Page 2564 - Week 09 - Thursday, 16 September 2021
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Tuesday, 14 September was going to be the day that this government would let Canberrans known what the plan was—the roadmap, the pathway forward—as we deal with this virus. On Tuesday, 14 September what we got was a loss of hope, a loss of confidence and a loss of trust that this government has a plan, a roadmap, a pathway out of this lockdown. After Tuesday’s announcement, businesses are no clearer on what their short-, medium- and long-term future looks like. After Tuesday, the thousands of businesses that have already been holding on for five weeks with no income are still no closer to receiving that critically needed support.
In the Chief Minister’s statement, he said that as at yesterday, 7,558 applications for business support had been received and that 3,471 had been assessed, with 1,325 approved. That is 1,325 out of 7,558 applications—17.5 per cent of applications received—have been approved, leaving a staggering over 80 per cent of businesses without the critically necessary support, leaving them crippled and in the dark about when or if they are going to ever receive the support that they desperately need.
One silver lining in this figure is that it is an improvement on the woefully inadequate figure we saw in the first two weeks of the scheme opening up, where only 400 applications had been approved out of some 6,000 applications—a staggering 6.7 per cent of businesses had received the critical lifeline that they needed. And if that was not bad enough, this is the figure that floored me this morning: out of the 7,558 applications, the Chief Minister says that 3,471 have been assessed but only 1,325 have been approved. That means that 38 per cent of the applications that have been assessed—not 38 per cent of those who have applied—have been approved. This leaves a startling 62 per cent of applications that have either been rejected or stalled because, presumably, the businesses have been asked for more information.
The Chief Minister has put the blame on businesses—when he is not putting the blame on the federal government—for these unacceptable delays. He accuses businesses of being frauds, of not being able to submit a simple application or to provide relevant information. During desperate times like this, if more than 60 per cent of businesses that have applied are being asked to provide more information or are being turned away, then there is something wrong with the system. I have heard from countless businesses that, in good faith, they have submitted their applications—some within the first few hours of the scheme opening—only to be asked weeks later for more information that they were never asked for in the first place, information that was not part of the original guidelines for the application, pushing them to the back of the queue again.
Our businesses needed support from the moment we were plunged into a lockdown. Our businesses needed support from the moment the support package was announced. Our businesses needed support from the moment they submitted their application. Our businesses needed support from the moment the lockdown was extended, with no meaningful lifting of restrictions for business operations. This is a significant failure on the part of this government. Our business community is suffering and will continue to suffer if this is not addressed urgently.
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