'Wiping out half your pay': Fire-hit small businesses warn of years of hardship
"We need some sort of financial assistance," said Phillip Jackson, owner of the Lakes Main Holiday Park in the Victorian town of Lakes Entrance."Every business in town is suffering, from the service station through to the clothing store — they rely on this period."
Some federal disaster payments are already offered to small employers, with concessional loans and subsidies available under Category B of the Natural Disaster Relief and Recovery Arrangements between Canberra and the states. But a more direct form of help is also being considered at a time when business owners have been forced to shut down.
"Some of them will be hitting the wall," Mr Strong said, adding the government had been "extremely receptive" to calls for more help.Eden takeaway owner Geoff McCabe, who had to evacuate when the fires hit the NSW South Coast town and who still has no power or water at his home, said he was afraid for the future of small businesses like his.
Tracy Innes, whose family owns the Innes Boatshed fish and chip shop in Batemans Bay, said the business expected to be down about $500,000 over the holiday season. "We’re trying to get the message out that a lot of Gippsland is unaffected and safe ... It’s a fantastic experience," Mr Robinson said.Census data shows about three times as many people work in the hotel and accommodation industry on the NSW south coast and in Gippsland than the NSW and Victorian average.
In the Snowy Mountains region, locals worry about a sustained economic downturn after the fire burnt through orchards and forests, with at least five years needed to bring new apple trees to production and more than two decades needed to recover lost timber plantations."This area produces two million tonnes of software fibre a year and we use three million tonnes," said Snowy Valleys Council mayor James Hayes. "We already were in deficit and now we're even further in deficit.
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