Page 2630 - Week 09 - Thursday, 16 September 2021
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outbreak in Canberra. When we went into lockdown, the ACT government began by meeting with small business peak bodies every day and has since been meeting tri-weekly, to discuss the impacts of the lockdown on their members and discuss solutions that complement our public health goals.
The minister has been consistently meeting with the Hotels Association, Canberra Business Chamber, Canberra Women in Business, the Canberra Region Tourism Forum, the Australian Retailers Association and the National Retail Association, and has assured me she will continue to do so. These tri-weekly meetings are on top of the already existing already formalised advisory committees the ACT government has to advise on business and economic growth.
Last year, the Chief Minister appointed the Canberra Economic Recovery Advisory Group, who are charged with the responsibility of advising on the whole-of-government strategy to ensure that Canberra recovers from the serious economic impact of this public health crisis. This advisory group has economists, industry representatives, community sector partners, unions and small business owners, all to provide advice to the ACT government on how we can continue to protect and create local jobs. This work is occurring alongside the ACT Better Regulation Taskforce, another formalised body, representing the private sector by advising the government on the needs of business as we recover from the pandemic.
The government has also reinstated the COVID-19 Local Business Commissioner, the former alternative Chief Minister and Liberal Party leader Brendan Smyth. He is charged with providing personalised support through his office to individual small business owners. The support he has been able to provide has been substantially increased by this government and will continue to be agile, given the unfolding situation. I encourage any small business person who is struggling at the moment to reach out to Mr Smyth’s office for advice and for support. It is ironic that the Canberra Liberals try to argue that the government is not doing anything to support small business when the government has in fact appointed one of their former leaders into a high-profile position to provide this support.
The ACT government heard that businesses were struggling with click-and-collect restrictions and they responded adequately, allowing more businesses to find ways to operate, with more staff on premises with click and collection and deliveries available to any business who could operate in a COVID-safe way. We will continue to make these judgements, balancing public health goals with keeping people in work and our community strong.
The ACT government knows small businesses are struggling financially and, to its credit, moved quickly to create a range of financial supports to keep them afloat within days of this outbreak. The significant economic support the ACT government has put in place to small business includes but is not limited to: COVID-19 business support one-off grants of $20,000 for eligible employing businesses and $7,500 for eligible non-employing businesses; further one-off grants for businesses in the tourism, accommodation provider, arts, events and hospitality industries; bringing back HOMEFRONT to support local artists with grants of up to $10,000; a COVID-19 small business hardship scheme providing up to $10,000 in credits for
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