{"id":211924,"date":"2018-06-21T23:14:21","date_gmt":"2018-06-21T13:14:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/?p=211924"},"modified":"2018-06-21T23:14:21","modified_gmt":"2018-06-21T13:14:21","slug":"lgaq-welcomes-promise-to-fix-broken-grants-system","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/2018\/06\/21\/lgaq-welcomes-promise-to-fix-broken-grants-system\/","title":{"rendered":"LGAQ Welcomes Promise
To Fix ‘Broken’ Grants System"},"content":{"rendered":"

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LGAQ chief executive Greg Hallam (Photo: Twitter)<\/figcaption><\/figure>June 21, 2018<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Local Government Association of Queensland (LGAQ) has given a cautious thumbs up to last week’s State Budget because of its implicit commitment to fix flaws in the Council grants system. <\/p>\n

LGAQ CEO Greg Hallam said Queensland’s councils were $61 million better off thanks to this year’s State Budget, and have moved closer to the $600 million per annum guaranteed funding target the LGAQ is seeking.<\/p>\n

However, Mr Hallam warned that grant reform still had some way to go. <\/p>\n

“Having spent a lifetime chasing dollars for councils, with the attendant frustrations of a myriad of grants programs across what has now been five state governments, I will take the commitment to grant reform embedded within the Budget papers this year as the biggest win for the sector,” he said.<\/p>\n

Mr Hallam said he had seen a report carried out by consultants KPMG for Deputy Premier Jackie Trad in the second half of last year which had laid out a blueprint for a future Council grants system.<\/strong><\/p>\n

“It is – without doubt – one of the best pieces of thinking and analysis I\u2019ve seen by state government in all my years at the LGAQ,” he said. <\/p>\n

“They nailed it, producing the blueprint for a future grants system – locked-in funding, thematic, flexible, allocative rather than submission-based and (with) simpler acquittal processes. Hallelujah!”<\/p>\n

Mr Hallam said in the past few years the Auditor-General had “touched up” councils – sometimes harshly – for not undertaking long term financial planning, but he thought this was unfair in the current situation.<\/p>\n

“It\u2019s like fighting with one hand tied behind your back, impossible to do when you don\u2019t know year to year what grant funding councils will receive from 1 William Street,” he said. <\/p>\n

“It\u2019s no different to a lottery, made worse if you must find matching grants and you have no discretionary revenues.<\/p>\n

“That (grant funding) model is well and truly broken.”<\/p>\n

In November 2012, the Queensland Grants Commission slashed the South Burnett’s annual grant allocation by more than $1.4 million without warning.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The sudden loss of funding forced the South Burnett Regional Council to introduce the Road Levy.<\/p>\n

It has remained in place ever since, partly because that funding has not been restored and partly because the Federal Government also introduced a three-year freeze on its Financial Assistance Grants (FAGs) in 2016-2018.<\/p>\n

The FAGs freeze was estimated to have cost the Council an additional $2.8 million in lost revenues.<\/p>\n

Combined, the grant cut and FAGs freeze have cost the Council close to $10 million over the past 5 years. <\/p>\n

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