The Rockliff Liberal Government is committed to supporting Tasmanian households and businesses with the cost of electricity and cost-of-living pressures and today we are expanding our targeted support package.
”Our strong financial management has allowed the Revised Estimates Report to include a provision of $33 million towards the National Energy Bill Relief program, which is currently being negotiated with the Australian Government. This package will provide further targeted support for those households and small businesses that need it the most,” Minister Barnett said.
”However, we also know that there are larger commercial and industrial businesses, that are being hard hit coming off non-regulated contracts, and these businesses are not within the proposed scope of the national relief package.
”That’s why the Rockliff Liberal Government will be implementing our own state-based program to support this group of Tasmanian businesses through hardship payments of up to $20,000.
Today I met with Tasmanian whisky distillers Damian and Madeleine Mackey, of Hunter Island Whisky at their New Town distillery. Damian said their business would benefit from any assistance with their electricity bills as an energy-intensive business.
“This week we officially launched our new product Hunter Island Whisky but it’s not well known that there are significant costs in producing every barrel and bottle, particularly energy bills”, said Mr Mackey
While Tasmania has the most generous electricity concessions of any State at $44.9 million in 2022-23, we have always said that we were prepared to do more to help Tasmanian households and businesses.
For larger Tasmanian commercial and industrial businesses to be eligible for the hardship payment, they will need to have re-contracted between April 2022 and 28 February 2023.
These new initiatives will build on our Winter Bill Buster discount of $180 provided last year to more than 94,000 eligible concession customers, in addition to our $50 million Energy Saver Loan schemes covering households and small businesses and up to $2.7 million in hardship support for Aurora customers.
Our $50 million ESLS for small businesses and households has been an outstanding success so far with 655 applications as at January 23 with 566 loans approved worth $4.8 million value, 193 installations completed and 61 vendors approved to supply the products and services.
As we head into autumn and winter I would encourage all Tasmanians, and especially small businesses, to consider this loan scheme as part of their future energy plan.
We know that cost of living pressures are a major concern for Tasmanians so helping businesses and households be more energy efficient is a great long-term solution to reducing electricity bills.
And, we announced just before Christmas a further $50 million loan scheme for larger commercial and industrial electricity users, which is currently being designed in consultation with industry.
The 2022-23 Budget provided more than $300 million in concessions to help vulnerable Tasmanians with day-to-day living expenses including $44.9 million in electricity concessions, $19.2 million in council rate remissions and $9.4 million in water and sewerage concessions.
By building a strong economy the Rockliff Liberal Government will continue to prioritise Tasmanian households and businesses with targeted energy and cost-of-living support.
We will continue to work with the Australian Government to finalise the details of the National Energy Relief Package, ensuring it benefits as many Tasmanians as possible.
