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ABC News
23-05-2025
- General
- ABC News
Firefighter and presumptive rights campaigner Simon Lund farewelled at funeral
Victorian firefighter Simon Lund has been farewelled at a funeral in Gippsland today, after spending his dying days campaigning for a better deal for others like him with a terminal illness related to their work. More than 500 people, including some of the state's top fire chiefs and local Labor MP Harriet Shing, attended the service at Churchill in Gippsland. During the eulogy, family friend Kellie O'Callaghan described Mr Lund as "the kind of person who left a mark on every life he touched". "He was loyal, kind, principled and loving. It wasn't just a job, it was a calling," she said. CFA acting chief fire officer Garry Cook presented Mr Lund's wife Tracie and their three children with one of the organisation's highest accolades — a Chief's Commendation for exemplary service. "I wish I could pick up the phone and say, 'Lundy, it's Cooky, you deserve this'," he told the service. In her tribute, Ms Lund said her husband's legacy would live on through their efforts to change the state's presumptive rights legislation for other fire staff. "When the Hazelwood mine fire devastated our community, we stood together," she wrote in her eulogy, read out at the funeral by Ms O'Callaghan. Funeral attendees sobbed as Mr Lund's casket was driven away in a vintage fire truck, through a guard of honour formed by more than 100 CFA members. Mr Lund worked at the CFA as a senior technical field officer for more than 25 years. In his role, setting up communication gear at command centres, he attended some of the biggest fires in the state's recent history, including the toxic Hazelwood mine 56-year-old was diagnosed with stage 4 oesophageal cancer last year, which his doctor attributed to his exposure to smoke, fumes and ash from fires, including chemical fires and the mine fire. The Firefighters' Presumptive Rights Compensation and Fire Services Legislation Amendment (Reform) Act 2019 ensures Victorian firefighters diagnosed with certain cancers are entitled to compensation. The act includes a list of 18 cancers and an associated career period that paid and volunteer firefighters, as well as vehicle and equipment maintenance employees, must have served to qualify under the scheme. However, professional, technical and administrative employees are not eligible — and as Mr Lund worked in an IT role, he was not covered. Instead, he had to go back and find old pay slips and time sheets to prove 25 years' worth of exposure to risk from fires to make a successful WorkCover claim. A week before he died on May 12, Mr Lund told the ABC the law needed to change. Ross Sottile is a lawyer at Maurice Blackburn who worked with Mr Lund and his family to get a WorkCover claim approved. "Presumptive legislation is beneficial legislation that makes the WorkCover claim process simpler, so what it does is it presumes that someone's work or volunteer service and their cancer condition are related," he said. "Although [Mr Lund] had ticked off that he had the correct cancer under the presumptive legislation and he had the correct service period in terms of the years that he had spent with the CFA, the definition of firefighter just did not cover his role." Mr Sottile said not only were workers then faced with having to prove their cancer was work-related under a WorkCover claim, but they were missing out on crucial entitlements. "In doing that, it's a delay in workers accessing crucial entitlements to medical expenses and weekly compensation so that they can focus on things like getting treatment, instead of worrying about the financial burden of getting treatment and paying for mortgages," he said. Mr Sottile said the current definition of firefighter under the act did not allow for the practical realities many fire staffers faced in the field. "I think when the legislation was drafted, it just didn't take into account all these other sorts of workers that are actually on the ground alongside our firefighters," he said. The Australian Services Union is campaigning for the legislation to be expanded to cover all professional, technical and administrative staff who attend incidents, or are exposed to contaminants. Victorian branch secretary Tash Wark, who attended Mr Lund's funeral, said the union was also negotiating with the CFA for a better staff tracking system. "So when exposures have occurred, there is an easy pathway back for people to be able to demonstrate what roles they have performed, when," she said. "Simon's greatest legacy will be his fight to change presumptive laws to include his training and administration colleagues to ensure they are covered," she said. Minister for Emergency Services Vicki Ward declined the ABC's request for an interview. In a previous statement, a spokesperson for the Victorian government said it would "continue to monitor whether Victoria's presumptive compensation legislation appropriately reflects the increased risks some emergency service workers can face due to their service".
