Overview
This quick guide provides information about domestic
arrangements at the Commonwealth level to work with state and territory
governments on emergency and disaster management and resilience. It also explains
some basics about Australian involvement in international initiatives where disaster
and emergency management efforts extend beyond Australian borders. Links to
relevant sources are provided throughout, and the end of this quick guide offers
a compilation of links to other key external resources.[1]
Disaster resilience—policy
framework
The National
Disaster Risk Reduction Framework, launched in April 2018, sets out the
domestic basis for reducing disaster risk associated with natural hazards
through domestic policy settings through to 2030. The framework identifies
initial strategic outcomes, over the five-year period 2019–23, to inform
decision-making across various sectors in the areas of:
- investment and spending
- public policy
- development/land use
- legislation and regulation and
- program design and resource allocation.[2]
The initial strategic outcomes are intended to align with
Australia’s commitment to the Sendai Framework for
Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030, endorsed by the United Nations General
Assembly as an international agreement on targets and priorities for action.[3]
Relief and recovery—policy and
legislative arrangements
Each state and territory has in place
legislation dealing with emergencies and disaster response within their own
borders. It is under this legislation that authorised officials—for example, the
Premier, Chief Minister or State Emergency Coordinator—can declare a ‘state of
emergency’ or disaster.[4]
Response coordination and planning for any emergency or disaster within
any jurisdiction falls to the state or territory government. Hence, the
financial burden of disaster recovery and relief falls principally and in the
first instance on state and territory governments. However, arrangements exist
for the Commonwealth to provide both financial and non-financial assistance.
Financial assistance
According to the 2018 National Disaster Risk Reduction
Framework, ‘federal and state government spending on direct recovery from
disasters is already around $2.75 billion per year’; with indirect costs ‘borne
by many sectors across multiple years’.[5]
Economic costs are anticipated to double before 2030, and to significantly
increase over the coming decades.[6]
The Disaster
Recovery Funding Arrangements (DRFA) is the principal mechanism for
Commonwealth financial assistance to state and territory governments; whereas
the Social
Security Act 1991 (Cth) is also relevant to assistance to individuals. Alternatively
or additionally, funding may be provided:
- under Federal Financial Relations payments for specific purposes,
as arranged from time to time (such as the National
Disaster Resilience Program or the National
Partnership on disaster risk reduction)[7]
- in the form of grants payments to local government and
non-government organisations that provide community services (for example,
Financial Assistance Grants accessible to local government councils allow for
those bodies to direct the untied grant funding to local priorities, including
disaster-affected assets)[8]
or
- via tax concessions or exemptions (such as those attached to
grants for primary producers affected in early 2019 by the north and far north
Queensland monsoon trough).[9]
A $3.9 billion Emergency Response Fund will be
established in the 2019–20 financial year.[10]
State and territory governments may seek Commonwealth approval to draw up to
$150 million from this fund in the event that there is a need for
additional financial assistance—beyond what is supported by existing national
disaster response programs for domestic incidents—following a significant and
catastrophic natural disaster.[11]
Disaster Recovery Funding
Arrangements
The DRFA provide a basis for the Commonwealth to enter into
cost-sharing arrangements with state and territory governments where a disaster
presents a significant financial burden. The DRFA is a form of contingent
payment from the Commonwealth, stipulated in the Intergovernmental Agreement on
Federal Financial Relations as follows:
D42 The Commonwealth may provide
financial assistance, usually in the form of partial reimbursement, to the
States and Territories for eligible expenditure incurred in relation to a
defined disaster.
D43 Payments will be made on the terms and conditions
determined in 2011 Natural Disaster Relief and Recovery Arrangements
Determination Terms and Conditions, as amended from time to time by the
Commonwealth.[12]
Up to 75 per cent of state expenditure on natural disasters
can be eligible for reimbursement by the Commonwealth under the DRFA.
Eligibility since November 2018 is contingent on claims meeting current terms
and conditions, including relevant categories of assistance measures,
thresholds, reimbursement rates and triggers. The categories of assistance
measures attract different levels of financial assistance; and disbursement can
be through grants or packages relating to recovery from specific disasters or emergencies.[13]
The DRFA categories are:
Category A
– Emergency assistance for individuals.
