Cautious flood buyback scheme approval

Flood-weary residents of northern NSW have cautiously welcomed an $800m buyback scheme for homes in areas where flooding ‘would pose a catastrophic risk to life’.

A woman walks her dog on a flooded road in Lismore in March. Picture: Getty Images

Flood-weary residents of northern NSW have cautiously welcomed an $800m buyback scheme for homes in areas where flooding “would pose a catastrophic risk to life”, but expect demand for aid will far exceed the funding available.

About 2000 homeowners in the NSW Northern Rivers region will be eligible to have their homes raised, repaired or voluntarily bought back under a scheme jointly funded by the federal and NSW governments.

The package covers homeowners in vulnerable areas of Ballina, Byron, Clarence Valley, Kyogle, Lismore, Richmond Valley and Tweed, but few details of the plan have been released.

The February-March floods damaged more than 10,000 homes in the Northern Rivers and left 4000 uninhabitable.

Only 60 per cent of houses in the flood-prone areas of Lismore are above the one-in-100-year flood level, with this year’s floods peaking 2m higher than that.

The Northern Rivers Resilient Homes Fund package will provide financial aid of up to $100,000 to raise houses above the flood level or up to $50,000 to retrofit homes using better building standards.

The NSW government will provide $100m to acquire land and open up new flood safe locations for future development, with the Northern Rivers Reconstruction Corporation conducting an expression of interest process to identify suitable parcels of land. Eligible homeowners will be offered help based on expert property assessments; flood-impact severity data, safety risks, and potential future flood levels.

Anthony Albanese said by retrofitting homes to make them more flood-resilient, and moving those at most risk away from danger, communities could be safer during future flood events.

“We know this repeated, relentless flooding can be emot-ionally and financially draining and we want communities to know we will be there to support them now, and as they recover,” the Prime Minister said.

NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet said he had seen first-hand the devastation extreme flooding caused across the Northern Rivers. “We are stepping up to provide options for residents to move out of harm’s way and protect themselves and their families, but we cannot continue to build back as we have in the past,” he said.

Lismore resident Isaac Campbell, whose home was completely gutted by the February flood, said he was dubious about the scheme because he was still living in a caravan nine months after the disaster and had experienced significant difficulty with accessing grants.

“I’ll believe it when I see it,” he said. “It depends on if they are willing to pay the property value or just the land, and then the issue is, where do you go? “Everywhere else is expensive to rent and too expensive to buy.”

Mechanic Steve Shepherd, who was planning his retirement before his South Lismore home was destroyed by floodwaters in March, said any voluntary purchase scheme or program to raise his house would be welcomed. “I’m still in the process of repairing the property, and like most people in Lismore, we didn’t have any home or contents insurance, so it completely changed mine and my wife’s plans for the future,” the 63-year-old said.