New fire investigation agreement

The following are the agencies who are signatures to the Agreement:

• Coroners Court of Victoria
• Victoria Police
• Fire Services Commissioner Victoria
• Country Fire Authority (CFA)
• Metropolitan Fire Brigade (MFB)
• Department of Sustainability and Environment (DSE)
• Energy Safe Victoria (ESV)
• Work Safe Victoria

The Victorian Fire Investigation Inter-Agency Agreement outlines the roles and responsibilities of the agencies in the areas of:

• Investigation of Fires
• Control of the fire scene
• Non-suspicious fires
• Suspicious fires
• Fires resulting in fatalities or serious injury
• Fires occurring in work places
• Evidence Collection
• Fire Trends
• Serial Arson
• Agency Integration
• Information Sharing
• Media

This updated document articulates agreed working arrangements between the Victorian agencies and organisations which have roles to play in investigating fires. 

Although a particular agency may have primacy of an investigation a collaborative team approach by all agencies is now seen as best practice. 

The benefits of an all agency integrated approach to fire scene examination and investigation include:

• Greater productivity and efficiency utilising existing resources
• Improved inter-agency co-operation
• Increased detection, apprehension and conviction rates
• Reduction in the incidence of arson
• Cost savings to the community
• Better intelligence sharing
• Increased data holdings
• Earlier identification of trends
• Early identification of product related fault
• Identification of other fire causes
• Improved training and cross training techniques
• Improved reporting rates and processes. 

A copy of the Victorian Fire Investigation Inter-Agency Agreement has been placed on the CFA’s Intranet and Brigades Online site at Operations > Fire Investigation for information purposes.

State Fire Investigation Coordinator Nicole Harvey