ON THE face of it, Agriculture Minister Barnaby Joyce’s flagging of a stimulus package to boost employment in drought-affected areas is a commendable and legitimate one.
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Farmer groups and some councils have already indicated they support something like it – however, there are some big buts about wholesale support for the idea.
Things might not just be crook in Tallarook, they’re crook right through a huge stretch of NSW and Queensland where drought is into its third year, around places like Walgett for example.
Farmers say they’re not whinging, but it is crook in the bush.
The Coalition government has taken some big hits from a primary industry reeling from the drought, largely on the back of criticism that the federal government has not done enough with drought strategies, and it’s had a very long lead time on putting together a drought assistance package at all.
Unforgiving eligibility criteria and red tape have hampered any real action, according to many.
Farm groups sat down with the minister last week to discuss what they saw as the urgent need to better target current assistance measures and expand support to local communities.
Some farmers face a fourth season of drought – and without income.
An injection of funds to drought-affected towns would aim to boost their lagging economies, not just farmers.
But while local economies need to be in control of any such stimulus, local government too doesn’t need to be unnecessarily burdened with a new responsibility for which it is not prepared nor able to do in practical terms.
The government has local employment firms which do those jobs – finding work for the jobless or the needy, or the out-of-sorts – and with the expertise and experience to do it well.
Local councils aren’t job search specialists.
While Mr Joyce might want them to find “shovel-ready” projects that can take a boost in funding, the onus of actually deciding which farmers take up drought jobs needs to remain outside the local government ambit.
Apart from the risk of more cost-shifting onto local government, it will, in many communities, be a subject for debate and dissension over who gets a helping hand and who doesn’t.
And drought-hit areas also need to have local input into that domino effect of the myriad of contractors who are also hurting and getting no work.