The Morrison Government will provide an initial and immediate base payment of $1 million to 42 of the most severely bushfire impacted councils in New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia and Queensland to help quickly rebuild vital infrastructure and strengthen community resilience.
\nA further $18 million will be set aside to provide additional support to larger council areas which have experienced the most significant damage, with the National Bushfire Recovery Coordinator Andrew Colvin working with state governments and impacted local councils on determining this additional allocation.
\nPrime Minister Scott Morrison said his Government was committed to working hand in hand with regional communities to rebuild towns and villages.
\n\u201cThese payments will provide immediate assistance directly into the hands of local councils to rebuild roads and infrastructure, employ staff to help in recovery activities and hold events which bring the community together and bring tourists back to town,\u201d the Prime Minister said.
\n\u201cWe are moving immediately to support local councils and our funding will be in state government bank accounts by tomorrow.
\n\u201cImportantly this is a base payment and just the start of our support for local communities, in what we know will be a long recovery.\u201d
\nFunding will be directed to councils which have been \u2018activated\u2019 by their respective state government for Category C bushfire disaster recovery relief under the Disaster Recovery Funding Arrangements (DRFA). Payments will not require matched funding from state governments.
\nCurrently there are 40 councils across Australia in receipt of Category C assistance, including 33 in New South Wales, five in Queensland and two in South Australia (list below).
\nFunding will also be provided to the Local Government Areas of East Gippsland and Towong in Victoria in recognition of an imminent request from the Victorian Government for Category C assistance for these severely impacted regions.
\nDeputy Prime Minister and Minister for Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Development Michael McCormack said the Government was backing regional communities to rebuild and recover.
\n\u201cWe have always known regional communities are Australia\u2019s most resilient and in the devastation of these fires we have seen again the remarkable community spirit existing in our regions, said the Deputy Prime Minister.
\n\u201cThe immediate payments to councils will boost affected economies by supporting local small businesses, farmers and trades as they rebuild, restock, replant and recover.\u201d
\nMinister for Natural Disaster and Emergency Management David Littleproud said the focus would be on supporting local communities.
\n\u201cI\u2019ve made it clear this won\u2019t be a Canberra led recovery, it\u2019ll be a locally led recovery and this is our first instalment in that process. We\u2019re empowering local governments to be part of that process today. We\u2019re committed to rebuilding communities but also the lives of those impacted by these devastating fires,\u201d Minister Littleproud said.
\nAll funds will be drawn from the $2 billion allocated to the National Bushfire Recovery Agency and this is in addition to funding that is automatically available to councils through other disaster recovery arrangements.
\nThe lump sum payments will be delivered by the Commonwealth by the close of business tomorrow to State Governments who administer payments to councils.
\nThe only condition placed on councils is that they develop a Program of Works within three months and report back to the Commonwealth in 12 months\u2019 time.
\nCouncils will be able to spend their $1 million payments on projects and activities that they deem essential for the recovery and renewal of their communities, including:<\/p>\n
Councils to receive assistance QLD<\/u><\/p>\n SA<\/u><\/p>\n VIC<\/u><\/p>\n The Morrison Government will provide an initial and immediate base payment of $1 million to 42 of the most severely bushfire impacted councils in New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia and Queensland to help quickly rebuild vital infrastructure and strengthen community resilience. A further $18 million will be set aside to provide additional support to … Continue reading “Immediate Financial Support for Bushfire Affected Communities”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4793","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-aussie"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4793","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4793"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4793\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4793"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4793"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4793"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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