ABC News
11-05-2025
- Health
- ABC News
Firefighter with terminal cancer wants to change presumptive compensation rules to help others
Simon Lund has lived his entire adult life in uniform. After a stint in the navy cut short by a knee injury, the 56-year-old had his first shifts as a volunteer firefighter with the Country Fire Authority (CFA) in 1998. He loved it so much, he never left and spent the next 25 years working as a CFA senior technical field officer on some of the biggest fire emergencies Victoria has ever seen. "I do love my job. It's been great in the fact that I've been able to meet so many good people," Simon says. But 12 months ago, Simon and his wife Tracie, a Latrobe City councillor who has dedicated her life to helping others through Foodbank and the local Neighbourhood House, were delivered news that turned their lives upside down. Simon first started feeling unwell in March last year, getting indigestion and having difficulty swallowing. Tests with local doctors in Traralgon were inconclusive, so he went to Melbourne for a second opinion. A diagnostic scope revealed that Simon had stage 4 oesophageal cancer. Doctors have attributed the diagnosis to his exposure to carcinogenic materials. "You never think it's going to happen to you," he says. 'It's like being slapped in the face with a wet fish. It was pretty hard. I knew as soon as the surgeon said that, that was it." Tracie recalls the agony of the long drive home from Box Hill Hospital to Traralgon to tell the couple's three adult children the life-changing news. "We were trying to find the words to tell our kids," she says. "I was just so broken. I just could not get my head around what they had just said to us, what that actually meant." In his technical role with the CFA, Simon worked on major fires across the state, including the fatal Black Saturday and Black Summer bushfires. His job was to set up all of the gear required at district headquarters and command centres on fire sites, including at the toxic Hazelwood Mine fire in 2014. But the long-term health implications of what he was being exposed to never crossed his mind. Simon says incident control staff were provided with standard PS2 masks and PPE gear, while firefighters who went down into the mine were issued with breathing apparatus. "I can remember walking into the training building, and there's a corridor that's probably about 20 metres long, and I couldn't see halfway down the corridor," he says. The Lund family initially kept Simon's diagnosis private, keeping their minds busy with work. Overwhelmed with feelings of grief and dread, they navigated the bleak practicalities of treatment plans, palliative care, updating wills, and sorting out superannuation. The Firefighters' Presumptive Rights Compensation and Fire Services Legislation Amendment (Reform) Act 2019 ensures Victorian firefighters who are diagnosed with certain cancers are entitled to compensation. His treating oncologist found there was a "sufficient probability" that Simon's exposure to smoke, fumes, ash and dust from fires, including chemical fires and significant coal mine fires, had "at least partly contributed to his risk of developing gastro-oesophageal adenocarcinoma". But as he was employed in an IT role, Simon is not eligible for presumptive rights. "With presumptive legislation, it's presumed that you have the cancer and that someone else has to prove that you don't, whereas with WorkCover it's the opposite," he says. His initial WorkCover claim was rejected and, as his health declined, Simon found himself burdened with the administrative nightmare of having to prove that he had physically attended fires and been exposed to carcinogenic risk. That involved gathering evidence such as 25 years' worth of photos, pay slips, call-out records, and information on fire conditions to support his second WorkCover claim. It was a traumatic and exhausting exercise that cost Simon and Tracie much of the precious time they had left together. Finally, with the help of lawyers, Simon's WorkCover claim was accepted. But the challenges he encountered in proving his claim would motivate the Lund family to campaign for presumptive legislation to be expanded to include professional, technical, and administrative CFA employees. "I don't want anyone to go through that when they should be spending time with their family and their friends and their colleagues and trying to enjoy the last of whatever timeframe they've got," Simon says. A spokesperson for the state government says it will continue to monitor whether Victoria's presumptive compensation legislation appropriately reflects the increased risks some emergency service workers can face due to their service. Last month, Simon was presented with a National Service Medal from the Governor-General for his service with the CFA. The Lunds have been overwhelmed by the outpouring of love and offers of support from their Latrobe Valley community since Simon's diagnosis. "Some days we are OK, sometimes we're really focused, almost like warriors, thinking we're going conquer this, we're going to change the legislation, everything is going to be alright," Simon says. "And then there are other days where we physically can't get out of bed." Simon has been particularly humbled by the people who have reached out in his final months to tell him what he means to them. "The only way our family can make any sense of it is to channel that anger, that despair, the fear and the dread into something positive to try and make some change for all the staff that will come after us," Tracie says. Simon's gruelling rounds of cancer treatment have ended now. He is in palliative care. But earlier this year, he fulfilled a lifelong dream, purchasing a Holden SS Crewman ute, which he'll take out for a spin again when he's up to it. "[Simon's] idea of a date was to get me in the ute and drive down to the ice cream shop at Traralgon and buy me ice cream. So we would really like to be able to do that," Tracie says. On advice from a friend, Tracie and Simon also indulged in booking a "yes" holiday, making lasting memories with the kids on a trip to New Zealand. During the holiday, Simon, a former naval officer, enjoyed a bumpy dinner cruise on rough seas, while the rest of the family groaned with seasickness. "We weren't undercover, it was absolutely freezing, the boat is going up and down, and I'm going, 'I'm absolutely loving this!'" Simon says.
