Local councils and PM meet today
June 25, 2009
Mayors and Shire Presidents from Australia's 565 councils will today meet with the Prime Minister, Cabinet Ministers and other Members of Parliament as part of the second meeting of the Australian Council of Local Government (ACLG).
Today's meeting builds on last November's historic first meeting and will further strengthen the growing ties between Australia’s national and local governments.
The meeting follows the National General Assembly of Local Government (NGA) which has been held in Canberra over the previous three days. A Communiqués summarising the positions reached at the NGA was unanimously adopted by the more than 650 delegates.
The president of the Australian Local Government Association (ALGA), Cr Geoff Lake, will present the Communiqués to the Prime Minister at the beginning of the ACLG meeting today.
The Communiqués calls for:
- inclusion of local government in the Australian Constitution;
- more ambitious targets for the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme;
- all levels of government to work together to develop and improve climate change mitigation and adaptation strategies;
- national action to provide water supply certainty throughout Australia utilising ecologically sustainable measures;
- entrenching the successful Community Infrastructure Program payments under the stimulus packages as an ongoing annual program;
- an increase to the base funding for Financial Assistance Grants paid by the Australian Government to local government each year for recurrent expenditure; and
- a permanent framework to address cost-shifting between the levels of government.
The ACLG meeting is being held at Parliament House between 8.30am and 1.00pm. The Communiqués is available at http://www.alga.asn.au/newsroom/communiques/22.nga/
- Contact
- Cr Geoff Lake, ALGA President 0411 645 281
- Amanda Lynch, Director, Public Affairs - 0419 123 862 / 02 6122 9434
