Page 484 - Week 02 - Wednesday, 17 February 2016
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Surely there are people in the community who need it more than somebody in the highest income quintile. Yes it is a small percentage, but 10 per cent of the households accessing the water and sewerage concession are in the fourth income quintile. I think it is well worth having a look at that and saying, “Is that the best way to spend the resources we have and help the people most in need in our community?” I think that is a fair question to ask there. So I am quite supportive of the government undertaking this sort of review.
Mr Doszpot singles out seniors as being under financial pressure. However, he should be assured that seniors in need will continue to be supported by this government. The Greens have the same concerns, ensuring that we do not leave people behind. There are a wealth of concessions available to people in our community which have grown over the years and were developed by various government departments over the past few decades. The Greens support the idea of looking at all of these concessions as a whole to ensure that these various means of financial support are actually targeting the people who need it; that people are not doubling up; and that, for that matter, we are not leaving gaps. This is an important principle. We need those concessions to reach people who need them.
At the moment we have a system, if it can be called that, but I do not think it is as cohesive as it could be. Until recently you had to apply for these concessions in various ways, through various directorates, with no centralised ACT government support. I reckon we can do better than that. That is another opportunity in reviewing the concessions. The ACT government is now working to streamline those systems and part of this process includes looking at who delivers it and how, whom it goes to and is it the right scheme.
The expenditure review committee that is looking at the ACT concessions program undertook consultation last year, starting with public comment last April and May. Twenty-four members of the community and peak community organisations lodged submissions to that process, and a discussion paper was put out for consultation over summer, with submissions closing late last week.
The government will spend the next few months looking at the feedback, and I believe a new concessions proposal will be put together by the time of the next ACT budget, leaving time to take account of any further changes that the federal government makes in the budget this year because, of course, the Treasurer and Chief Minister has outlined today the impact we have seen on the ACT of federal government changes to concession schemes. One of the options we will have is to see what the federal government does in its budget and contemplate how the ACT may need to respond to that. I think that is a responsible thing to do as well.
The Greens certainly support concessions. We know that they are important for seniors, for pensioners and also for all the other people in the ACT who need them, who are struggling, be they people with a disability, people who have found themselves unemployed, with disability issues that mean that they cannot work, either temporarily or permanently. We have advocated strongly for the indexation of energy concessions—members who were here last term will remember my taking that issue
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