Homeowners begging for the Morrison Government’s long-promised intervention to drive down soaring insurance premiums in Northern Australia have been left stranded by the shallow efforts on a reinsurance pool in last night’s Budget.
Despite promises of a $10 billion reinsurance pool, the Budget papers reveal that the Morrison Government has only allocated $2.4 million to establish a taskforce to begin consultation on the reinsurance pool which will not start until at least 1 July 2022.
The Budget also shows that the reinsurance pool will be designed to be cost-neutral to the Federal Government over time, based on the predicted cost and frequency of cyclone events, but with no detail provided on how this will be achieved.
After being in office for eight long years, the Morrison Government is now asking Northern Australia to wait until after the next election while they come up with a plan, for a plan, to fix the insurance crisis. Residents in the region still do not know how much they will save on their insurance premiums, if at all.
Northern Australia deserves more help to ease the insurance burden, not a taskforce and a plan for a plan.
It is clear from the Budget that the shallow promises on a reinsurance pool are yet another marketing exercise and shameless political fix from a Morrison Government that is more concerned about getting through the next election than actually delivering results for the region.
While details on the reinsurance pool remain scarce, Labor will, as always, work constructively with the Morrison Government to provide a better outcome for the people of Northern Australia.
Labor is also calling for a comprehensive plan that includes mitigation, retrofitting houses and a suite of measures to properly address the problem in a region that is prone to cyclones and natural disasters.
