939. p. 16. Retrieved 26 April 2022 – via Trove.
18. "N.E. Service on statutory basis". The Northern Star. New South Wales, Australia. 12 February 1941. p. 4. Retrieved 7 January 2021 – via Trove.
19. "New N.E.S. Chief welcomed". The Sydney Morning Herald. New South Wales, Australia. 12 February 1941. p. 13. Retrieved 7 January 2021 – via Trove.
20. Robertson, James (28 January 2017). "Anthony Roberts, Brad Hazzard take key roles in Gladys Berejiklian reshuffle". The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 29 January 2017.
21. "Government Notices (30)" (PDF). Government Gazette of the State of New South Wales. 2 April 2019. p. 1088-1090. Retrieved 3 April 2019.
22. Sas, Nick (31 March 2019). "Gladys Berejiklian says Liberal Party has no women problem as re-elected NSW Premier shuffles Cabinet". ABC News. Australia. Retrieved 3 April 2019.
23. "Parliament, Ministerial, Courts and Police (662)" (PDF). Government Gazette of the State of New South Wales. 21 December 2021.
24. Heves, Bryant (4 April 2023). "Chris Minns makes historic announcement about NSW cabinet". skynews. Retrieved 17 April 2023.
25. "Parliament, Ministerial, Courts and Police (93)" (PDF). Government Gazette of the State of New South Wales. 9 March 2022.