Murray Watt (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you, Senator Davey. I presume the program you're talking about is the Regional Small Business Support Program pilot, which was a form of financial counselling. I think it was originally offered after the bushfires but it has been going for a couple of years. As I indicated to you at estimates, that was a matter that we were giving consideration to, because the former government, despite saying that they thought this was a really important program, only decided to put money in the budget through to 31 December this year. I don't quite understand why the former government, that you were part of, decided to have a funding cliff for this service, given that you thought it was so important. Be that as it may, again, that's something that we've inherited.

I recently approved an extension of that service to 31 March 2023, so that these services had funding certainty to carry them through the high-risk weather season. I'm not sure, Senator Davey, whether you are aware but the former government, of which you were a part, actually commissioned a review of this service which found that rather than the service primarily being used by businesses who were suffering from the impact of natural disasters, in fact it was mainly being used to deal with issues arising from COVID-19 and the impact on businesses from that, and from other matters as well, and certainly not the kind of floods that we're seeing at the moment. But we decided, regardless of the findings of the review, that it was important to give those services certainty and it was important to give their clients certainty and that's why we extended it until 31 March next year, to carry them through this disaster season. Those services that have funding remaining at that point in time will be able to continue it beyond 31 March to 30 June next year. In the meantime, we are giving thought to what other services and funding could be provided to provide the kind of financial counselling that you're talking about. But it would've really helped if the funding didn't cut out on 31 December in the first place.