May 13, 2015
A decision by the Federal Government to freeze Financial Assistance Grants (FAGs) to councils for three years until 2017-18 drew a withering response from South Burnett Deputy Mayor Keith Campbell at Wednesday’s Council meeting.
Cr Campbell warned the South Burnett stood to lose almost $2.8 million from its income by the time the freeze was lifted.
“This is equivalent to a 12.6 per cent rate increase over three years just to make up the difference,” Cr Campbell said.
“That’s untenable.”
Cr Campbell was speaking on a motion asking Council to support a campaign by the Australian Local Government Association and the Local Government Association of Queensland to ensure FAGs grants continue to be indexed annually.
“At present, FAGs grants make up 13.1 per cent of the South Burnett Regional Council’s annual income,” Cr Campbell said.
“The main reason our rates have moved up in recent times is because the level of financial assistance from the Federal Government has reduced.
“There are only three ways to beat that.
“One is to lobby the Federal Government as hard as we can alongside the LGAQ and ALGA to lift their contribution. Another is to reduce or even close down services.
“And the third is to continue adjusting rates relative to the outcomes of the other two.”
Mayor Wayne Kratzmann agreed.
“At the moment the Federal Government takes 84 per cent of the taxation pie, State Governments get 14 per cent and councils get the remaining 2 per cent.
“The Federal Government has been reducing its support for local government for many years, and I think it’s now got to the point where they need to give councils a bigger slice of the pie.
“Our annual cost rises are always higher than CPI because of the types of products we buy and the types of services we provide. This is well known.
“So trying to keep their contributions at or below CPI or freezing grant levels just winds up hurting ordinary ratepayers.”
Cr Damien Tessmann also agreed, but took aim at the Grants Commission which distributes Federal money to councils.
“At the same time the Grants Commission took $1.4 million away from the South Burnett in 2012, they gave Maranoa Regional Council a $70,000 increase,” Cr Tessmann said.
“Maranoa Council are doing very well out of gas fields in their region; they get millions of dollars a year from airline companies to use Roma airport; and they do very well out of other some other industries they have in that region too.
“The South Burnett does not have access to these types of resources.
“Yet when we asked the Grants Commission to explain why they’d cut $1.4 million from our annual grant but given Maranoa an extra $70,000, they were unable to explain it.
“In fact, no one I know from Ministers downwards can explain how grants are allocated. It’s almost as if they use a ouija board to draw up grant allocations.
“Any system that has such a lack of transparency has got to be wrong.”.
Cr Barry Green agreed with Cr Tessmann that a meeting between Councillors and representatives from the Grants Commission in 2013 had been “a waste of time”.
“They cannot explain what they do or how grants are worked out. And they cannot expect councils to continue putting up rates to make up for Federal and State Government funding shortfalls.
“The answer is to push them for a fairer slice of the pie.”
Cr Kathy Duff then reminded everyone they’d gone a bit off track.
“We need to address the core issue, and that’s the three year FAGs freeze,” she said.
Councillors voted unanimously to support the ALGA-LGAQ campaign.
- Editorial: Show Us The Money
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