4 minute read
President’s Message - FPANZ
In this, his last message as Fire Protection Association of New Zealand (FPANZ) president, Chris Mak looks back at the Association’s recent successes and looks forward to its plans for a new training facility and CPD services.
This will be my last message as the FPANZ President. As required by our constitution and rules, I will be stepping down as President at this year’s AGM. It’s been a pleasure to lead the Association, including during the two and a half trying years of the Covid pandemic, which now appears to be a faint image in the rear-view mirror.
While this was a very challenging time for the association and its members we did fair very well, the most significant thing was of course not being able to run FireNZ for two years. However, it was very positive that the first year back in Christchurch in 2022 was a great success and one of, if not the largest event ever.
I first became actively engaged with FPANZ when I returned to New Zealand in 1992. Over the past 31 years, the Association has evolved with the various Presidents and CEOs, constantly growing and becoming more professionally run.
To that effect, I would like to thank Scott and Elaine in particular for their efforts in recent years. We have built solid financial reserves, including during the Covid impact years, by being prudent with our expenses without sacrificing daily member services, noting that our subscriptions have modestly increased every year even during the pandemic.
This is material as the Association is about to embark on its most significant project, where we will start to reinvest these reserves to help meet our stated goals of being the unified voice of industry.
This will involve setting up an industry training facility, which will allow subject matter experts to deliver consistent hands-on training for the alarm, passive and sprinkler industries, to complement the NZQA regime. There is also a push to provide more continued professional development for members.
No longer is it acceptable best practice to obtain a qualification and then consider that staff are fully trained for life. With this in mind, the association and other organisations will expect to see staff doing a minimum number of hours of CPD training as is the norm in other industries. FPANZ will be pushing for this requirement and supporting members by providing these CPD services.
Reflecting over the years I have been involved in the industry and with the association, I recall an AGM that was held at the Commerce Club in Remuera, with a technical presentation following. This presentation has morphed into the Fire New Zealand Conference (FIRENZ), with both the Institution of Fire Engineers and Society of Fire Protection Engineers (NZ Chapter) joining us as our partners.
While my opinion may be somewhat biased, and with apologies to our friends at the Fire Protection Association of Australia, I believe that our conference has grown significantly in the past few years to be the best conference in the South Pacific. Hopefully, they see this as a challenge.
This year we once again have a wealth of interesting speakers, including a great line up of international keynotes that we bring in for the benefit of their global experience, noting that Prof Hugh Dillion was invited as the FPANZ keynote speaker.
Hugh was formally a DeputyCoroner in New South Wales, and will be speaking about several harrowing fires where, simply put, loss of life was avoidable. I’m sure that as the various reports are released following the Loafers Lodge fire, we will see similar findings.
Overall, the FIRENZ committee work on sourcing high calibre speakers from around the world and locally to have a diverse and informative conference for the industry. I also note the significant contribution of all the sponsors and exhibitors.
Please join me thanking the FireNZ events committee, speakers and exhibitors by taking the time to visits stands, converse and learn with them and your peers. FIRENZ is the best networking event and opportunity for the fire protection industry regardless of what area you specialise in.
On behalf of myself and the FIRENZ partners (FPANZ, IFE, SFPE) welcome to FIRENZ 2023 –feel free to catch up with me over the duration of this year’s event.
