Minister for Police, Corrective Services and Emergency Services
The Honourable Neil Roberts

Saturday, November 07, 2009

SES WEEK 2009: North Queensland SES Volunteers acknowledged

SES volunteers from North Queensland received top honours today at the SES Week Northern Region Awards Ceremony in Ingham.

Emergency Services Minister Neil Roberts said a series of events would be held across the state to celebrate and acknowledge the contribution made by SES volunteers.

“SES Week is a valuable opportunity for the local community to thank SES volunteers across the state and learn about the vital role volunteers play within the community,” Mr Roberts said.

“Northern Region is home to more than 600 SES Volunteers from 42 groups, who committed close to 12,250 operational hours to frontline activities during 2008-09.

“It takes a unique person to be a volunteer - a person who is selfless and willing to put their own needs on hold to assist others.

“Whether it was in response to a search for a missing person, a mass response to a natural disaster or the recent bushfires across the state, SES volunteers gave their time and labour to help those impacted.”

Emergency Management Queensland and SES Regional Director for Northern Region Warren Bridson said that Bryan Parison of Giru SES Group was today named Regional Member of the Year.

“As a former group leader of Giru SES Bryan has shown exceptional dedication to his job and his community,” Mr Bridson said.

“Giru is renowned to be one of Queenslands most floodable towns and on many occasions floodwaters have blocked the passage to Bryans home, seperating him from his family for extended periods of time while he helped residents within the community.

“Bryans knowledge, attitude and experience has been invaluable and reassuring to the Burdekin Shire Council and the Local Disaster Management Group.”

Mr Bridson also said that Hinchinbrook SES Unit was named Regional Unit of the Year and Carpentaria SES Unit was awarded Regional Operational Response of the Year.

“Hinchinbrook SES assisted the community for a prolonged period of time at the start of the year when the shire was severly impacted by major weather events including the before and after affects of Ex Tropical Cyclone Charlotte and Cyclone Ellie,” Mr Bridson said.

“Although many of their own homes had been indundated with floodwater and severely damaged SES members remained at the SES shed for days on end so that they could assist their local community.”

Carpentaria Shire SES unit was awarded Regional Operational Response of the year for their commitment during the most prolonged flooding events the area had ever experienced.

“For the first three months of this year the Carpentaria Shire remained isolated from the rest of Queensland and Carpentaria SES volunteers showed exceptional commitment to the group for the weeks during this incident,” Mr Bridson said.

“The resupply of goods to the Carpentaria Shire was the largest resupply undertaken in Queensland and SES members assisted with the transport of more than 400 tonnes to the local community.”

Winners of the regional awards have been nominated for the SES Week State awards which will be presented at a ceremony in Brisbane on Sunday 15 November.

Queensland SES Week is proudly supported by NRMA insurance as the major sponsor of the Queensland State Emergency Service.

Further information on SES week celebrations can be found at
www.emergency.qld.gov.au/ses

Media contact: Minister’s office - 3239 0199; DCS Media – 3247 8186

---