Shellharbour Council wants the waste levy fee scrapped. Photo: @photability Envato.
Shellharbour councillors are calling on the NSW Government to scrap the waste levy on storm debris, arguing it’s an unfair financial burden on communities while they’re cleaning up after natural disasters.
Councillor Kellie Marsh, who introduced the motion at the August Shellharbour City Council meeting, said the current system burdened all NSW councils and residents at their most vulnerable time.
“We all know firsthand the impacts that severe weather has had on our community in the recent months – the flooding, the wind damage, fallen trees, debris and destruction across public and private land,” Cr Marsh said.
“What’s even more frustrating is that in the aftermath of these events, councils and communities are often still charged the waste levy – a tax that’s applied even when we’re cleaning up after natural disasters.”
Cr Marsh said with adverse weather events happening too often in the Illawarra, the motion allowed the fee to be waived “proactively, or as a minimum, promptly, not reactively, often many days after the event or not at all”.
The motion specifically calls on the council to write to the NSW Government to proactively waive the waste levy for storm and flood-related waste as soon as adverse weather occurs, to better support communities with real-time clean-up, rather than requiring lengthy application processes that delay clean-up efforts.
Cr Marsh hoped this would remove ambiguity after major weather events, noting the levy was a waste tax that raised revenue for the State Government without actually providing the public with any service.
Her second point was for the fee to also be waived for landfill cover material used for this type of storm debris.
Currently, councils and contractors must pay the levy even on landfill cover materials used to safely manage storm debris, adding unnecessary costs during emergency response operations.
“This is not about avoiding our environmental responsibilities at all,” Cr Marsh said.
“It’s about an unfair financial burden placed on local government and residents at the worst possible time, when we all need help.”
She said the motion asked the government to implement the waiver policy as a standing protocol so communities like Shellharbour weren’t “left in limbo after every storm, trying to clean up while being taxed for doing so”.
“It’s time the waste levy system recognised the difference between everyday waste and disaster recovery,” Cr Marsh said.
Cr John Davey successfully amended the motion to also take the proposal to the Local Government NSW conference in November, seeking statewide support from all councils.
This part of the motion is subject to validation by council staff that it meets the Local Government NSW criteria. It will come back to the next council meeting to be endorsed before proceeding to the state conference, where it will seek backing from councils across NSW.
“I think that’ll give greater impetus to this,” Cr Davey said, noting it would be “good to see a potential cost transfer going the other way”.
Cr Rob Petreski said he was all for better and more accessible waste services, but added that adverse weather events couldn’t be open to a council’s subjectivity, but had to have an objective measure.
Cr Petreski said when there was a declaration of a natural disaster, emergency services provisions kicked in, and part of that was also the waste removal and clean-up.
“Clean-ups usually take place after the event, and the full and true extent of the damage cannot be known beforehand,” he said.
“To a point, I understand to expedite this would be fantastic, and to get the response to be as soon as possible, of course, but at the end of the day, somebody has to sit there and assess at what point do you enact these provisions, and at what point do you say they do not meet the threshold.
“Of course, we can advocate for it, and we will, and I hope that the LG New South Wales conference also advocates for it, because I think that would add further weight to it.”
Only Cr Lou Stefanovski voted against the motion.
