Since we established Independents for Canberra at the start of this year, our ambition has been to develop locally-led, evidence-based policy commitments designed to help solve the Territory’s most pressing challenges.

Recognising that all people and organisations across our city and our region have important perspectives to share, we have prioritised genuine consultation and collaboration with community members, stakeholders and leading experts to inform the development of our policies. 

Today we are pleased to announce Independents for Canberra’s first shared policy commitments which are designed to support the most vulnerable members of our community. Specifically, Independents for Canberra commits to:

• Closing the 30 percent community sector funding gap that has emerged since 2010. 

• Tying future community sector funding to population growth plus inflation.

• Funding full-time roles for the Chair and Deputy Chair of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Elected Body to advocate for Indigenous people.

• Funding two full-time roles for Advocacy for Inclusion to advocate for people with disability.

These commitments are important because our community is experiencing unprecedented levels of unmet need. We know that an estimated 40,000 people in the Territory are living below the poverty line, including 9,000 children. Too often we are failing those who need our help the most, including Indigenous people and people with disability. 

Tackling these challenges must start with increased support for our critical service providers. Since 2010, a devastating gap has emerged in funding for our community sector. For more than a decade, funding has remained almost static, failing to keep pace with the ACT's 30 percent population growth during the same period. As a consequence, we have seen some service providers being forced to cut back on services in recent months.

Today, only four percent of our community organisations report they are able to meet current levels of demand. Less than 10 percent believe their funding actually covers the full cost of service delivery. We have a responsibility to ensure these organisations can meet increasing levels and complexity of need.

Something all our candidates agree on is that our nation’s capital should be a place where no one gets forgotten or left behind. 

You can learn more about our policy platform here.

We welcome your feedback on our first shared commitments and the policy scaffolding that you can find on our website, with more detail to be released in future announcements. There is so much more work to do and we look forward to sharing further commitments with you throughout the month of August.

You will see us posting about our commitments on social media this week @INDforCBR on Facebook, Instagram and X, and we would greatly appreciate your assistance in sharing these posts far and wide!

To provide feedback or request a meeting, you can write to me at [email protected]. 

Thank you for your support of the independent movement. 

It’s time for change!

Tom

Thomas Emerson
Independents for Canberra