Blue Shield Australia’s response to the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee’s Senate inquiry into national volunteer incentive scheme (Climate Army)

Committee Secretary

Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee
Department of the Senate

Parliament House
Canberra ACT 2600

Dear Committee Secretary,

Re: National Volunteer Incentive Scheme (Climate Army)

I am pleased to provide the Blue Shield Australia’s response to the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee’s Senate inquiry into national volunteer incentive scheme (Climate Army). Blue Shield Australia (BSA) welcomes the committee’s commitment to supporting an expansion of skilled people to respond to the immediate aftermath of natural disasters in Australia.

BSA makes this submission as the national committee of the international organisation, Blue Shield International, working to protect the world’s cultural heritage threatened by natural disasters in Australia. Established in 2005, the BSA committee comprises representatives from the following Australian peak industry organisations:

  • ICA: the International Council on Archives, represented in Australia by the Australian Society of Archivists
  • ICOM: the International Council of Museums, represented in Australia by ICOM Australia
  • ICOMOS: International Council on Monuments and Sites, represented in Australia by Australia ICOMOS
  • IFLA: the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions, represented in Australia by the Australian Library and Information Association
  • AICCM: The Australian Institute for the Conservation of Cultural Heritage
  • AMaGA: Australian Museums and Galleries Association
  • Federation of Australian Historical Societies
  • Pacific Regional Branch of the International Council on Archives (PARBICA)

Blue Shield Australia is an advocacy, networking and communications body that enables these organisations to work together at the national level to prevent, prepare for, and respond to emergency situations in case of armed conflict or natural disasters that could affect Australia’s cultural heritage.

We make this submission at a critical time for holistic disaster preparedness in Australia. In their report, Too Close to Home: How do we keep communities safe from escalating climate impacts, the Emergency Leaders for Climate Action and the Climate Council analysed the impacts of extreme weather events including bushfires, floods, and storms between 2008–2009 to 2022–2023. The report found there were 240,828 displacements across Australia within this 15-year timespan, yet two-thirds of these events occurred within the last 5 years.[1] As we look to respond quickly to these imminent threats, there is a risk to provisioning training and support for disaster recovery that does not include protection of cultural heritage.

Cultural heritage contributes to making communities experiencing disaster inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable by:

  • Creating a sense of belonging, inclusiveness, collaboration.
  • Confirming the value of one’s culture heritage and traditions.
  • Developing knowledge capital, sources of creativity and innovation, and resources to face challenges and find appropriate solutions.
  • Building of a shared civic responsibility for a community able to prevent, cope with and recover from disturbances.

Given the critical role that culture plays in in disaster preparedness, response and recovery, BSA has identified strategic opportunities for ensuring Australia’s national volunteer incentive scheme (Climate Army) is able to effectively prepare for and respond to disasters in coherence with the recommendations to protect cultural heritage in the United Nations’ Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030.[2]

Structure and governance of the National Volunteer Incentive Scheme (Climate Army)

Without a doubt, the increasing climate disasters across the country require skills in the technical aspects of emergency preparedness and response for circumstances that threaten lives, buildings and infrastructure. These issues are rightly the focus of the emergency preparedness and response community. However, it has become increasingly clear in the disaster preparedness and response sphere that we also need to develop skills and capabilities to address the threats posed by these events to our cultural heritage, in terms of community and individual cultural assets and property.

The United Nations’ Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030 acknowledges the importance of cultural heritage in disaster risk reduction and notes how important cultural assets are in substantiating and fortifying communities and individuals who are threatened by, or have experienced, such events. The framework includes goals and actions to protect cultural heritage and reduce disaster risk as it acknowledges the value of cultural heritage and its transmission for “making cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable” as an integral part of the UN Agenda 2030.[3] Any volunteer incentive scheme should follow the protocols and recommendations laid out in the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction.

Recommendation:

  • In order to meet international standards, the structure of the volunteer incentive scheme (Climate Army) should include cultural heritage professionals or representatives to ensure that Cultural Heritage is considered and incorporated into all aspects of response.

Integrating volunteer opportunities within educational institutions to increase student participation in volunteer organisations

Professionals from archives, libraries and museums receive their qualifications through Vocational Education (VET) and Higher Education (HE) programs across the country. These educational institutions should not be overlooked as a potential source for committed volunteers who can work with professionals  with experience and expertise in the protection of cultural heritage to the Climate Army.

In 2019, there ere 1,772 full time equivalent students studying Library and Information Science (LIS), evenly distributed between VET and HE.[4] At present, there are only two HE programs delivering conservation of cultural materials courses in Australia, and the resources required make it difficult to provide practical skills in the conservation of damaged cultural collections and personal heritage. The Climate Army offers an opportunity for students of these courses to work with professional conservators in gaining vital ‘hands-on’ skills in the salvage and conservation of damaged objects.

