“The Minister of Finance needs to explain why businesses already badly affected by the City Rail Link (CRL) development are now not entitled to the Covid-19 Resurgence Subsidy” says ACT Leader David Seymour. 

“Businesses that are in the area where the CRL development is taking place have already taken a massive hit to their incomes through no fault of their own.

“Then along came Covid-19. To be eligible for the wage subsidy for Covid-19 they had to prove their incomes were down 30 percent of the previous year.

“It took a bit of work to prove they were down 30 percent on the meagre turnover they’d had on the year before because they’d already been hit so hard by the impacts of the CRL. This took until the last days of the application period – but all were approved.

“Today, MSD has told the CRL affected businesses that they won’t be eligible for the resurgence payment as applications close this week and they can’t apply until their last subsidy has runout.

“These businesses didn’t ask to have the CRL built on their doorstep and they didn’t ask to be shutdown because of Covid-19. Those were decisions by Government, so Government should have a duty of care in return.

“The Government keeps telling us to be ‘be kind’ what about showing some kindness to these businesses by extending the time limit that they can apply for the resurgence subsidy?”

© Scoop Media