3.1 Governance Strong governance is required to coordinate policies and strategies across the sector. Figure 1 depicts the overarching emergency management governance structure in Victoria. Following commencement of the Act on 1 July 2014, the SCRC was established to drive a more integrated approach to governance. The SCRC achieves integration by developing and coordinating policy and strategy and overseeing its implementation across the spectrum of emergency management functions. The SCRC membership comprises the:  Secretaries of each government department  Chief Commissioner of Police  Executive of Emergency Management Victoria (EMV)  Emergency Management Commissioner (EMC)  IGEM (as an observer)  Chief Executive Officer of the Municipal Association of Victoria (as the representative of local government). The SCRC is supported by three sub-committees: Risk and Resilience; Capability and Response; and Relief and Recovery. The SCRC and its sub-committees meet no less than quarterly. They ensure integration and cohesion across the sector and enable the government to progress the reform agenda. The SCRC sub-committees’ membership is made up from a broad range of organisations with a role in emergency management. SCRC key priorities Every year the SCRC develops a list of key priorities, the delivery of which will realise its role as the peak crisis and emergency management advisory body to the Victorian Government. The priorities support the delivery of the reform agenda. The key priorities for 2016–17 were:  strengthening resilience and risk mitigation  implementing a Whole of Government integrated approach to emergency management that meets future needs  implementing a next generation relief and recovery system for Victoria, including a focus on community- led recovery and integration of emergency management activities before, during and after an emergency  strengthening counter-terrorism security and social cohesion  testing changes to the natural disaster funding arrangements  providing ongoing oversight of implementation of inquiry/audit recommendations and other findings, including implementation of those from the Hazelwood Mine Fire Inquiry reports  building diversity and inclusion in the sector, including the development of a Diversity and Inclusion Framework. Figure 1: Overarching emergency management governance structure in Victoria
6.2 Progress against reform agenda Reforming relief and recovery The White Paper[9] recommended a range of improvements to relief and recovery arrangements in order to enable communities to participate in their own recovery. Specifically, it envisaged that relief and recovery should:  target the unique of each community using community-led approaches that engage the community  operate simultaneously and cooperatively with response procedures  be timely and seamless with scalable arrangements embedded in legislation and policy  be informed by effective impact and needs assessments  have the capacity and capability it through investing in partnerships over the long-term, and effectively harnessing public goodwill and participation. In February 2017, EMV released the Resilient Recovery Discussion Paper[4] (the Discussion Paper). The Discussion Paper introduces a model of resilient recovery, which aims to connect community systems and networks to support and plan for community outcomes of wellbeing, viability, sustainability and liveability. It describes components under each community outcome and how each aligns to resilience characteristics. EMV sought feedback from the sector, businesses and the community on the Discussion Paper. The feedback period closed on 28 April 2017. EMV will consider the feedback in developing recovery policy and strategy to meet the intent of the White Paper. A Relief and Recovery Reform Steering Committee has also been established to oversee reform progress including the development of the governance, policy and operating arrangements to best meet the four community outcomes identified in the Discussion Emergency management performance standards As already described under the Risk and Resilience part of this Annual Assurance Summary, the Act and the SAP[5] call for development of operational or performance standards in relation to responder agency performance. The EMC released the second version of the Standards[7] in December 2016. The Standards for relief and recovery comprise five functions:  relief  context and complexity  community capacity building  sector coordination and capacity  communication. For each function, the Standards describe the context, the desired outcome, objective, assumptions and then list minimum requirements and criteria that responder agencies report against to EMV, with consolidated information to be provided to the EMC and IGEM. The Standards for relief and recovery apply to responder agencies as of 1 January 2017. Work on this is continuing and IGEM will revisit progress in the next Annual Assurance Summary.