Rates bill: Farmers slugged with hefty hike in fire service levies

Farmers are being slugged twice as much to fund the state’s fire services as last year, as the Allan Government prepares to push up costs.

Victorian Minister for Emergency Services Jaclyn Symes must decide whether to hand more CFA territory to Fire Rescue Victoria, which will add to soaring fire levy costs.

Farmers are being slugged twice as much to fund the state’s fire services as last year, as the Allan Government prepares to push up costs by handing more CFA territory to the union-dominated FRV.

Rates notices that began pouring into farmers’ email and post boxes over the past week reveal fire services property levy hikes of between 50 and 130 per cent.

One northern Mallee farming family’s rates notice showed their FSPL had risen from $384 last financial year to $900 for 2024-25, on just one of several blocks they own.

Further south the FSPL bill on one of Carron grain grower Jason Mellings blocks jumped from $627 to $929 in 12 months.

“It’s one of several blocks, so overall it’s going to cost us an extra couple of thousand (dollars),” Mr Mellings said. “All these costs are getting chucked on us – Victoria wide.”

The variable FSPL charge on just one of Macalister Irrigation District dairy farmer Neil Gannon’s blocks has gone from $207 last year to $380, which he said was unsustainable in the wake of a 20 per cent drop in farmgate milk prices.

Most of the increase is due to Treasurer Tim Pallas’ May budget announcement that the FSPL on primary producers would rise from 16.9c per $1000 of a property’s capital improved value in 2023-24 to 28.7c/$1000 of CIV for 2024-25.

But it is only now that farmers are starting to realise the full impact of the levy hike, in combination with rising property values across many rural shires.

Meanwhile Emergency Services Minister Jaclyn Symes is considering the

the recommendations of Victoria’s Fire District Review Panel’s final report, which has previously called for FRV to take over 13 CFA zones around Eaglehawk, Kangaroo Flats, Edithvale, Berwick, Carrum Downs, Hampton Park, Narre Warren, Epping, Werribee, Wyndham Vale, Ballarat, Sebastopol and Wendouree.

Ms Symes office said “no decisions have been made on the fire district boundaries and we will respond to the review in due course”.

Any move to expand FRV’s territory is set to add even more to the costs of running the service, which incurs expenses of close to $1.2 billion and has repeatedly recorded deficits of $132m in 2021-22 and $119m in 2022-23.

Rutherglen grain grower and CFA volunteer Ashley Fraser said the government could not just keep extending FRV’s territory and increasing the cost for farmers, who were volunteer firefighters.

“It’s not the answer”, Mr Fraser said. “Every other business has to cut costs, but the government just sticks it into farmers and extracts more money from us.”

Victorians are already paying more than any other state to run the fire services.

The Productivity Commission’s latest analysis shows Victorians pay $323 per capita to fund the state’s fire services, compared to $201 per head in NSW, $172/hd in Queensland and $147/hd in South Australia.

CFA Chief Officer Jason Heffernan has already rejected FRV taking over the 13 CFA zones, lodging a submission with the District Review Panel in March, in which he said “the existing arrangements continue to be appropriate”.

CFA chief officer Jason Heffernan is battling to stop FRV taking over even more territory, which is set to push up fire services property levies as more career firefighters take over from volunteers.

The submission highlighted that “CFA provides significant value to the community which would be lost if boundary changes are implemented without due consideration”.

Chief Heffernan said his assessment was underpinned by “the most recent incident and performance data, and a consideration of the broad range of factors that contribute to effective risk mitigation”.

The United Firefighters Union has long campaigned for FRV to take over more CFA territory, warning regional Victorians they were not protected by “professional firefighters”.

Yet FRV has struggled to meet key performance targets since it was formed on July 1, 2020 through the merger of the MFB with 38 CFA stations.

In his latest report Victoria’s Fire Services Implementation Monitor concluded “for the fourteenth consecutive quarter, FRV did not meet its target” of responding to 90 per cent of structure fires within 7.7 minutes.

Under the FRV Act, the Minister must not only consider the panel’s recommendations, but the capacity of fire service agencies to perform their responsibilities, as well as its budget and resource implications.