- Target:
- Ms Julia Gillard, Prime Minister of Australia
- Region:
- Australia
Many Central Queensland towns have been declared disaster zones due to the extensive rain that has resulted in flooding in the regions.
By now, we, the national and the international community are aware of the devastation in areas such as Innisfail, Bundaberg, Dalby, Emerald, Rockhampton, St George, The Lockyer Valley, inclusive of Grantham, Toowoomba, Ipswich and Brisbane CBD and its associated low lying suburbs. Not since the floods of 1974 and the devastation of life, limb and infrastructure have we witnessed such an event of this magnitude, that there is concern that current funds may not completely cover the damage. Further, and more recently, parts of NSW and Victoria have experienced many losses and require adequate funds so that they too may rebuild their lives and assets.
We are aware that full disaster clean up operations are being commenced to assist the towns, cities and States in crisis, however, there are expectations that any future rises in flood waters will create a new wave of misery and destruction unless the said regions are not adequately floodproofed.
We are also aware that the government is positioning various emergency services to commence salvage operations and provide food, health and some financial assistance to those that have lost homes and businesses. These floods have not only resulted in lives being lost, but millions of dollars per day are currently being lost in ongoing property damage claims. Unfortunately however, thousands of insured flood victims will not be eligible for payouts because their policies make a distinction between rainwater and flood damage.
Many others will face long delays in having claims assessed because experts will need to be called in to decide how the damage occurred.
Further, many who have either underinsured their properties or not insured at all are facing homelessness as well.
We, the undersigned, call on the Federal Government to expedite and streamline, not only the rebuilding of basic infrastructure to the said regions, but we would like the government to act swiftly in forming a taxpayer/flood victim/private enterprise consortium with the corporate insurers to enable an equitable order of priorities wherein all insurers view and expedite all claims equally, given an order of merit.
We also expect that those on low incomes who have inadequately insured their devastated homes are given immediate re-housing attention. Owing to the financial and human cost of the disaster discussed herein, we respectfully seek that the Federal Government put a temporary halt to providing overseas financial assistance to other countries at this point in time, by re-directing those funds into Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria, with Queensland as a high priority, as a matter of urgency to assist the rescue efforts as determined by the consortium.
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The Rehouse Queensland's Flood Victims petition to Ms Julia Gillard, Prime Minister of Australia was written by Effie Mourginos and is in the category Human Rights at GoPetition.