Overwhelming community support drives campaign’s next stage

With new figures highlighting more than 80 per cent of Tasmanians support council amalgamations, Tasmanians for Reform will unveil the latest phase of its campaign, simply titled ‘It’s Time’.

The announcement will coincide with the return of State Parliament, with Tasmanians for Reform spokesperson Rob Mallett saying the time for talking about the issue was over.

“With a steady growth in support for amalgamations over the last 18 months, it is now beyond doubt that the overwhelming majority of the community want council amalgamations,” Mr Mallett said.

“We’ve been talking about it for far too long, this needs to happen now.”

Polling by EMRS in November 2010 showed that 56 per cent of people polled agreed that 29 councils for a population of 500,000 people was too many. This number then increased from to 65 per cent in May 2011 and then to 75 per cent in November 2011.

“Now we have a survey that 4,400 Tasmanians responded to with 81 per cent supporting the proposition that council amalgamations need to occur now,” Mr Mallett said.

Mr Mallett was joined by representatives from many of the 25 businesses and community organisations that have already pledged their support for Tasmanians for Reform, including TasCoss and the Tasmanian Hospitality Association.

Mr Mallett said Tasmanians for Reform were calling on Tasmania’s elected members of local government and parliament to take the initiative and finally recognise significant local government reform is what the community want.

“This issue has been put on the backburner a number of times now,” Mr Mallett said.

“The current system is antiquated, and in desperate need of an overhaul.

“Tasmania wants, deserves and must have council amalgamations, the time is now, no more excuses.”

Tasmanians for Reform is the largest group of its kind in Tasmanian history, with peak organisations representing chemists, car dealers, plumbers, hoteliers, real estate agents, small businesses, hairdressers and butchers, just to name a few.

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