Residents affected by December floods in the North East need more funding assistance, Home Affairs Assistant Minister Linda Reynolds believes, who will write to Premier Daniel Andrews.
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Ms Reynolds and Indi Liberal candidate Steve Martin met with about 60 people in Tarrawingee on Friday morning, ahead of the Long-term Disaster Resilience launch.
"Clearly they need additional assistance," she said.
"Under funding arrangements the state government has to ask the federal government for assistance, and I'll suggest he (Mr Andrews) might like to make a category C request to the Prime Minister so we can together get some primary producer grant support and grants for small businesses.
"What I have promised the community is that I will get someone from the Insurance Council out there next week, because a lot of them have had the run-around.
"Some of them have had very good experiences with some insurance companies, and others have had a horrific time.
"And for companies that are clearly serial offenders here, to get some of that addressed.
"Even the toughest people need a hand … a number of them now haven't had any income for two months."
Under Recovery Disaster Funding Arrangements, 'Category C' funding involves assistance packages for community recovery funds, clean-up grants for small businesses and producers, while 'Category B' refers to restoration of essential public assets, concessional loans, and counter-disaster operations for the protection of the general public.
Ms Reynolds said the situation in the North East should require a category C application.
"The Victorian government did ask initially for some support form the federal government for what we call category B grants … it appeared a number of people in the community didn't know about those grants.
"Seeing the distress on people's faces, they clearly need a lot more support."
The Victorian government said in a statement in February that assistance was made available to flood-impacted farmers and the community through a range of mechanisms including Emergency Relief Assistance Payments, which provide up to $540 per adult and $270 per child.