OWNERSHIP laws for shacks located on Crown land will be abolished if SA-Best candidate for Mount Gambier Kate Amoroso is elected and the party holds the balance of power after the state election.
The political aspirant said Labor’s “harsh laws”, where shacks built on government-owned land are returned to the Crown on the death of the last person named on the lease, were particularly damaging in the Mount Gambier electorate.
Ms Amoroso said around 70 properties along the Glenelg River in the Donovans, Dry Creek and Reed Bed areas were impacted, with local communities suffering as more shacks are returned to government and eventually destroyed.
“The Labor Government’s changes to decades-old laws make no sense at all,” she said.
“Most of these shacks have been owned by families for generations and as such contain a lifetime of memories for those families and their friends.
“The non-transferable life tenure laws offer absolutely no incentive at all for shack owners to maintain the upkeep of their properties as they have no idea how long they will be able to keep their shacks.
“Further, the local economies that rely so heavily on these shack cluster areas will struggle with the potential loss of jobs as more shacks become the property of the government and are destroyed.”
Ms Amoroso criticised the government’s introduction of the laws after concerns many of the shacks did not meet modern environmental practices, praising the Victorian Government’s “wisdom” not to change its laws for similar shacks interstate.
“The most sensible thing to do would be to introduce new legislation for shacks on Crown land to be given renewable tender options, which include compulsory contemporary environmental standards being met,” she said.
“This will ensure the shacks are upgraded to modern-day environmental expectations and the local regional economies which rely on the shacks being inhabited at various times of the year are not unduly impacted.”
