Anne Ruston
The days of federally funded compensation packages for former forestry workers appear to be over, according to the minister responsible. Source: ABC News
Millions of dollars in state and Commonwealth funding has been provided to Tasmanians caught up in the collapse of forestry giant Gunns, including money for retraining, leaving the industry and financial transition support.
Earlier this year an additional $1 million compensation fund was announced, using money left over from a package introduced by the former federal government.
The new Assistant Agriculture Minister, South Australian Senator Anne Ruston, said it was likely to be the last.
“Because obviously with an industry that is growing and all the positive things are happening around the industry, we are now in a position where the industry is going to be profitable into the future,” she said.
She acknowledged the forestry industry was hit particularly hard in Tasmania, but urged former workers to look to the future.
“We need to move forward and work out what we are going to do to make the industry as profitable as it possibly can be and a profitable industry doesn’t need grants,” she said.
Greens senator Nick Mckim who has previously claimed schemes had been rorted, now wants the Federal Government to help workers transition out of the industry.
“You do need to see managed transition packages that actually assist people to re-skill themselves, start up businesses in other sectors of the economy,” he said.
“We do need to think about how to look after people who will need to exit that industry.”
Senator McKim said another compensation package was needed, but must be more strictly enforced than previous packages.
“The simple fact is that the exit packages that have been put in place in recent times have been rorted and gamed and they have not actually delivered what they were designed to deliver in terms of people exiting from native forests,” he said.
“We need to make sure that they are un-rortable, the problem has been that the implementation of those packages has not been satisfactory.
“We’ve seen a lot of people get a lot of money to exit the native forest sector and then they are coming back in.”
There have been concerns from former contractors that the current $1 million scheme, which is being administered by the Tasmanian Government, will not adequately address industry needs.
Senator Ruston said she had been involved in the process.
“About looking at ways that we can make sure that the final amount of money that has been left in the grants, that hasn’t been expended, the guidelines around eligibility can be loosened a bit,” she said.
