Firefighters boycott SA park fires

More volunteer firefighters in South Australia are refusing to fight blazes on government land, including national parks, to protest a tax hike.

About 30 Country Fire Service members in Kapinnie, in the lower Eyre Peninsula, say they'll only respond to fires on private land.

It follows a similar pledge by CFS members in Green Patch, near Port Lincoln, who hope the protest will convince the government to bring back discounts to the emergency services levy.

The government removed discounts from the levy in this year's budget, saying it was necessary to help recover more than $600 million in federal cuts to health spending.

Most CFS volunteers are farmers, who are among the worst affected by the ESL hike because they often own more than one property.

Kapinnie unit captain Dale Howell says some local farmers are being hit with tenfold increases in their levy payments.

"There's a lot of angst among our members here," he told ABC radio on Tuesday.

"We're not against paying an emergency services levy ... it's just the level of the increase we're not happy with."

The protest comes after a 38-year-old CFS volunteer suffered severe burns and died on Friday while helping a neighbour contain a fire in the state's mid-north.

Total fire bans have been fast-tracked in eight of SA's 14 districts, with dry conditions and above average temperatures expected until at least the end of the year.

Emergency Services Minister Tony Piccolo said the government would not back down on the ESL hike unless the federal government reversed its funding cuts.