Category B
– Emergency assistance for the repair of essential public assets and to support
primary producers and small businesses recover from a disaster event.
Category C
– A community recovery package that is intended to support a holistic approach
to the recovery of regions, communities or sectors severely affected by an
eligible disaster.
Category D – Covers ‘exceptional circumstances’, in the
opinion of the Commonwealth, to alleviate distress or damage.[14]
The DRFA allow for advance payment from the Commonwealth
where the cost of responding to a severe disaster ‘is likely to be greater than
the state can manage in the short-term’.[15]
State and territory governments can reinvest DRFA funding towards to ‘natural
hazard mitigation activities’ where efficiencies are realised from
reconstruction projects.[16]
The assistance measures and funding available under the
DRFA do not bind or limit state and territory government expenditure where
Commonwealth financial assistance is not called upon for mitigation or recovery
efforts.[17]
Individual assistance: Disaster
Recovery Payment and Disaster Recovery Allowance
The Australian Government provides financial assistance to
individuals through the Department of Social Services in the form of:
- the Disaster
Recovery Payment—a one-off payment to eligible Australian residents who are
adversely affected by a major disaster and
- the Disaster
Recovery Allowance—a fortnightly payment for up to 13 weeks for eligible
individuals whose income has been affected by a major disaster.
These individual assistance payments are both contingent on
the responsible minister making a determination that an event is a major
disaster.[18]
Non-financial assistance
The Australian Government collaborates with state and
territory governments on emergency or disaster preparedness, management and
recovery. The Department of Home Affairs holds Commonwealth responsibility for
this role, performed through the Emergency
Management Australia division—Australia’s national disaster management organisation.
Emergency Management
Australia:
Emergency Management Australia’s functions also form part of
governance arrangements and operational capabilities underpinning the
Australian Government’s responsiveness to emergencies that do not relate to
natural hazards, but to national security risks (such as terrorism) that
present significant threats to public safety, public health and/or critical
infrastructure.[22]
Under Part IIIAAA of the Defence Act 1903
(Cth), the ADF may be called upon to assist in the event of ‘domestic violence’
(for example, civil unrest or a terrorist incident).[23]
Recent and upcoming Australian
involvement in international initiatives
Australia will host the 2020 Asian Ministerial Conference
on Disaster Risk Reduction, a biennial regional summit held under the auspices
of the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction.[24] The Ulaanbaatar
Declaration, which was the outcome of the 2018 conference in Mongolia, set
a target to ‘substantially increase the number of countries with national and
local disaster risk reduction strategies’ by the time the next conference is
held in Brisbane in June 2020.[25]
The 2020 conference is ‘expected to produce a political declaration on disaster
risk reduction and an updated regional action plan’.[26]
Delivered primarily through the Department
of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Australia’s aid program provides funding for disaster
risk reduction, resilience and relief efforts through its humanitarian programs.
The Australian Government pledged in its 2017
Foreign Policy White Paper to increase overall funding for
humanitarian programs to $500 million per annum, up from
$433.8 million in 2016–17.[27]
In this context, the Australian Government typically considers that ‘$1
invested in risk reduction can save up to $15 in the aftermath of a disaster’.[28]
Australia is an ASEAN
partner nation and cooperated with the ASEAN Coordinating Centre for
Humanitarian Assistance on disaster management (AHA
Centre) to conduct the 2018 East Asia Summit International Disaster
Assistance Workshop series. Australian participation in this multinational
workshop series included all levels of government and a number of
non-government stakeholders, to test a plausible scenario that exhausted
Australia’s response capabilities and resources and prompted a call for
international assistance. The outcome of this workshop series is to inform the
next iteration of Australia’s Catastrophic Disaster Planning Capability
Roadmap, which ‘will support the development of guidelines on requesting and
managing international assistance in support of existing systems, and will
support a better understanding of how domestic arrangements can be repurposed’.[29]
Links to other key resources