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The natural disasters royal commission is wrapping up its hearings ahead of a final report due on October 28.
Commissioner Mark Binskin and senior counsel assisting Dominique Hogan-Doran are scheduled to make their final remarks on Friday morning.
The commission heard this week Australia faced more frequent and intense disasters in coming years as a result of global warming, and now is the time to make policy changes.
The final report is likely to make a raft of recommendations relating to national coordination, decision-making and accountability.
On Thursday, the inquiry heard from Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet secretary Phil Gaetjens and National Bushfire Recovery Agency co-ordinator Andrew Colvin, who outlined the ongoing recovery from the so-called Black Summer bushfires.
Mr Colvin said communities had an overwhelming sentiment of fatigue and anxiety, with another high-risk weather season approaching.
“There’s still 1700 calls a week to the dedicated lifeline number,” he said.
“And that is steadily increasing.”
Mr Colvin said 600 people a week were also accessing telehealth or face-to-face medical support for trauma in relation to the bushfires.
Commissioners are looking at a single, scalable body responsible for natural disaster recovery and resilience at a national level.
The commission is also looking at the idea of a national emergency declaration, which was part of the Commonwealth’s submission.
The latest figures on the bushfires recovery show almost 300,000 individual support payments have been made and 26,269 businesses supported, while 4882 damaged properties have been cleared across NSW, South Australia and Victoria.
Australian Associated Press
