Disasters and Building Resilience

The Challenge

The community sector plays a critical role in managing the human impacts of disaster and fostering essential social cohesion, but is inconsistently included in formal disaster planning.
Responding to the impacts of climate change requires a sustained approach, but current funding relies on short-term programs that undermine long-term efforts to build community resilience.

Targeted investment in social infrastructure:

$6.6M for Spontaneous Volunteer Support grants program, funding councils, non-government-organisations and community groups to prepare for future natural disasters.
$2.4M for the Disaster Response Legal Service
$20M to continue to deliver social housing across flood impacted locations in Northern NSW

Extensive investment in physical infrastructure, including:

$3.3B to repair roads damaged in major flood events, including Lismore, Armidale and Tweed Shires
$525M for Resilient Homes – Northern Rivers and Central West
$282.7M for the regional Roads and Transport Recovery Package – local and state transport infrastructure resiliency works
$159.3M Infrastructure Betterment Fund to improve infrastructure resilience

NCOSS welcomes the additional funding for spontaneous volunteers, legal advice and continued restoration of homes and infrastructure after disasters. However, this pales in comparison to the investment in physical infrastructure.
The Government must do more to meet the disproportionate impacts of disasters and climate change on the most vulnerable members of society. This includes strengthening NSW’s overall disaster capability by leveraging existing social service infrastructure.
For example, investment in existing and new local community resilience hubs that build capability, inform local planning and connect to local governments and emergency agencies.