General News
31 May, 2025
Rates protest gets rowdy
ONE hundred pensioners have conducted a raucous protest about increasing retirement village rates.
They gathered in the foyer of the Cairns Regional Council headquarters on Wednesday for an hour, greeting arriving councillors and staff with chants such as: “Your policy, our poverty”.
It is the first of at least two protests at the council chambers.
At issue is a move by the council to slug retirement village property occupiers with the minimum general rate, (about $1071), which for some is an 800 per cent increase on their current rating which amounts to as low as $60 a year.
A protest organiser, Colleen Duplock, said she was pleased with the demonstration but was disapppointed that only one councillor – Cr Cathy Zeiger – spoke to the group. “It was a really good turnout,” she said.
Ms Duplock said Mayor Amy Eden ignored a call to come down from her office to meet them.
Cr Zeiger said she believed the new policy was unfair and she was undertaking due diligence to try to find a solution.
She said she was investigating a grandfather clause – a provision in a law or policy that allows certain individuals or situations to be exempt from a new rule or regulation while it applies to everyone else. The pensioners plan another protest on June 11.
