Annual Forward Plan of Reviews 2022-23

All hazards

Risks spanning across multiple hazard types and across the emergency management system.

Biosecurity

Exotic animal and plant disease outbreaks and pest incursions can have significant economic, community and environmental impacts.

Bushfire and other fires

Bushfire and other fires have potential consequences including loss of life and property, and damage to infrastructure and environment.

Climate change

Risks include more days of extreme heat, harsher fire weather, less rainfall and rising sea levels.

Communications disruption

Communications services are crucial in keeping communities safe, connected and informed before, during and after emergencies.

Cyber security and ICT systems failure

Risks relating to the confidentiality, availability, integrity of information and data and disruption of services.

Energy supply disruption

Reliable energy supplies are critical to many social and economic activities.

Flood

Major flood events have occurred in Victoria every 10 to 20 years, with much of the increasing risk created by human settlement.

Hazardous material incident

Potential risks relate to many places where Victoria’s hazardous materials are manufactured, stored, transported, used and disposed.

Heatwave

Heatwaves are considered to be the ‘silent killer’ of extreme weather events and are the leading cause of weather-related deaths in Australia.

Public health emergency

Risks may relate to the delivery of public health services, with impacts on community health and wellbeing and potential for loss of life.

Supply chain disruption

Geopolitical, environmental, economic, societal and infrastructure-related shocks can expose supply chains to wide ranging consequences.

Terrorism and extremism

Attacks carried out by individuals or non-state groups with ideological, political or religious goals can result in loss of life, severe injury and/or material damage.

Water supply disruption

Risks include collection, storage, treatment, delivery, availability and allocation of water for consumption and environmental, recreation and cultural uses.

Workforce and resourcing

Risks may relate to human resource supply and skills to support emergency management operations.

IGEM undertakes system-wide reviews, including reviews of the emergency management functions of responder agencies and government departments as prescribed in section 66 of the Emergency Management Act, and based on an Annual Forward Plan of Reviews.

This forward plan provides a high-level description of the reviews IGEM will conduct in 2022–23, and includes broad information specific to the context, aim, scope, stakeholders, approach, outputs, publication, implementation and intended review outcomes.

In developing the forward plan for 2022–23, IGEM considered recent reviews and inquiries, ongoing reform in the sector, state and local risk assessments, and other risks to Victorian communities.

IGEM also considered the risks and themes from its ongoing monitoring of previous recommendations made to the minister and other performance monitoring conducted under the Act. Targeted stakeholder engagement was conducted to inform its final selection of reviews.

Based on these considerations, IGEM conducted two planned reviews in 2022-23: