2025/26 Tasmanian State Budget wrap-up

Yesterday, Treasurer, the Hon Guy Barnett MP, handed down the latest State Budget.

Disappointingly, the Budget fell short on the Treasurer’s promise to ‘deliver on the things that matter to Tasmanians,’ like a safe and affordable place to call home and paying for energy and health care.

We’re concerned the Government has lost sight of what matters most to Tasmanians, with billions of dollars spent on hard infrastructure and significant financial capital consumed by cost blowouts and planning mistakes that could have been avoided.

A new stadium won’t help Tasmanians living on low incomes feed their family and get their foot into the housing market. 

Moreover, this Budget spends more than $2 billion on servicing government debt. This is money that could have been used to build 5,000 social and affordable homes, thereby providing housing for everybody on the social housing waitlist or providing energy efficiency upgrades for every household in Tasmania that needs it, permanently slashing energy bills.

The main point here for our industry is, the greater the cost of debt, the less funding that’s available to provide essential services to the Tasmanian community, which means more Tasmanians will miss out.

We are aware of many organisations who are cutting hours, cutting staff, changing service delivery, and most concerning, cutting services completely. And sadly, this is just the tip of the iceberg of the crisis in community services that we see on the horizon.

Community services announcements
There are some welcome announcements in the Budget, notably the removal of the Working with Vulnerable People Card registration fees for the next two years, and a goal to achieve 100% literacy at the forefront of our educational focus. You can read more in our industry overview fact sheet here.

While these were welcome, there is widespread disappointment across the industry that the funding announcements fall well short of what is needed. And as we hear more from members on their reactions to this Budget, we are increasingly concerned there is insufficient funding to meet their level of need.

Industry sustainability
We were also pleased to see the Government recognise the industry’s contribution by committing to five year funding agreements for community service organisations, but TasCOSS and others call for it to be accompanied by a clear timeline for implementation, and an indexation formula that reflects the real costs of doing business and the increasing level of need in the community.

At our event this morning, the Minister for Community Services, the Hon Roger Jaensch MP, gave an update on the move to five year funding contracts, as a phased approach. We will be seeking further detail from the Minister on the timeline for this rollout.

Many concerns were also raised around contract certainty and the fact that many organisations whose funding ends 1 July were unaware of their funding outcome until Budget day.

Pleasingly, it was recognised by the Minister there’s a lot of work to be done on industry sustainability and that a genuine partnership between our industry and Government is needed to address these barriers.

We understand funding has been allocated for our industry to come together to identify a package of sustainability initiatives. We look forward to being a part of this work and will have more detail on next steps soon.

Implementation of recommendations of the Commission of Inquiry
We are concerned this Budget does not show a meaningful commitment to implement evidence-informed and rights-based approaches to keeping children safe.

The funding announced in the Budget leans heavily on crisis response and tertiary interventions, with glaring gaps in long-term prevention and early support. Without serious investment in proactive measures, we risk failing the very children these reforms were meant to protect.

We’ve collated feedback and reactions to the Budget from the community services industry network of peaks, which you can view at the following links:

TasCOSS 2025/26 Tasmanian State Budget Briefing materials
I’d like to use this opportunity to thank everyone who attended our 2025/26 Tasmanian State Budget Briefing. It was fantastic to see so many of our valued TasCOSS Members and supporters in the room and online. Our voice is only strong because you support us and our mission.

The Q&A session with Minister Jaensch was insightful and I’d like to once again thank the Minister for his time and for making himself accessible to the community services industry.

View the TasCOSS 2025/26 Tasmanian State Budget Briefing presentation slides (PDF, 1.44MB) and watch the recording (YouTube).

TasCOSS will continue to monitor the implementation of initiatives announced in the Budget. If you or your organisation have a specific area of interest that you would like to bring to our attention, please contact Stephen Durney, Senior Policy Officer, on (03) 6169 9508 or email Stephen.

But wait, there’s more…
Next week, we’re also hosting a free, online Policy Conversation on Tuesday 3 June 2025 at 10am with Professor Richard Eccleston (Tasmanian Policy Exchange, University of Tasmania) to unpack the Budget.

The session will focus on the implications for the community services industry, and how well the budget addresses some of the most pressing issues facing Tasmanians today. Register for the post-budget Policy Conversation now!

More 2025/26 Tasmanian State Budget analysis and information: