Dr WOODRUFF (Franklin - Leader of the Greens) - Mr Deputy Speaker, I understand the Government is preparing an amendment for this. I think that is in train. I am not sure whether you have settled on what that is going to be, but -
Mr Ferguson - No, we are still working on it.
Dr WOODRUFF - Still working on it?
Mr Ferguson - Yes.
Dr WOODRUFF - I can say that the Greens support this motion as it is at the moment, that the House orders the Premier to table all the advice, financial modelling and risk analysis received by the Department of Treasury and Finance around the options for the Tasmanian Fire and Emergency Service funding by 6 p.m. tomorrow, including the dates the advice was requested and received.
The issues of properly funding Fire Service work are desperately in need of reform and there is no doubt that the nearly 50-year-old system in place, a levy, is not fit for purpose. I do not think there is disagreement across the Chamber that we need extensive reform and there has been a large number of reviews that show that.
The current legislation that governs this was developed 43 years ago. More than three-quarters of the State Fire Commission's revenue comes from three sources: the Fire Service contribution, which is a property based fee collected by local councils through rates; the fee for owners of properties based on a formula that takes into account a range of factors, including the assessed value of the property; and the type of fire brigade in the area. It can also vary based on how much funding the commission accesses from other sources. If the funding they receive elsewhere goes up then the amount collected under the Fire Service contribution will go down and vice versa. A typical charge for a property owner of a mid range residential property could be in the order of $50 to $300 per year. We have come to understand from the reviews that have been undertaken that that is definitely going to change for some property owners and it could be a substantial increase.
The Fire Service contribution at the moment accounts for around 40 per cent of the State Fire Commission's total revenue. The other component is from the motor vehicle fire levy that has been applied to all registered vehicles. Two years ago that rate was $19 per vehicle and that accounts for about 10 per cent of the SFC's total revenue. Then there is the insurance fire levy which is paid to the commission by insurance providers and that is set at 28 per cent of the premiums collected by insurance companies. Some people have argued that is a levy that deters people from purchasing insurance because of the higher cost that goes on their premium. However, we do not have solid information on that and there is no strong evidence for that position. It may well be the case. I am not agreeing or disagreeing; I am just reporting it as accounts that have been provided.
The insurance levy accounts for about 25 per cent of the commission's total revenue. The State Fire Commission also gets some money from the Australian Government from time to time for assisting with the protection of Commonwealth lands, and then there are some program-specific and operational-specific funding that comes also from time to time from the state Government.
There is no doubt that there has been extensive work done in this area. There was a parliamentary review inquiry in 2016, the issues paper from 2018, the review of the act by Mike Blake in 2020, the options paper produced by Treasury in 2020 21, and the Stevens report that looked at the consultation on the Blake review and the options paper.
There has been a conversation in the Tasmanian community for many years, the whole time I have been a member of parliament, about reform to the Fire Service Act and, within that, the levy. It is the funding mechanism that will be made available to the new Tasmanian Fire and Emergency Service after a bill to transition the State Fire Commission into the new TFES arrangements and the legislation which is being proposed. The levy on Tasmanians is what is of concern to many people. There have been a number of options papers, so we have landed with the latest consultation process around two options, the A and B option, or option 1 and option 2.
The situation really is that it was talked about at a fairly academic level, I suppose, with people who are fire levy wonks and a very small number of people, maybe in LGAT and maybe a few people in the union, and it was all very difficult to get any kind of traction in the community and conversation about it, but once we were confronted with the possibility of numbers and choices between two different options, that really elevated community conversation, and so it should. The first option is a single rate to set across the state. The second option is a two-tiered rate between rural and urban areas, depending on where you live. Both options have different amounts that have been proposed for different zone land class areas.
The Greens come at this from the point of view of the need to have a well-resourced fire and emergency services sector. That is our starting point. Climate heating is rapidly unfolding in front of us, so we have to make sure that the people standing on the front line are supported, that they have uniforms, trucks, up to date technology, people in the administrative areas who are providing them with the support they need, the technical back up, and that their resources are ring fenced, they have all the workplace conditions that are needed to support them in what is for most of those people a voluntary contribution. They should not be out of pocket for things like fuel and food when they are working. They need support, but they do not need to be paid on an hourly rate. That would be a fundamental shift and that is not what is being proposed. What is being proposed is the mechanism to make sure that the people in the communities and urban areas get paid and that there are enough people there and enough resources to support them to do the job they need.
Let us be frank, we do not actually know how much we are going to need to fight the fires and emergency service response to events in the future, but we can have a good guess that will be more than we are spending today. There is no doubt about that. We will spend more and more on responding to extreme events and the cost of cleaning up and rebuilding infrastructure will also increase along with that. That is not something the Government is talking about or legislating in this bill. This is about the raising of money to support TFES volunteers and career firefighters.
