The Beagle Editor,
Recently there’s been a couple of the Beagle's supporters make comment about the Eurobodalla Council, the IPART supported rate rise and how the Eurobodalla Shire Council managed to meet the State Government Fit for the Future Criteria. Someone suggesting the council staff were not capable of fudging figures, not that smart or words to that effect being used.
The State Government FFTF criteria it seems didn’t make it a requirement for the Government Agency checking or receiving Rate Rise Applications to make individual checks or if you like audits. Naturally you’d have thought that would have been a requirement of the process. Some staff in the Premiers department at the time were concerned about what was occurring and peoples ability to pay over time. Fair redistribution of tax collections hadn’t been included either in NSW local Councils viability and their residents ability to fully fund their local Councils immediately or in the longer term. Local Councils are not just providing for their residents either. They provide for a range of people in the national population as well as for tourists who also assist the local and national economy’s and use facilities and infrastructures where ever they go. The Eurobodalla economy needs tourists to support local small business and employment and assist with state and national tax collections. It’s reasonable for the State and National Government to participate in Tax redistributions to assist NSW local Councils provide infrastructures that all people need including transport delivery operators eg. Public toilets, rest stops etc.
The NSW State Government's economic advisers had been telling the Government to, in the longer term, require all NSW Local Councils to be self funding organisations or Corporations. The State Government's long term plan or agenda is to eventually abolish grant funding or a fair redistribution of States Tax Collections. The NSW State Government collects Multi Millions of tax $$$ from country NSW and wants to use it all in the metropolitan Sydney area. They are in my opinion supporting or developing a double or multi taxing system in NSW.
They want all NSW Local Councils to unfairly and unreasonably fully fund themselves in the end.
Allan Brown Catalina
