When the heat has subsided arsonists will get a year in jail and a taxpayer-funded appeal against the severity of the sentence. Talk now of murder charges is nothing more than law-and-order grandstanding, because a murder charge, which requires intent, is very unlikely to stick when a murder charge often does not survive against someone who kills by stabbing. But arsonists can cause more death and destruction than terrorists.
Tossing a lit cigarette butt from a car in times of serious to extreme fire risk is hardly less than arson, and when people are killed in the ensuing fire hardly less than manslaughter. Yet many smokers do it as a matter of course. Just a few minutes ago I watched a woman from an office opposite my window toss her lit butt into the gutter. Yes, the gutter is not bush, but it was a gesture of her entitlement to toss lit butts to the ground. The answer to the risk posed by smokers is education and relentless fining, neither of which we have.
The answer to arsonists is much harder. Perhaps we need a community watch to identify people who seem intent on lighting fires, and that would be most effective if they could be locked up at the beginning of summer each year. Intervention, counselling, would have to help.
The danger now is that some arsonists will be encouraged by the sheer force of the firestorm that ripped through Victoria at the weekend. If they were seeking impact, they succeeded.
Is there an answer? Longer sentences? Mandatory sentencing for arsonists?
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