For firefighters the work of being first responders when people have heart attacks or stop breathing can be confronting. 

But for the community it can literally be the difference between life and death. 

The CFA has been trialling EMR at five fire stations with significant results. 

A January 2013 Productivity Commission report found that patients in the trial areas were being assisted four minutes earlier in 90 per cent of cases. 

Since then, the Napthine Government has delayed a decision on introducing EMR in CFA areas for more than two years while residents in MFB areas have had the added security of firefighters attending medical emergencies since 2000.

It is unfair and dangerous that CFA residents - who pay a higher rate of Fire Services Levy - have been short-changed by the Coalition.

Labor has promised to give CFA professional firefighters the same training as MFB firefighters in CPR, defibrillation, and oxygen therapy.

Firefighters won't provide the skilled treatment of paramedics, but they will maintain life until an ambulance arrives.

Over the past 15 years, since EMR was introduced to the MFB, more than 100 lives - probably many more - have been saved through a relatively small investment in training.

It will be similar for the CFA - a small increase in the training budget for initial training and then skills maintenance - and dozens of lives saved by firefighters maintaining life until paramedics arrive.

Labor's initiative will make a difference in many parts of Victoria including Morwell, Traralgon, Geelong, Warrnambool, Portland, Ballarat, Bendigo, Shepparton, Wodonga, Wangaratta, Mildura, and the majority of suburban Melbourne.

This is to be applauded.

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