Recognising that the current arrangements are severely outdated, that there has been a large body of work supporting change and there is obviously a strong argument for reform, we came to this consultation waiting to see what people in Tasmania thought about what was on offer. I have to say that what is happening here today has been writ large by the way the Government has approached this consultation, because it is the same way they have approached consultation in other areas, so it is not surprising that the proverbial is hitting the fan at this point because the Liberals in Government are incapable of having a conversation with Tasmanians about the things that are difficult and complex. They either sit in DPAC or the agencies, they cook something up and then present it as though it is a consultation process. However, they are determined to go down the path they have set themselves. They are almost unswayable on the issues that people care about.
When it comes to people paying money each year, it is not surprising that the Liberals have not had a proper conversation about the trade-offs and how it is going to affect communities. I am not surprised to hear Michael Bailey from the TCCI talking about the failed consultation process. If Michael Bailey is complaining about the failed consultation process it shows how bad it is. Usually the TTCI and the Property Council get first-class treatment from the Liberals. It is only the environment movement, the Aboriginal community that get nothing.
No one has had consultation with the conservation movement about the expression of interest process because they do not want to hear the answer. The comprehensive roar from Tasmanians is that privatising wilderness stinks and there is no way they are going to put up with it. They can do what they like but people will keep making sure that those things do not get privatised. We will go to court. We will stand in front of bulldozers. We will do what it takes. The Liberals are refusing to listen. That is not surprising; we are used to it.
It is the same thing with planning. If it is a planning thing that the Liberals do not like then Mr Ferguson, the Planning minister, will make a grandiose statement. To the Clarence community he said, 'Hold on, you cannot do that, you cannot demand to have your land back in Bellerive, we want to keep this Chinese petrochemical company, we want to give them a lifeline to the future. We are not going to let you, we will see if we can do something about that'. He tried and failed because the whole Clarence community is on board with their council wanting the land back and wanting to get some action in Bellerive. That is the sort of approach the Liberals in Government have taken.
The Aboriginal Lands Act is an absolute disaster of controversy in the community. It is so bad that after the minister had committed to bringing it on this year, he has correctly withheld it. He had no choice but to do that because people were rightly outraged at things popping into legislation that they had not had a conversation about. Things that had not been in previous consultation drafts just appeared in the legislation.
Now we have another minister fix: an attempt to go into the Aboriginal Lands Act and deal with an electoral roll issue. This is not something that minister Jaensch has talked to the Aboriginal community about. He is proposing to go off with his own legislative pitch without having worked it through the community.
This is the same issue for the Liberals playing out on the fire levy. We support understanding on what basis they have come up with the numbers in the options paper. Why did they choose the percentage rates for each of the land classes? Why did they choose 1 per cent for residential in one area and 1.2 per cent and 0.6 per cent in the other category. I can think of reasons for that, but is it fair to Tasmanians who will be having to put their hand in their pockets in a cost of living crisis? An extra $50 to $300 is a significant amount of money to pay. We want a system that is fair and equitable. We do not expect everyone to pay the same. That is not fair and equitable. It is not fair and equitable that everyone should pay the same because some businesses, some properties, demand more resources from the fire and emergency services than others. An industrial area is a greater fire and hazard risk than a small single property in a rural zone. People who have $3 million properties should pay more than people who have $500 000 properties or $300 000 properties.
We do not have a problem with progressive taxing. The Greens do not have a problem with taxing full stop, as long as it is equitable, as long as it has a purpose which is public interest and social good, and as long as it is, in this instance, being hypothecated, directed, ring-fenced wholly into the work of fire and emergency services. One of the concerns that the TFS had was that some of the money might end up, if the Police Commissioner was in the position of secretary above the Fire Commissioner, with the police.
These are critical things to get fixed in the bill. Today is about what information the Government used to bring this consultation paper to Tasmanians, and on what basis did it make the decision for the rates that it is proposing. We support the need for all the financial modelling and the risk analysis.
I can see the minister has an amendment. Maybe the minister could pass it to me while I am on my feet and I will consider it. I will listen to the minister's comments about the amendment he is proposing when he gets up to speak. The Greens will support more public transparency on this matter. The Government should be accountable for the decisions it makes. We think it has got into the habit of woeful consultation. This one has come back to bite them in a public way. There have been many others. It may be too late for them to learn but never too late to give it a go.
You are better off having the conversation with the community first before you go to something that is going to concern people who are in pretty tough financial situations, as many Tasmanians are.
