The Boating Industry Association Ltd (BIA) today launched a petition in a bid to stop Transport for NSW applying from 1 July the highest taxes in Australia on boating.  

BIA is calling upon all members of the boating community, from industry to the public and including boating media to help send a message to the NSW Government to stop its unfair, excessive and surprise move to increase boating fees by as much as 88%. The increases span fees for all boat and PWC licences, registrations and vessel moorings. 

BIA represents hundreds of mostly family businesses and thousands of people employed in the sector, and millions of everyday Australians who enjoy boating in all sorts of craft from “tinnies” to yachts.  

The petition calls upon Transport for NSW to: 

• Abandon this new approach to increase boating fees beyond CPI that include x2, x3 and even x15 times higher than CPI, making NSW fees the highest in the nation by a large margin, and even reaching the highest in the world 
• Return to the policy and conventions applied for more than 20 years to apply only CPI (which is currently 5.89 per cent) to the entire boating fees schedule covering licences, registrations and moorings 

The BIA petition calls upon the Minister for Transport to intervene and force Transport for NSW to reset the full schedule of fees impacting licences, registrations and moorings to be no more than CPI adjusted; and to ensure appropriate consultation in such matters into the future.  

BIA is asking the boating community to sign the petition and share it with friends and family who go boating. 

The petition can be accessed on Change.org via  www.change.org/p/have-your-say-stop-major-increase-to-nsw-boating-fees

For more information on the NSW boating fee increases visit: bia.org.au