In addition to traditional, professional education programs, each of the four BSA committee organisations provide and promote professional development opportunities for their members. Committee organisations are well-positioned to promote volunteer opportunities within their respective membership to increase volunteer participation specialising in protection of cultural heritage within the Climate Army with highly skilled professionals who may be looking for new professional opportunities or short-term assignments that contribute to their communities. For example, the Australian Society of Archivists (ASA) has 711 Individual members and 470 Corporate members, made up of non-government organisations; the Australian Library & Information Association (ALIA) has 3,293 personal members and 541 institutional members. BSA provides the infrastructure to increase participation of highly skilled volunteers.

Recommendations:

  • Ensure Australia’s Climate Army includes specialists who can bring expertise in the protection of cultural heritage to maintain compliance with the Sendai Framework.
  • Increase participation of volunteers through outreach to students in VET and HE archives, libraries, monuments, and museum education programs.
  • Join with BSA to catalyse interest and increase participation of highly skilled volunteers through outreach to professional members associated within each committee organisation.

Creating a nationally recognised qualification scheme that provides tangible benefits to volunteers and formally acknowledges their skills and contributions across sectors

Through BSA and each committee organisation, comprehensive training materials currently exist to provide high-quality training in the protection of cultural heritage. These training materials are currently being rolled out, as funding permits, to BSA members through face-to-face and online opportunities, and can be leveraged to efficiently augment a nationally recognised qualification scheme that includes protection of cultural heritage in accordance with the Sendai Framework.  This specialist training in managing cultural heritage before, during and after a disaster should be essential to those coordinating the handling of cultural heritage as part of any disaster management program.

Our collective training expertise and materials are developed by BSA professionals who are domestically and internationally recognised in the protection of cultural heritage sector, including:

  • AICCM’s ‘Be Prepared: Guidelines for Small Museums for Writing a Disaster Preparedness Plan’ used throughout Australia and around the world. In 2023 it was translated into 4 languages (French, Arabic, Indonesian and Spanish) by the Centre for the Study of Manuscript Cultures based in Germany. In addition, the ‘Be Prepared’ Training of Trainers program has been delivered across the country.
  • ALIA is a contributor to the UNESCO Toolkit for the Prevention and Preparation Stages of Disaster Risk Management for Documentary Heritage and Digital Archives.
  • BSA committee members have delivered training to institutions at-risk for disaster across the country and in international forums.
  • BSA committee members have overseen several major disaster recovery operations including the Lismore Gallery and the Eugowra Museum. The latter included follow-up training sessions to salvage collections that had been damaged in the flood, then frozen until we could run the training programs.

Recommendations:

  • Ensure a nationally recognised qualification scheme includes protection of cultural heritage in compliance with the Sendai Framework. This will build a cohort and professionally trained and capable people across Australia who can work to ensure cultural heritage is accounted for in national and local planning for disaster preparedness and response.
  • Collaborate with BSA to leverage existing, internationally recognised training materials on protection of cultural heritage to augment nationally recognised training qualifications across sectors.

Blue Shield Australia applauds the proposal to build a Climate Army that can assist in the work to ensure that Australians are fully prepared and able to respond to the growing risks of natural disasters. We see an opportunity for Australia to appropriately resource the salvage and management of cultural heritage as part of disaster planning and response in regards to both appropriately qualified personnel and with material resources and equipment to properly manage cultural heritage in these events.

Our cultural heritage is that which makes us who we are and it is critically important in building and maintaining community and personal resilience at times of threat. Recent events – in the bushfires of 2019-20 and the floods of 2022-24 – show that working to protect and save cultural heritage assets is a critical part of community response and recovery at these times.

Blue Shield Australia would be pleased to appear at the inquiry to provide more detail of how cultural heritage can be appropriately managed as part of disaster management and response.

[1] Climate Council, Too Close to Home: How do we keep communities safe from escalating climate impacts. https://www.climatecouncil.org.au/resources/too-close-home-keep-communities-safer-escalating-climate-impacts/

[2] United Nations, Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030. https://www.undrr.org/publication/sendai-framework-disaster-risk-reduction-2015-2030

[3] United Nations, Sustainable Development Goals, Goal 11: Making cities inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable. https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/cities/

[4] Australian Library & Information Association, ALIA LIS Education, Skills and Employment Trend Report 2020. https://read.alia.org.au/alia-lis-education-skills-and-employment-trend-report-2020