RFCS future focus March 2008 No.20

Office of Rural Financial Counselling

Media kit for RFCS Program developed by RFCS SA

Rural Financial Counselling Service South Australia (RFCS SA) has produced a media kit containing a 30-second radio advertisement and a television advertisement, as well as a media release and a print advertisement. These advertisements have been professionally produced and promote awareness of the RFCS Program in the rural community.

The advertisements can be easily adapted for use by any rural financial counselling service provider across Australia and RFCS SA has generously agreed to make them available to other service providers on request. Service providers would need to meet the cost of amending the ads.
The Office of Rural Financial Counselling would like to thank RFCS SA for its vision in producing the ads and for offering to make them available to other service providers.   

Executive officers’ workshop April 2008

Executive officers and representatives from state governments in the RFCS Program will attend a two-day workshop on 29 and 30 April in Canberra.

The workshop’s aims are to:

Annual report workshop 1 May 2008

The executive officers’ workshop in April will be followed by a workshop on annual reports on Thursday 1 May.

A working group of executive officers, independent advisers and a state government representative will analyse the 2006–07 annual reports provided by service providers and will identify a ‘better practice’ template to help service providers prepare their 2007–08 annual reports.

ACCS to become RDA committees

In a ministerial statement on 20 March, the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government, the Hon Anthony Albanese MP, announced in parliament that Area Consultative Committees (ACCs) will become local Regional Development Australia (RDA) committees. The ACC Chairs’ Reference Group will become the RDA Interim Board until 31 December 2008.

Mr Albanese and Parliamentary Secretary Gary Gray will meet the Interim Board to discuss the transition of the ACC network to RDA, including the development of a Charter for Regional Development Australia and its proposed responsibilities, and to discuss ways of ensuring closer ties with the local government sector.

ACCs are not-for-profit, community-based organisations. There are 54 ACCs across Australia and members voluntarily give their time to serve on the committees. Only the chairs and their deputies are appointed by the Government.

The new RDA network will take on a broader role to develop strategic input into national programs to improve the coordination of regional development initiatives and ensure that there is effective engagement with local communities.

From the ARC helpdesk

Training

On 12 March, we conducted the pilot of the new training format for new rural financial counsellors and administrative assistants – now called the RFCS Program Induction Day. Feedback from the administrative assistants and rural financial counsellors who attended indicated that the new format provided helpful information and we will be introducing further changes based on suggestions made. We will send a summary of the feedback to executive officers, along with a list of changes to be implemented for future sessions.

ARC database updates

We are making several changes to the ARC database and executive officers will have details of these.

Issues from the helpdesk

We have found that some transferred clients are not being imported in a timely manner, causing errors when users finally attempt to import them. If another counsellor has transferred a client to you, please make sure you import the client as soon as possible.

If you need any assistance, please contact the ARC helpdesk on +61 2 6272 3933.

NEWS

Fuel tax credits: expanded eligibility—The entitlement for fuel tax credits will be expanded from 1 July 2008. This means that businesses that weren’t eligible before may now be able to claim fuel tax credits for fuel they acquire, manufacture or import for use in business activities. For more information, see the fact sheet at the ATO website

Building Better Boards Conference—The 4th Building Better Boards Conference will be held on 26–27 July 2008 at the Novotel Brighton Le Sands, Sydney. The conference provides an excellent opportunity for non-profit boards to explore issues such as the relationship between boards and CEOs, diversity and succession planning for boards and the roles of the chair, secretary and treasurer. For more information, visit the Better Boards website

Agricultural Census: small area census data released—The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) has released the final data for the 2005–06 Agricultural Census. The main objective of the Agricultural Census was to provide benchmark information on the agriculture sector for small geographic areas. The publication Agricultural Commodities: Small Area Data, Australia, 2005-06 (cat. no. 7125.0) provides final estimates of area and production of crops, livestock numbers and livestock products for major agriculture outputs, and industry structure details, and can be downloaded for free from the ABS website.

For comments about RFCS future focus, please email

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RFCS Website

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Address:
Office of Rural Financial Counselling
Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry
GPO Box 858
Canberra ACT 2601

© Commonwealth of Australia 2008