NSW floods crisis: Last straw for many in regions of despair

The floods in NSW could be the ‘straw that breaks the camel’s back’ for regional businesses and tourism operators.

Tourism and Transport Forum chief executive Margy Osmond says the latest flood could be the last straw for some businesses. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Christian Gilles

The floods in NSW could be the “straw that breaks the camel’s back” for regional businesses and tourism operators who were relying on school holidays to recoup losses from previous disasters and Covid lockdowns.

Regional tourism across the state was worth more than $14bn in domestic spend alone in 2019, but the four floods experienced across the past 18 months coupled with bushfires and a global pandemic have resulted in millions of dollars pouring out the doors of local businesses.

For the Shoalhaven region alone, which has faced each of these disasters, tourism is worth $1bn a year to the community.

Its mayor, Amanda Findley, said businesses that had bookings for the school holidays were getting cancellations and she expected some would close either temporarily or permanently.

“Because we had such soaked catchments (from the last floods), we saw the rise of floodwater much faster than any other episode this year,” she said. “That’s after the summer of 2019 and that destruction for Shoalhaven because of the fires, and then early 2020 we had a flood …. then we went into Covid lockdown one, then we had another flood and then we went into Covid lockdown two. Now we’ve had two major flooding events ­already in 2022.

“The impact across the whole of year is there will be millions (of dollars) lost across a number of businesses.”

Quest Apartment Hotels managing director David Mansfield said he was seeing cancellations in properties in Nowra, Wollongong and other coastal getaways.

“They (those regions) are doing it tough,” he said. “These floods just raise the anxiety level in a very fatigued, small business owner community … who are just not sure what tomorrow will bring.”

However, he said he was seeing bookings redirected to areas that were not being affected by the floods, with accommodation in places like Orange, Goulburn, Liver­pool and Maitland “doing relatively well”.

Tourism and Transport Forum chief executive Margy Osmond said the latest flood could be the last straw for some businesses.

“This could be the straw that breaks the camel’s back for a range of businesses, particularly for outdoor experiences, and may also be the case for north coast and regional NSW tourism businesses that have had a couple of floods now on top of Covid,” she said.

To ensure affected regions could recover by the next school holidays, Ms Osmond said the clean-up needed to be expedited.

“Not only is this a problem right now, but it’s going to be a problem over the next … number of months as those infrastructure pieces are repaired,” she said.

“In terms of the future of those communities, the tourism access lines … all will need major and very swift attention to ensure those regions can recover in the September and Christmas holidays. ”

Anthony Albanese said Australian Defence Force personnel had already been made available to help not only with rescues but with immediate recovery.

“We have made 250 ADF personnel available, 100 of them on the ground at the moment, 100 on standby and 50 there to support clean-up in areas once that commences,” the Prime Minister said in Perth on Tuesday.

He said NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet had welcomed the ­ “urgent action” taken by the federal government in the form of hardship grants, money for structural repair and low-interest loans.